By Darrell Martin
You’ve heard about day trading and how you can make money from home on your own time. No bosses, no crazy co-workers, everything on your own terms. Oh, there’s risk, but you think you can handle it. Well, don’t quit your job on day one!! Yes, day trading successfully does offer all the above advantages however, the road to success must be traveled carefully and thoughtfully.
Day Trading, Not A Hobby
Trading with success, or day trading for a living should be considered a career. Like other careers create a way of life, with day trading there is a way of life which has systems and techniques that must be learned and ingrained. Consider that doctors and lawyers spend years in college and put six figure investments into their education and training. One of the advantages to day trading is the ease of entry into the business. There are no degrees or initial investments required such as franchises which require fees. Although you do need your initial capital to start, that can even be a minimal amount. However, as with any career, you need to know what you are doing and have some training. Going back to doctors, would you let a doctor with little education and training do surgery on you or even diagnose an ailment you had? Of course not. Don’t cheat yourself and your possible success with not educating yourself as much as is possible.
Take Your Time. Learn To Know Your System
Be sure to take time and learn a system. Learn your tools of your trade. Get to understand your charting program inside and out. Get familiar with the different markets, the exchanges and trading sessions around the world. You don’t have to know everything and every little detail to get started, but you should know and have down your strategy and system. You should understand how to connect to your data feeds and manage your live charts. If you treat your trading like a hobby, then you might as well go to Vegas and gamble because, without education, a strategy and a system, that’s basically what you are doing.
Invest in yourself and take the time you need to learn what you need to know and build your confidence. Do you want to trade for the next 12 days, or be able and around to trade for the next 12 months or longer? The longest distance to a destination often times is a shortcut. Don’t take short cuts. Take advantage of any free education available and use your demo account for simulated trading. No matter what instrument and market you decide to trade and the strategy, it is much more cost effective to learn in demo and simulated trading, than live with real losses. Build your knowledge, and your confidence in demo while training yourself into habit through practice and repetition. Once you’re profitable and can show a consistent record, then go live.
Have a long term goal. Why did you get into trading? Do you want to quit your job eventually, spend more time with the family, for extra income, maybe income in retirement? Know what your goal is and keep your focus on it. As with any endeavor, keeping focus on your goal and the reason for the goal, will help maintain your motivation and inspiration through challenging times.
A Good Risk Management Plan, 5% A Day
Have a good risk management plan. Consider if you started with an account size of $1000 and the goal of increasing your account by 5% a day. Then, once you reach the 5% for the day, or $50 you stop taking anymore live trades. Continue trading in demo for practice but don’t take anymore live trades. If you saw the numbers on a spreadsheet, you would see in 20 - 22 trading days a month you will double your account size. Then the next month you continue to trade until your profit reaches 5% of your account which is now $2000. If you continued to do this for 12 months you could grow your account to $1 million dollars. Now, of course, you’re not going to profit everyday. There are going to be losses. Again, with the losses, once you reach 5% of account size you stop for the day. This is just an example of one risk management plan that can work. This is a very doable plan if you trade, for example, Nadex Spreads or Binaries, which can be traded from 49 different countries.
Don’t Trade With The Mortgage Payment Money And Risk Losing Your Spouse
Trade with risk capital only. Don’t trade with the mortgage payment money. As mentioned earlier, it is essential that you know when to stop for the day, either if you are up or down. You could be up for the day and feel like a god, a king or a queen. If you continue trading however, you’re most likely going to do what’s known as “giving it back to the market” and end up breaking even if you’re lucky, or you could even lose for the day. So stick to risk capital only and know when you are going to stop whether you’re up or down.
Trade your plan and stick to a system, don’t jump around. Being consistent and trading by the rules will help to take the emotions out of it. Emotions run heavy and can be overwhelming in trading, therefore, it is important to really trade your plan. Learn one system and strategy at a time and then add on. Make sure you have it down before you go to the next system and strategy. However, don’t be married to one system or strategy either. You will need to have multiple plays in your playbook to take advantage of different market conditions. Just like not marrying your system, you don’t want to marry a specific market either. Get to know one market first and how to trade it well and then you can add on.
If you want some profit involved with day trading, that’s how to start. At the end of the day there are only two reasons to trade, one being for practice and the other for profit. Study, train and put your time in to get it down and know how to trade. Then be profitable in demo, transition to live with one contract at a time, then stay alive in live and you will be on your way to day trading for a living.
Whether you are just starting out or are an experienced trader, for training in day trading including but not limited to futures, spot forex, spreads and binaries, visit www.apexinvesting.com.
