Day Trading

I am starting out day trading stocks and want to minimize the taxes I will have to pay. Does anybody have good tips or tricks to doing this? I will not be holding them for over a year. Also any good programs or websites I might want to use. I use Scottrade currently but want something for charting.

If you have at least $25K on your brokerage account then you are classified as a pattern or full time trader and you can deduct trading commissions as regular business expense. That’s the most you can do. You will always have to pay taxes whether you sell ice cream cones or trade stocks.

Also you pay less taxes if you hold stocks long term. The more time that passes the less the percentage. I don’t remember the exact numbers right now but you could check on sec.gov . So traders basically pay more tax % than long term investors.

Hi, My name is Madan. I am novice to stockes and share trading. Especially intra day trading. 2n any one tell me how do I get started in intra day trading.Your guidence will be appreciated.

Hi Madan,

I would suggest you create a simple trading system that can help you to make the decision when to enter and exit the market quickly, since with intraday you need to make a decision in a relatively quick time.

It also depend you what time frame you want to trade.

There is a free book for intro to intra day trading by Markus from rockwell trading, http://www.rockwelltrading.com/free-ebook
I am not affiliated with rockwell trading, I chat with Markus a couple of time during their trading room session as well as Brian. My impression is they are very good, they answer any questions I have and very open.
I only try their trading room for $1 trial for 1 week.

you may want to check the free book out to give you some idea.
I use their simple trading system combine with my trading system to improve the accuracy.

there are a lots of info about intra day trading on the net if you google, I would caution that there are lots of intra day trading room on the net which try to sell you expensive courses or free course but expensive monthly trading room, since you may find the same information from the net which is free in most cases. you can check them out as well and see if they are right for you. since trading need to trading system should match with you risk profile as well as the time need to suit you as well.

I found the simple trading system is still the best

Hope it helps.

Regards
- Max -

Does brokerage vary for intra day trading?
What is the % brokerage?
What are the other types of trading ?

Intra day trading is day trading. On line brokerages charge from 5 dollars to 20 dollars. The bigger brokers probably wont do it. If they do they charge hundreds of dollars. Other type is interday which is long term.

What are the rules on day trading in a futures account? I understand that I have to have a minimum of 25,000 dollars in my account if I am a pattern day trader in a stock account. Does this same rule apply for a futures account?

Absolutely not. Some brokerages have minimums as little as 500 to trade an S&P emini.
Check out the websites at Advanced Futures or Velocity futures. Their miniumums are low.
I am making no recommendations, however, just answering your question.
There is definitely NO huge pattern type day trader rule in the futures industry.
And the reason is, you don’t own a contract, so you don’t own anything unless you take delivery. You are simply putting up good-faith money. (But since you are "buying" or "selling" on margin, you WILL have to put up more money if your position goes against you and you want to keep holding it.)

A real trader gives insight on what it takes to become a successful trader in this video from Lightspeed Trading’s (http://www.lightspeed.com/individual.aspx) Trader Talk Series.

Duration : 0:2:8

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With all the information available online, you may have decided to begin your day trading education there. Unfortunately, among all the good information, there is a lot that will send you down the wrong course fast. With many advertisements for day trading courses and services proclaiming you can easily get started as a trader and quickly learn to be successful, you might actually start to believe the hype. Before that happens, please consider the points below to see if your day trading education has truly prepared you.

1. Know Your Level Of Discipline

One of the main things that separates those traders who consistently profit from those that don’t is the level of discipline they put into their trading. This discipline starts with their education. Successful traders put in the time and effort to learn all they can beforehand. Then they find or develop a trading plan or system and stick with it. If you are a person who is just looking for fast profits, you probably do not have the the inner-strength needed to keep your emotions in check.

Are you someone who can’t follow through with a plan, or a person who is easily influenced by their emotions? If so, no amount of day trading education is going to help you be a better trader until you overcome these obstacles.

2. Know Your Level Of Risk

Every day trader has a breaking point. Because of this, knowing how much liquid capital you are willing to risk and being honest about that amount is another factor you should educate yourself on. If you don’t have the tens of thousands of dollars necessary to comfortably start day trading, you should not start – no matter how well you’ve educated yourself on the subject.

Even the most well-educated day traders know that they will make mistakes and that these mistakes will sometimes cost them very large sums of money. They calculate this risk into their plans and systems and make certain they have both the capital to cover this possibility and the inner-fortitude to emotionally handle such a large loss if it should occur.

3. Know What You Don’t Know

Day trading education is an ongoing process and not a one time effort. Once you do start trading, you should continually make note of any information, terms or concepts that you come across and don’t recognize or understand. Then, regularly block a certain amount of time for further research and study to fill these gaps in your knowledge.

Again, discipline will go a long ways here too. Keeping up with new information and trends and continually educating yourself will put you on a higher plane, one much closer to that of the most successful day traders.

With the above points in mind, take some time to honestly assess your position. In the end, if you decide you do in fact have the proper level and combination of day trading education, discipline and capital to risk, you may well be on your way to a profitable day trading career.

James Allen
http://www.articlesbase.com/non-fiction-articles/day-trading-education-are-you-really-ready-to-trade-92807.html

I need to know whether there are any stock trading companies that wil allow me to trade day to day without a margin account. I want to buy a stock one and and sell it the next. I can’t do it with Scottrade because they require that I have margin in my account.

While you don’t need to have a margin account to day trade, you will be required to have 100% of the purchase price on hand if you are trading simply in a cash account.

I’m wanting to use an online service such as e-trade or scottrade for day trading. I’m wondering what the time difference is between entering the decision to sell and when the stock actually gets sold.
Sam, people like you make me laugh.

It depends on the type of order you have placed. Suppose you have GM shares (before bankruptcy, of course!). You want to sell those shares. You can sell them either at the prevailing price, or at some particular price in your mind. Suppose, you place the order to sell those share at 75 cents, you will have to wait till the share price reaches 75 cents. And if you place the order to sell them at market price, your shares will be sold at whatever lowest price at which the buyers are ready to buy them.

Let’s say someone has a brokerage account with $50,000 in it. How much of it should they trade in order to reduce risk but also make some money? How do you reduce risk in your Day Trading?

The answer to this depends largely on the risk of the strategy. If you had an absolutely riskless system (impossible but just for the sake of argument), of course you would risk a lot. But for just starting out, I’d recommend using none of the margin at all and only investing a portion of the equity itself. Or better yet, paper trade (see below).

Be sure you’ve got a genuinely profitable strategy, because most people (over 90%, according to most studies) lose much or all of their captial within a fairly short period of time. If you’re not sure about this, or even if you think you are, then you should "paper trade" or simulate your trading. Most brokerages now offer paper trading features. This will also give you a much better idea of how much you want to risk. But even then, there’s a lot of risk (simulators aren’t perfect, and things change).

Peter Millman discusses his addiction to the stock market. Video by Vincent Laforet.

Duration : 0:1:58

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