Learn More About Day Trading Strategies

By Suzanne

The term Day Trader refers to a person who buys and sells stocks (or any market) in the same day, investing huge amounts of money to cash in on small fluctuations in the prices of stocks and indexes that are highly liquid and volatile. Certain stocks are suitable for Day Traders, liquidity and volatility are the two most essential aspects that are looked at by Day Traders.

The essential elements of successful Day Traders are, Excellent trading psychology and mental state management, Proven money management systems, Proper tools and training, Profitable trading system. There is a certain amount of risk involved in every trade. The risk increases for those without sufficient knowledge and training.

Day Trading used to be practiced generally by financial firms, investment bankers and speculators. However, with new leaps in technology and the introduction of electronic trading and margin trading, it has become more popular with casual at home traders.

There are many styles within Day Trading. Many focus on short term trading, as in they close all their transactions before the close of the day to avoid all unmanageable risks. Others focus on price momentum. While yet some others lay emphasis on technical patterns. Day Traders often borrow certain amounts of money to trade. This is called Margin Trading.

Some of the strategies followed in Day Trading are discussed here:

* Trend Following - This basically follows the principle that prices of stocks once rising will always be rising, and vice versa.

* Contrarian Investing - This follows the principle that prices that have been soaring will reverse and prices that have been falling will go up.

* Range Trading - This is based on keeping record of stocks and seeing the range in which they fluctuate. Thus stocks are brought when they are at a low and sold off when they reach their peak.

* Scalping - This is a trading style where traders buy stocks that are on the rise and sell them off in minutes or seconds to get the profit instantly. This basically exploits the market when the market is volatile.

* Rebate Trading - This technique involves trading low priced stocks in huge amounts which helps them trade more shares and have more liquidity. This uses ECN as the primary source of profit.

* News Playing - This is the most important aspect which Day Traders exploit. Often there are rumors in the market of stocks going up or falling and these have to be understood by the Day Traders and stocks are bought or sold off in accordance to maximize their profit.

It is estimated that around 90% of Day Traders fail or lose their capital and it is a hard discipline. However, with the advent of newer technologies and statistics it has become somewhat stable. For a good Day Trader the most important aspects are good training, a proven system, and managing emotions. - 23199

About the Author:

Are you willing to learn more about day trading strategies? http://www.UMTTrading.com is a popular website providing resources, strategies, and tips for traders. Check out the latest information on day trading strategies, tips, and videos at http://www.UMTTrading.com

Know About The Terms In Option Trading

By Dr. Asoka Selvarajah

Definition Of Options Trading

Option trading is a way of entering a market with a relatively small upfront investment, but with the possibility of netting you a much bigger return on investment than if you had traded in the underlying instrument. What you are doing in option trading is purchasing the right to buy or sell the underlying security within a specified time period.

In option trading with stock for example, an option gives you the right to purchase or sell a fixed number of shares, determined by the option contract specification, within a specified time period and at a specified price. Hence, as an option buyer, you either execute that trade within the specified time period or forfeit the premium you paid, or else you sell the option itself for either a profit or loss depending on what has happened in the intervening period. Option trading expirations for a given option series are generally spaced one month apart, and the termination date is generally the third Saturday of the month or any other day decided by the Stock Exchanges. Once that date has expired, all rights of the trader cease and he cannot use the option to buy or sell that particular underlying stock.

Concepts

Stock trading and option trading are quite dissimilar. Understand the ideas and the terms behind option trading if you choose that as the way to trade in the stock market. The words used are quite specific and may sound like Greek and Latin to the newcomer. As on option trader, you would have the right to buy or sell a particular stock in the volume agreed on at a fixed price, as long as you execute the trade within the time that has been specified.

The option trader who buys options has no obligation to act whatsoever, and is only obligated to pay the premium to buy the option in the first place. He retains the right to exercise his options in the future, should the opportunity arise and should he wish to do so. The option "exercise price" locks in the specified price at which the underlying stock can be bought or sold for the lifetime of the option. If you are the owner of a call option, giving you the right to buy stock at the exercise price, and the stock price rises above the exercise price during the lifetime of your call option, you can exercise your option to acquire the stock at that exercise price instead of the prevailing price in the market, which may be far higher. In other words, you are buying stock cheaper than the market value.

The stock price may drop or just remain lower the exercise price, the buyer of call option cannot use at all, but can also sell the option and in that way exit the position at a loss or breakeven. Instead, he can hold onto it with the hope that there will be rise in the option of the market value, by depending upon factors such as volatility, expiry time and much more.

Generally though, because of the leverage that options provide, you can control a far larger amount of the underlying stock for a relatively small capital outlay compared with buying or selling the underlying instrument. That is what makes options so attractive because there exists the potential to make far higher return on capital than through merely trading the underlying instrument. When you know what you are doing, there are also far more trading opportunities with relatively lower risk compared to merely buying or selling the underlying.

Terms in usage

When you opt for option trading you trade in blocks of 100 shares.

The buying option of the underlying instrument at the strike price is referred to as a call option.

Put option: The option giving the right to sell the underlying instrument at the strike price

The price set in the option trading contract at which the underlying may be bought or sold is called the "strike price".

In option trading, for call options you are "in the money" if your strike price is below the market price of the stock. For put options, if the strike price is higher than the current market price, you are again said to be "in the money".

Out of the money: When the strike price is above the existing price of the stock and you exercise a call option, and when the strike price is below the existing price of the stock and you exercise a put option. - 23199

About the Author:

Which Of These 7 Deadly Mistakes of Online Trading Are You Making Right Now? Get Dr. Asoka Selvarajah's critical Free Report, The 7 Deadly Mistakes Of Online Trading and surge your trading profits, starting today. Visit His Online Trading Site OnlineTradingRebel.Com Right Now!

Forex Made Easy Secrets

By Chan Boldene

If you've been following Forex at all over the last few years, you've probably heard the statistic that 95% of all traders lose money at this profession (before applying Forex Made Easy principles). Let's think about that for a sec. 95% of all traders lose their money. So, how can you become part of the five percent who actually "win" in this profession? Simple, education and experience.

Education is the First Forex Made Easy Secret.

Not being educated in this field is a dangerous and costly. You might as well hand over your money to the clerk in the store. On the other hand, there are many courses available online, so what do you choose? Again, the answer is simple, the course that is free! But but But, say the Forex Made Easy readers. No buts. There are a wealth of courses [pardon the pun]. You just need to search them out. Remember, not being educated could land you broke.

Forex Made Easy Secret: Experience.

The next best teacher is experience. When your money is on the line, you need to have experience making the trades, clicking the buttons, watching your money rise and fall with each tick. The only way you can do this is through experience (actually making the trades). Seems obvious, doesn't it?

But most Forex Made Easy readers will jump right in and watch their hard earned dollars or euros fly out the window. Sure they had a plan but they didn't follow it. Sure they had goals but they weren't realistic. Sure they had an account but they were undercapitalized. Sure they had a hunch which way the market was going to go, but that's all it was, a hunch.

Greed is a very large factor in Forex. People want to earn a lot of money in a short period of time. It just doesn't happen that way.

Learning a profitable trading method is easy and very do-able. The hard part for most Forex Made Easy traders is getting the right mindset. Here are some facts that you must accept:

- You win some; you lose some. Everyone does, even those who've been at this for decades.

- You need discipline to trade. Without discipline you will fail. Period.

Trading the Forex Made Easy way can be extremely profitable. It takes a combination of keeping great discipline, managing risk, and accepting losses to be successful. - 23199

About the Author:

Mr. Boldene is a Freelance Writer and writes about a variety of subjects. To learn more about the Forex Made Easy way, click on the Forex Made Easy Info Blog button or the Forex Made Easy Intro.

Option Trading and the Global Macro Trader

By Brevan Glg

During tumultuous markets, the global macro trader often finds himself in lonely company. Instead of losing a lot or even most of his money the macro trader often finds that he has generated strong returns while most other trading styles have failed. Because of the macro traders penchant for risk it is important for them to practice sound risk management principles.

One of the first and most important risk management tools available to the macro trader is the practice of positions sizing. Position sizing is when you determine an optimal amount to risk on a trade. Obviously several factors can go into your position sizing algorithm. You can look at the probability of the trade working out. You can look at the over all risk versus reward ratio. And you can look at how much of your portfolio you want to risk. Obviously there are hundreds of potential variables that you can input into your position sizing model.

Now that you have the right position size you can start to figure out how to best maximize your trade results. Some securities can give you a greater bang for the buck while lowering your over all risk profile. Others of course make your position far riskier then you first thought it was.

One of the easiest ways to cut off tail risk is by building your position using options. When you are a net buyer of volatility, which is to say that you are long options whether they be calls or puts, you are only risking the amount that you have put into the trade. For instance if the option position costs you one thousand dollars then you can not lose more then that.

Options are very useful to cut off tail risk because they totally limit your risk while allowing for plenty of upside. In fact sometimes they provide a lot more bang for the buck then an outright stock position as they can have a lot of inherent leverage.

Of course as with anything there is a potential downside to using option to cut off tail risk. The risk is two fold. One is that you may be overpaying for the options. Depending upon the situation that may or may not matter but it is important to be aware of.

The second major risk is that options expire and therefore you need to fully understand your time horizon before getting into a trade. If your plan is to hold the position for years and years then options may not be the best way to go. If on the other hand you are looking at holding the position anywhere from a few days to a year or so then options are definitely worth looking at.

Ensure that when you are trading that you look at al the available ways to express your market view. By doing this you will often use options and in so doing improve your global macro trading results. - 23199

About the Author:

If you need actionable trading ideas then check out The Macro Trader It is a weekly global macro investing advisory publication with frequent intra-week updates for time-critical analysis and actionable trading ideas.

Gold Coins or Gold Bullion for Investing

By Cindy Wilson

You should diversify your portfolio with gold and you should also diversify your gold portfolio. There are many different types of gold you can invest in and diversify your gold portfolio, including gold bullion, domestic and foreign, modern gold coins, domestic or foreign and antique gold coins, domestic and foreign.

There are many options of gold withing each category that also allows you to either receive and store your own gold or allow the broker or dealer to store your gold for you. Most people that are buying gold in case of financial disaster feel that keeping your own gold is the whole point of buying gold. Those investors believe that because of the antique gold coins intrinsic and collector value that they are immune confiscation by the government.

On the other hand, gold bullion in recent history has been confiscated by the US government and there are several organizations that are trying to push legislation through that will fix that situation by not allowing the government to be able to confiscate personally owned gold bullion or coins of any kind.

Can the US government confiscate foreign gold bullion or modern foreign gold coins? Back when gold was confiscated by President Roosevelt in 1933, foreign gold and foreign gold coins "earmarked or held in trust for a recognized foreign government or foreign central bank"

That would mean that if we go by what happened in history, foreign gold bullion and foreign gold coins would be safe from US gold confiscation. That's what happened before, but the US government can make laws to fit the situation, so the way it happened before, may not be the way it happens in the future.

Antique gold coins are many salespeople's favorite products because of their higher markup and profit margins. A lot of dealers and telemarketers take advantage of investor fears about the gold confiscation that Roosevelt ordered in 1933. In recent history, President Ford issued his own executive order repealing the Roosevelt order used to confiscate gold in 1933.

In 1977 Congress removed the president's authority over gold transactions during a national emergency other than war. What does this mean? Probably nothing. Sales people that use historic events to sell their most profitable inventory are not being completely honest and preying on investor fears of previous events. This shows that the previous gold confiscation has nothing to do with what the government may do in the future.

Just because President Roosevelt exempted antique gold coins and foreign bullion doesn't mean a current administration would go by those same guidelines. The truth is, no one knows what will happen in the future, especially in the event of a financial collapse. - 23199

About the Author:

Buying gold coins and antique gold coins at Buying Gold Coins Online and How to buy Gold Coins