You don't have to day trade. You can become a week trader or a month trader. It is easier. There are more edges. It is far less time consuming. Of course, potential rewards are less (notice I said potential).
Why argue with a post that is more than 3 year old and an online handle that has ceased to be active for more than a year?
People that are new to trading should NEVER trade with real money until they have paper traded(demo) for at least 6-8 months and know how to implement risk/reward parameters, and are consistently profitable. Think of it like a new airplane pilot in training. An airline never allows a pilot in training to actually start flying a plane until he/she has proven themselves to be consistent on a simulator. I know its easy to be suckered in with all those "1st 20 trades free", $50-$500 gift credit to your acct", etc offers and just wanting to jump in the game. But if you let your impulses control your decisons on when to start trading with real money you will just blow it all away. And one more thing, PLEASE concentrate on learning ONE market, either equities, equity options, commodities, or forex, etc. Don't try to multitask trying to learn more than one market at a time, you're just going to add more confusion in your head. When you go to an investment firm like Goldman, or a hedge fund, etc, their traders specialize in one area. An equities trader trades equities all day, everyday. A bond trader only trades bonds, nothing else !! BECOME SPECIALIZED IN ONE MARKET Best Regards...
I get really annoyed when I see posts like this. I know you probably just mean well but EVERYTHING in life is a risk. There is a risk of failure in everything you attempt. Embrace the risk and enjoy the rewards. Comments like this generally tend to be from losers in life! Just ignore them and always take an optimistic approach. I can't guarantee that being optimistic will make you succeed but I can guarantee that more optimistic people make it then pessimistic!!
Gotta disagree with you there. I think it would be much more important to work with a small amount of $$ instead of a demo. Not enough for it to be disastrous but enough so that the lessons are learned. People never respect the risks taken until there is something real to lose. What was that quote from Mike Tyson... "everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face"... I'm sorry but shadow boxing your pillow just ain't the same as trading with real money
Sim is ok for developing an edge or strategy. If you have neither why would you want to risk real money trying to develop them ?
Agreed but you don't know if it is an edge until you actually trade it. Of course learning how everything works such as entering orders etc can be learned in a sim but you really can't learn the lessons of trading until you chuck yourself into the frying pan. Even if this is with a small amount to begin with it still 10x better then trading in a sim IMO The basics of trading can be learned in no time at all... applying them in a consistently profitable way can take years or a whole life time to learn.
After trading for over 30 years, backtesting almost every conceivable pattern, over 30,000 hours of screen time, done over 100,000 trades and taught, sim is the way to go. And I required students to be sim profitable 13 out 15 days with last being 5 for 5 before allowed to real time trade. If you can't compete with the big dogs, you have no reason the trade. Of course trading profitable thru sim does not guarantee success, but it is a lot better than opening a small account of throwing your money away. Four more months "I" am retiring from short term and day trading, going to kick back and enjoy the good life, just concentrate on long term trading, where the big money/less hours exists. Day trading just wears on you, long hours of finding what doesn't work, always tweaking your methods, day after day of grinding it out, just drains the body.