So I clicked on the links to see what the douche bag was selling, and not surprisingly I found a website that just reeks of a bucket shop... CAUTION: New and prospective traders and investors beware of any company or firm offering any product or service through spam advertising. If you're not readily familiar with a certain firm, do LOTS of research and try to find out what other people with past experiences have to say about them. You'd be surprised how many people throw money away on bucket shops, boiler rooms, wizetrade and its clones. Do some background checking, and if there is any doubt as to a firm's credibility, go with a big name that you've heard of before. Maybe they're more expensive (surprisingly most of the big names finally got competitive with the discount brokers a few years back) but for the first few months it's best to try to avoid headaches and scammers. And yes, that also means SPAMMERS. For future reference purposes, try using the search function to query anything related to the market in Elite Trader's search function. Usually you'll be able to find loads of results matching your search criteria, but in this case there were only five matching threads. One person posted four of the five, and all the related posts were just posted today. The other thread was unrelated... Just remember to use your head and do some background checking before jumping into the deep end of the shark tank head first.
One of the most informative threads on ET that I have come across. Any advice for those who dabble in futures?
Yeah, don't walk away, RUN!!! Just kidding Find someone willing to share their trading experiences, and just annoy the hell out of them!
NYSE vs. Nasdaq (my take as requested by PM) In my opinion, there's no longer much of a difference between the two. Sure, you could point out two dozen stocks on the NYSE that act completely different than two dozen on the Nasdaq, but take into consideration that there's just as many NYSE stocks that act completely different from other NYSE stocks and vice-versa. Low Volume, Low Volatility Stocks New traders would probably do best trading them as opposed to the tweaked out crackhead stocks. You can watch patterns develop at a much slower pace, and adjust to the speed of the fast paced high-volume highly volatile stocks by slowly integrating them into you trading methods. I personally prefer stocks that run around like Jason Statham in Crank. Cutting Losses After a Few Pennies Don't do it. It's just my opinion, but if you took the time to read more than two of the pages in this thread, you probably shouldn't be chasing pennies or nickels... The introduction of decimalization to the stock markets killed the SOES bandits and their scalping of 1/8 and 1/4 points. If you're targeting 1/4s or 1/2s, but exiting trades after a couple pennies or a nickel then you're going to get shaken out of 90% of your trades. And that even includes the trades that would have gone a point or more too. If you're targeting nickels or less, then good luck is about the best response anyone will give you. Scalping the Bid:Ask Try it yourself if you refuse to listen to 99% of the traders out there who say scalping is dead... you'll eventually learn the hard way... Another Caution: avoid anyone wanting to sell you anything related to trades with target profits under a dime. This falls under the previous cautions. They're called 'arcades' or 'snake oil peddlers'. They're not quite as sophisticated as bucket shops and boiler rooms, but sometimes they can be even more tempting to new traders.
another bump. Beginners: I'm not on ET very much anymore, but if you have questions post them on this thread or send jho a PM and ask him for his take. I'm too busy these days to even check my email, let alone throw pies at people on ET, but I wanted to give this thread another bump because I think it has some decent guidelines for young and new traders... And my opinion that you shouldn't take advice from people online as gospel, still stands. Regardless of who posted the advice, do your homework and research it yourself. Good Luck.
Wow. That was a pretty good post. I think I'll pat myself on the back... Like I said, I'm not on very much anymore but I think this thread is about the only worthwhile contribution I've made to ET. So I'm going to periodically bump it so beginners can easily find useful guidelines and equally important warnings.
Scamming Scammers and the Scams They Sell http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=1651494#post1651494 Investools, InvestTools, Invest Tools, etc... Is a ridiculously overpriced business model designed to Rip Off prospective beginners. These businesses' practices are shameful, and unfortunately, they exist in very large numbers... Such as WizeTrade and the like, but more appealing and less bucket-shop like.
THE SKY IS FALLING!!! (again...) http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=1647624#post1647624