Anyone here trade stocks on a regular basis? Has it been profitable for you?

[Arkitech]

I've been wanting to get into trading stocks for some time now but I never really have decided to try and get involved until now. Next month I'm thinking of opening an account with an online broker and trying my hand at executing a few trades. I'm primarily interested in short term trading and not holding onto any given stock beyond a few days or a week.

So anyone here trade stock on a regular basis? Have you had good results? bad?

Who would you recommend for a reputable online brokerage? Are there any sites that will allow me to setup a pseudo account for practicing? (Yahoo had a feature like this a couple of years ago but I'm pretty sure its gone now)

 

[austin316]

Originally posted by: Arkitech
I'm primarily interested in short term trading and not holding onto any given stock beyond a few days or a week.

IMO, based on my studies in school (finance major) and the books, magazines, and online journals I have read, this might not be the best idea. Day to day trading causes a big problem due to the brokerage fees. You need to have a fairly large amount invested to be able to have continually good returns and even then, your risk is high. I highly suggest just trying to match the market with ETFs. This is a much smarter investment. And if you feel as though this tactic, might not pay off big time and you want more risk, then diversify your portfolio accordingly.

Say 30% in ETF, 30% in small cap, 30% in large cap, 10% bonds/money market/savings. Just make sure your stocks are based over a variety of sectors. Here you have a chance to make a lot, but still have lower risk then just each day trying to guess the market.

 

[Arkitech]

Originally posted by: austin316

Originally posted by: Arkitech
I'm primarily interested in short term trading and not holding onto any given stock beyond a few days or a week.

IMO, based on my studies in school (finance major) and the books, magazines, and online journals I have read, this might not be the best idea. Day to day trading causes a big problem due to the brokerage fees. You need to have a fairly large amount invested to be able to have continually good returns and even then, your risk is high. I highly suggest just trying to match the market with ETFs. This is a much smarter investment. And if you feel as though this tactic, might not pay off big time and you want more risk, then diversify your portfolio accordingly.

Say 30% in ETF, 30% in small cap, 30% in large cap, 10% bonds/money market/savings. Just make sure your stocks are based over a variety of sectors. Here you have a chance to make a lot, but still have lower risk then just each day trying to guess the market.

Personally for me I would rather choose real estate for long term investing (2 months+) as opposed to the market. I can use the banks money in most cases to finance purchases and it's rare for real estate values to drop without warning. Short term investing on the other hand is more attractive to me at the moment. With 5 or 10k (to start with) and some time to watch my trades I'm hoping I can make a few hundred to a thousand bucks within a matter of weeks. Of course I'm very new to this so it's always easier than it sounds, which is why I'm interested in setting up pseudo accounts to learn with.

 

[austin316]

Originally posted by: Arkitech

Originally posted by: austin316

Originally posted by: Arkitech
I'm primarily interested in short term trading and not holding onto any given stock beyond a few days or a week.

IMO, based on my studies in school (finance major) and the books, magazines, and online journals I have read, this might not be the best idea. Day to day trading causes a big problem due to the brokerage fees. You need to have a fairly large amount invested to be able to have continually good returns and even then, your risk is high. I highly suggest just trying to match the market with ETFs. This is a much smarter investment. And if you feel as though this tactic, might not pay off big time and you want more risk, then diversify your portfolio accordingly.

Say 30% in ETF, 30% in small cap, 30% in large cap, 10% bonds/money market/savings. Just make sure your stocks are based over a variety of sectors. Here you have a chance to make a lot, but still have lower risk then just each day trying to guess the market.

Personally for me I would rather choose real estate for long term investing (2 months+) as opposed to the market. I can use the banks money in most cases to finance purchases and it's rare for real estate values to drop without warning. Short term investing on the other hand is more attractive to me at the moment. With 5 or 10k (to start with) and some time to watch my trades I'm hoping I can make a few hundred to a thousand bucks within a matter of weeks. Of course I'm very new to this so it's always easier than it sounds, which is why I'm interested in setting up pseudo accounts to learn with.

not to sound like an ass, but if you can consistently (sp?) make a thousand bucks in a couple weeks off an investment of $5,000, call up any financial company, because they will hire you in a minute.

 

[DaveSimmons]

search "invest" "trade" including archived threads, this gets asked fairly often and there have been several good threads with opinions, experiences, links, book suggestions, etc.

I buy and hold mutual fund shares for the long term, but partly because I don't want to spend much time on investing, I'd rather read a book, watch a DVD, or play a computer game in what free time I have.

 

[Arkitech]

Originally posted by: austin316

Originally posted by: Arkitech

Originally posted by: austin316

Originally posted by: Arkitech
I'm primarily interested in short term trading and not holding onto any given stock beyond a few days or a week.

IMO, based on my studies in school (finance major) and the books, magazines, and online journals I have read, this might not be the best idea. Day to day trading causes a big problem due to the brokerage fees. You need to have a fairly large amount invested to be able to have continually good returns and even then, your risk is high. I highly suggest just trying to match the market with ETFs. This is a much smarter investment. And if you feel as though this tactic, might not pay off big time and you want more risk, then diversify your portfolio accordingly.

Say 30% in ETF, 30% in small cap, 30% in large cap, 10% bonds/money market/savings. Just make sure your stocks are based over a variety of sectors. Here you have a chance to make a lot, but still have lower risk then just each day trying to guess the market.

Personally for me I would rather choose real estate for long term investing (2 months+) as opposed to the market. I can use the banks money in most cases to finance purchases and it's rare for real estate values to drop without warning. Short term investing on the other hand is more attractive to me at the moment. With 5 or 10k (to start with) and some time to watch my trades I'm hoping I can make a few hundred to a thousand bucks within a matter of weeks. Of course I'm very new to this so it's always easier than it sounds, which is why I'm interested in setting up pseudo accounts to learn with.

not to sound like an ass, but if you can consistently (sp?) make a thousand bucks in a couple weeks off an investment of $5,000, call up any financial company, because they will hire you in a minute.

I termed that badly before, I have about 5k or so that I intend to play with. And my goal is to invest and reinvest until hopefully I have a big enough chunk to buy 1000 or 2000 shares of whatever stocks I'm interested in. I admit I have a lot to learn but I'm confident it's possible. A coworker of mine did really really well with trading and she eventually quit and she now spends her time at home making a few thousand bucks a month from online trading. I currently have a new coworker who is really well educated about the market and he consistently does well with trading. So that tells me its not impossible to make money, I guess the key though is dedication and education. So hopefully I will learn enough to make a few bucks as well.

 

[austin316]

Originally posted by: Arkitech

Originally posted by: austin316

Originally posted by: Arkitech

Originally posted by: austin316

Originally posted by: Arkitech
I'm primarily interested in short term trading and not holding onto any given stock beyond a few days or a week.

IMO, based on my studies in school (finance major) and the books, magazines, and online journals I have read, this might not be the best idea. Day to day trading causes a big problem due to the brokerage fees. You need to have a fairly large amount invested to be able to have continually good returns and even then, your risk is high. I highly suggest just trying to match the market with ETFs. This is a much smarter investment. And if you feel as though this tactic, might not pay off big time and you want more risk, then diversify your portfolio accordingly.

Say 30% in ETF, 30% in small cap, 30% in large cap, 10% bonds/money market/savings. Just make sure your stocks are based over a variety of sectors. Here you have a chance to make a lot, but still have lower risk then just each day trying to guess the market.

Personally for me I would rather choose real estate for long term investing (2 months+) as opposed to the market. I can use the banks money in most cases to finance purchases and it's rare for real estate values to drop without warning. Short term investing on the other hand is more attractive to me at the moment. With 5 or 10k (to start with) and some time to watch my trades I'm hoping I can make a few hundred to a thousand bucks within a matter of weeks. Of course I'm very new to this so it's always easier than it sounds, which is why I'm interested in setting up pseudo accounts to learn with.

not to sound like an ass, but if you can consistently (sp?) make a thousand bucks in a couple weeks off an investment of $5,000, call up any financial company, because they will hire you in a minute.

I termed that badly before, I have about 5k or so that I intend to play with. And my goal is to invest and reinvest until hopefully I have a big enough chunk to buy 1000 or 2000 shares of whatever stocks I'm interested in. I admit I have a lot to learn but I'm confident it's possible. A coworker of mine did really really well with trading and she eventually quit and she now spends her time at home making a few thousand bucks a month from online trading. I currently have a new coworker who is really well educated about the market and he consistently does well with trading. So that tells me its not impossible to make money, I guess the key though is dedication and education. So hopefully I will learn enough to make a few bucks as well.

Its up to you, just keep in mind that there are a ton of mutual fund managers that get paid 6 figures a year to simply figure out how to beat the market and rarely do they ever outperform the market. If you think you have access to more information than these people and a better investment background, go for it.

If you are going to invest though, go read a couple of beginners guides to investing. They will help you immensely. And good luck investing.

 

[fs5]

I'm about to dump $1,000 into nvidia this afternoon

 

[RobCur]

If you have alot of money, there's no reason to risk it all :|
Don't burn money, use it to buy stuffs you need and spend like mad!

 

[Yax]

I reallocate my 401K funds all the time, does that count?

I've been moving the funds as follows:

Monday-Thursday (morning), move money to agressive funds ( small caps, large caps).
Thursday afternoon - move funds to conservative funds till monday.

It's been paying off pretty good.

 

[dudeguy]

my advice is get an account from deal4free.com , cantorindex.com, igindex.com, or cityindex.com, and trade small, ie less than $1 a point, untill you have paid your tuition, and know how you make money. again DO NOT trade large amounts of money until you know exactly what you are doing, bec i almost guarantee you wll bail too many trades, not take profit when you should and lose your money.

 

[tw1164]

Originally posted by: Arkitech
Personally for me I would rather choose real estate for long term investing (2 months+)

2 months is long term for you?

 

[BD2003]

If it was that easy to make money in the stock market, everyone would be doing it. But the brokerage fees are going to kill you.

Lets say you threw 1000 bucks in ebay about 2 weeks ago. Since then its gone up 8%, which is pretty damn good for 2 weeks. But even then, you would only be up about 80 bucks. Minus about $20 in brokerage fees for the trades. So youre down to 60. And thats best case scenario.

Youre more likely to see a change of +/- %2 or so on that kind of time scale. At 2%, youd have made 20 bucks, which is erased by brokerage fees. If it went down 2%, you not only lost the 20 bucks from the depreciation, but the brokerage fees as well.

So basically, to make any sort of money day trading, you are going to have several thousand dollars to play with, huge cajones, and the willingness to lose money, because you almost certainly will. If you could predict the stock market, everyone would be doing it. Last I heard the vast majority of day traders lose money. The dirty secret that most financial firms hide is the simple fact that its ALWAYS a guessing game. If youre consistently good at beating the market, you are consistently lucky.

You dont have to be lucky to make money on the stock market in the long term, its practically a given. But short term, well, good luck.