Attempting To Day Trade Your Way To Financial Freedom

Financial freedom means different things to different people. But, at its core, it is about the ability to make choices that you otherwise would not be able to make. Haven’t you heard that old age old question, “What would you do if you had a million dollars?” Granted, the amount hasn’t increased since the theoretical question was first invented. We might be better off asking what one would do if they had ten million dollars, but you get the point. It’s supposed to illustrate to us what we truly love doing, that is, if money was of no concern. If money and expenses were of no consequence to you, would you still have the same job or career that you do now? While I am sure there are some cases of people who would say yes, I know many others that would most definitely say no. How do you gain the freedom to say no to work you don’t want to do and yes to the life experiences that matter to you. It is simple: You spend way less than you earn.

Now, there are a couple ways you can do that. You can cut your spending way down, to subsist at a level that allows you to save and invest conservatively while still making that paltry salary the boring cubicle job affords you. Our you could up your skills and earn way more than you spend, by creating a second stream of income, eventually building up that stream of income to eclipse the first, paltry stream. Multiple income streams are a must for anyone eyeing early retirement. You simply need to protect yourself for downturns in the stock market, housing values, sales commissions, or any other type of investment or revenue stream you currently enjoy.

One of the best ways to create that second stream of income is to become a day trader. You can make money off stocks that move up and down during the trading day, but you need to have a coherent strategy, rock-solid risk management instincts and a willingness to study and do research. There are day trading education sites out there that can teach you the strategies and give you a chance to hone your skills in trading chat rooms with veteran day traders and in trading simulators.

Now, it needs to be said that day trading is not a way to get rich quickly. You need to learn your way to competence before you can begin to make even small profits. But that can be a stepping stone to bigger and better things. As with all investments there is inherent risk, so you should only invest to the level that you are comfortable and can afford the cyclical nature of the markets. Investing, and specifically day trading, takes a certain amount of time and discipline to master and get good at.

Veteran day traders can take a small amount of money and build it back up into a real serious pile of cash. After years of learning the market, they can take a couple of months to trade their way to six figures, faster than noobs on the market. That’s why it pays to stick with it even if you hit a rough patch or two to start.

There is a story out there about some serious interactive brokers that funded a trading account with just over $500 and turned it into $100,000 in just 44 trading days. While that may seem like an old wives tale, it is true. I wouldn’t say this is a typical expectation for first timers, but it’s a result that is measurable and achievable, and these are the sorts of guys you want to learn from!

But, in order to do that, to build up a career from scratch that will allow you to be in that category of day trader, you need to really buckle down and do the work. Learning momentum day trading strategies, absorbing risk management lessons and trading on a day to day basis takes a long time. So it helps to have a day trading education site that will support you on this journey to financial freedom.

I have a system with a special focus on preparing novice traders for the volatility of the market, day to day. Because volatility is one of the backbones of day trading profitability. Getting on with a stock that sees a 20-30% spike in share price on a given day and getting off before you see that spike go down, is a great way to lock in some profits on a particular day. The key is, with day trading, to do that every day. And to minimize your losses at the same time, so you have a healthy profit/loss ratio at the end of the week or the end of the month.

Part of optimizing your risk management instincts is by trading in simulated environment before going out and risking real money. That is where you can learn how to make trades in real time and make mistakes (and learn from mistakes) before you are risking real money. A paper trading simulator gives you a certain amount of virtual currency and mimics the brokerage account, stock market conditions and technical indicators that allow you to trade like a real day trader, but you can avoid losing your savings.