How to Buy and Sell Stocks

A beginner usually feels very attracted to the stock market while for example discovering a stock that’s being reported in CNBC or the news program and watching it rise fast and make new highs from $10 to $35 in just 2 months.

While learning about this successful news story he’s saying to himself … “ Oh boy if I was one of those lucky guys who bought that stock back when it was priced at $10 i easily would have tripled my money by now … That means my 20 grand would transformed in to a whooping 70 K ! hassle free … I would have been able to grab one of those big HUMMERs on the spot and probably pick up a nice Rolex by the way !

The stock market news constantly reports of hot stocks that are breaking out and making tremendous gains on the same day or doubling in price in just a few hours. Back in the bull market of the late 90’s you could easily see a good number of hot stocks sprouting out every week.

Those years surely made it look like every body could easily take LONG SHOTS and make a shiny pile of gold every day in the stock market. But today’s market is a different story. A totally different animal.

Some say that the stock market has gotten more realistic. Fantasy land is over and GAMBLING YOUR WAY TO RICHES is not an option anymore. You might get lucky a few times, but your constant loses can wipe you out sooner or later.

This is one of the large advantages over the futures market. When you buy a futures contract, you are obligated to buy or sell a specific amount of a specific commodity at a specific time for a specific price.

The fact that the bull market period has ended for now doesn’t mean that you can’t make a great deal of money in today’s market. A lot folks from many walks of life keep making excellent profits on a daily basis, pocketing hundreds & thousands of dollars by trading stocks online.

Success in day trading starts by applying a wiser and REALISTIC methodology for choosing hot stocks as well as for getting in and out of them with profits in mind.

You need to look at the stock market more realistically. You got to learn that you can benefit when stocks go up and also when they FALL down. You got to WORK SMARTER and get more selective about the hot stock trading opportunities that you choose. You need to embrace the nature of day trading and be fully prepared to take advantage of stocks that are poised for a BIG RISE on the same day.

The bottom line is you have to PREPARE YOUR SELF to be successful, just like you would do it in other areas of your life in order to achieve success.

Fortunatly there are some excellent day trading information websites that can help you prepare your self to pick hot stocks in a simple yet effective way.

In the end, stock trading is all about buying and selling according to your especific knowledge FILTER. Once you master and follow your proven filter parameters like a clock, you can expect to start making serious amounts of cash on a consistent basis.

Momentum Stock Pick helps day traders and investors pick hot stock trading opportunities every day at http://www.MomentumStockPick.com.

5 Reasons to Trade Forex Instead of Stocks

While Forex trading is becoming more popular in the United States, the vast majority of investors still do not understand the massive advantages offered in the foreign currency market when compared to equities or fixed income trading. When you fully grasp the following concepts, you'll understand why you might want to reconsider your current investment strategies.

1. Currency prices are not heavily influenced by institutional investors. In stock trading, there is a limited amount of volume on a daily basis. Each stock has a specific number of shares on the open market and trade prices are governed by the number of people attempting to buy or sell shares at a specific point in time. This makes the market vulnerable to price swings when a large investor is attempting to buy up or unload large amounts of shares. For example, if some pension fund owns 10% of a company and suddenly decides to liquidate their position, the market is now flooded with sell orders. Since the amount of shares attempting to be sold will outnumber the amount of buy orders, the price of the stock will start to drop as the number of buyers days up. This creates losses for the remaining shareholders. On the other hand, the forex market is so massive and has so many investors that no single investor can possibly have a major impact on pricing. There are too many units of Euros, Dollars, Yen, etc for any single institution to hold even close to a controlling interest in any currency.

2. Margin requirements are significantly lower in forex trading than equity trading. While the exact amount of margin allowed is determined by each broker, the restrictions are usually much less stringent when trading forex. Margin allows the investor to "play with house money." In essence, you're borrowing money from the broker to invest in your own account. While this can be risky, it can also be insanely profitable. For example, let's say you have $10,000 of your own money to invest. If you open up a margin account at an equity broker, you can usually margin up to 50% of the value of stock. So if you buy $10,000 in Microsoft stock, you can borrow another $5,000 to own a total of $15,000 in value. With your forex account, the margin requirement is often as low as 1%. Which means that if you buy $10,000 in Euros, you can use your broker's money to buy another $1,000,000. So you now own over $1 million in Euros. Now lets say that the value of each investment increases 10%. Your $15,000 in Microsoft stock is now worth $16,500. You sell it, pay back the $5,000 you borrowed, and you pocket $1,500 in profit (minus any fees or interest). Your return on investment is 15%. If your Euros went up 10%, your $1 million is now worth $1.1 million. After selling and repaying your broker, you profit $100,000 before any interest.

That's a return on investment of over 1,000%. Of course, you need to be extra careful when trading on margin. Imagine if the transaction went the other way. You'd be in a much bigger hole in the forex scenario. But the potential for enormous gain is there and is one of the major reasons why forex trading is so attractive to serious investors.

3. Forex trading is open 24 hours a day. Unlike the U.S. stock markets, you can trade forex any time of day from Monday through Friday. If a major news story breaks when you're holding stock, and it's after hours, you're stuck holding onto your position until the market opens the next day. By the time this happens, everyone else knows the news and there's thousands of buy/sell orders waiting when the opening bell rings. This will dramatically influence your trade price and negate any advantage you might have had by being one of the first to react. Keep in mind that many corporations withhold major news such as earnings reports and personnel moves until after the market closes. They do this to minimize emotional trading, which is smart for them to do but also hurts savvy investors. Since Forex trading is open 24 hours, you can place your trade order whenever major events occur.

4. The foreign exchange market is more liquid than the equity market. Forex is the largest market in the world. Every day, an average of $1.4 trillion dollars is traded, and the amount of securities (foreign currencies) is minuscule when compared to the number of companies traded in the equities market. This means that there are always buyers to be matched with sellers, which means that you'll have a much better chance to get a fair and accurate price on your trade than if you were trading a low volume stock where the bid and ask spreads can be very large.

5. Forex trading offers the advantage of limited risk. Which means that if disaster hits, you're out of luck. For example, lets say you buy a futures contract to sell corn. If news breaks that reports an outbreak of deaths caused by a pesticide used in corn crops, the price on your contracts will drop through the floor, limits will drop, and you could be stuck in your position and end up taking massive losses. This would not happen in the forex market since you can leave your position at any time.

This article is just a small piece of the free Forex Trading Course at forexgameplan.com Go learn about this incredible market and sign up today while the 30 day course is still free.

How To Buy Stocks That Are Hot With No Effort

Even traders want to be trendy when they buy stocks. Many traders make trades because of public opinion, not because the trade itself makes sense. When a particular stock seems popular, they rush in so they don`t feel they`ve missed an opportunity. As a result they end up buying at a price point where the trade can`t possibly work out. You should always avoid the emotion of the “hot” stock.

Here`s an example of what not to do when you buy stocks: Let`s say you`ve been following a particular stock which is in a “hot” sector, and it just announced a stock split. The stock is now at $18, and you calculate it could get to $25 or more by the time of the split. The market is currently bullish, and it looks like a great trade.

The problem is that the stock has been rising for the past four days. It started at $12, but you didn`t notice it until it hit $18, and it`s still rising. The stock split is a month away, and you know it`s likely to fall in price somewhat between now and the split. Still, everyone is talking about this stock. What if it continues to rise and becomes the next blockbuster? You become afraid that if you don`t make a trade you`ll miss a great opportunity. (And besides, you want to be able to tell people that you hold a position in this stock, because it makes you seem smart.) So you buy 1,000 shares at $18.50.

During the next two weeks, the stock goes to $19, then levels off, loses momentum, and drifts down to $17. Then a couple of leading NASDAQ companies give earnings warnings, the market drops, and the stock slides to $15, triggering the stop you`d set at $16 on half your holdings. The stock trades in that range for a week, and then begins to rise slightly going into the split. Your plan is to sell a day or two after the split. The stock rises a little beyond $20.50 by the second day after the split, and then the volume dries up and you sell it for a $2 profit. But since you stopped out of half your shares at $16, you lost $2.50 per share on that half, with a net loss of $.50 on 500 shares. What went wrong?

What went wrong was that you didn`t let the stock come to you. Instead, you chased it as its price rose, knowing perfectly well that, following the stock split trend, it would probably pull back before running up again. It was more likely to pull back than it was to continue on an uninterrupted run to $25, and you knew that if you bought at $18 or higher you were probably paying too much. You ignored what you knew was more likely in favor of what might happen.

You should have given the stock a chance to come to you, at a price you felt was reasonable. If the stock had pulled a surprise and never gotten down to where you thought it would, that would be okay. There were many other stocks to trade, and some of them would have come down to your price. You didn`t have to own this particular stock.

What was the right way to play this particular scenario? When the market is bullish, it`s very likely for a stock to rise when a split is announced, drift down after a few days` rally, and then begin to rise again a week or so before the split. If that`s the trend and there`s no solid reason to think the stock will rise immediately, wait a few days for the stock to drift down and stabilize before buying it. If you had done so in this case, you could have bought it at $16.50 and then sold it for $20.50 for a $4.00 profit on the entire 1,000 shares.

If you had a solid reason to think the stock might continue to rally, you could have bought half the total number of shares you wanted at a price that might have turned out to be too high, and waited for a lower price to buy the other half. If it had turned out to be too high, it would only have reduced your profit. (No stock goes up or down in a straight line. Wait for a pullback before buying.)

There is a good way and a bad way to buy stocks or trade a “hot” stock. The good way requires discipline and careful market evaluation. The bad way is to trade from your feelings. As you can see from this example, it`s always more profitable to trade the good way.

David Jenyns is recognized as the leading expert when it
comes to designing profitable trading systems.

Discover the "secret formula" of trading that anyone can use
to consistently generate BIG profits from the market by downloading your FREE copy of David's new Ultimate Trading Systems course. >Click Here To Download ==> Trading Systems http://www.ultimate-trading-systems.com

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