What is the best way to start stock trading?

Any recommendations and tips?Suggestions will be appreciated as I will be beginning to trade for the first time,thanks !
Additional Details
what is the safest amount for a beginner to begin trading and also how frequently should a follow up be to be safe?

There are many sources that would say they have the answer for you- and they may- but the professional sources all come with a price and they cannot gaureentee you any form of success. The price range for information and knowledge may range from $14.95 to $25,000.

However, you can learn stocks and options on your own if you know 1) how to ask questions, 2) how to read answers, and 3) spend some money on your own education by investing in some good books.

You've taken your first step by asking how to start stock trading. Congrats!

Here are my recommendations to start trading in the stock market without spending alot or any money:

1. Read up on the news. I have found that yahoo.finance is a good source of news. Get your news from Yahoo Finance and from Google Finance. It is good to be updated on what is going on with the economy and that knowledge will help you understand your investment decisions later. Also, you will begin to become aware of the lingo of investing. Investing is a whole world unto itself.

2. Get a free stock chart program from MarketBrowser. This is a very good program with several tools that can help you. They have several links to various news and stock information sources. They hold up to 36 charts per worksheet and are fabulous to look at. They also have the capacity to give you currency charts (though I don't use it for this).

3. Learn the fundamentals of stock trading. There are some sites that you can go to to learn the basics as well as different trading strategies. I prefer strategies that involve options (stock) and so have included a link to it as well. The Chicago Board of Options Exchange (CBOE) also has a learning Center which gives you different trade strategiesgive for options as well as a basic overview of what they are.

For stocks this seems to be a good site: www.stocktradingtogo.com/free-education/

4. Get experience with a virtual trader. Before you ever commit real money you need to have a degree of confidence that you can at least place the orders without making a mistake that will cost you money. Thus you have need for a virtual trader. I have been very satisfied with the virtual trader powered by optionsXpress for both stocks and options (which is the reason why I have chosen them as my online broker. I was able to open an account with them without funding it for up to a year before they required me to acutally put money into my account. I was tempted to use another broker but they only gave me a month of time before I had to fund my account). However, CBOE also has a free virtual trader that you can use, and, guess what... it is the same one I use at optionsXpress; that is, optionsXpress powers their virtual trader. There is also a paper trader powered by ThinkorSwim via the CBOE.

5. Develop a plan, or set of plans. This may seem to be out of order but once you have a plan that works for you you may want to really test it. There is a big difference between virtual trading and real trading in that when you virtual trade you know that it isn't real. That's it. With a good virtual trader you have pretty much the same experience as you do making the actual trade but the real thing feels very different I assure you. You may not believe that there is much difference and maybe you can pretend to treat the virtual trader as "real" but when it is finally real and you are really put to the test you will know what I mean.

6. After you have some experience, open an account with an online broker. Why? Because I don't know of any better way to trade stocks and options than using an online broker. optionsXpress also has a "live chat" option which allows you to clink a tab and get online assistance immediately. Some people prefer to talk on the phone perhaps, but I like the ability to see the chat I had and refer to it later if I need to.

7. Continue your education. Read good books, and maybe invest in education. I spent $25,000 on stock education, which I look back at and wonder if it was worth it. In hind sight I can say "yes" as I would have never known how to get into stocks myself. My $25,000 was a token of my commitment to succeed- but I wish I could have found a cheaper way of doing it. I bet Batman wishes his parents weren't killed by bandits (Yes, I know he's not real but suffer through my example) but if they weren't there'd be no Batman. The internet has a great source of education!

Everyone is different. I had access to online coaches, which I used to some extent, but not much. I prefer to learn on my own and there is this fundamental truth- You are always solely responsible for all of your own trades. No one can or will ever accept responsibility for your trade decision.

Bottom Line: Eventually you'll have to open an online account, but you don't have to do that in order to get some experience. Get some knowledge, some experience, some practice, and then you'll see more clearly.

Hope this helps. I wish someone did

If you're investing a small amount, ING has a great program called ShareBuilder that I'd suggest.

You pick the stocks you want to invest in, and the dollar amount you want to contribute (weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, etc). You don't have to purchase full-priced shares.

For example, say you picked 5 stocks priced at $50 each. If you wanted to buy a share of each of those, it would cost $250 on the market. If you use ShareBuilder, you can contribute whatever amount to those shares... let's say $100. You would then own $20 of each share, or .4 shares of each. Every time you contribute, you will increase your shares.

Great way to build up a portfolio.

i think you better start with Investopedia Stock Simulator at

http://simulator.investopedia.com/

good luck ÙØ±Ø

Why would you want to? The reasons will determine a lot. Say you are looking at stocks as a gambling game and your dreams of avarice are grand, or perhaps you are thinking of value building up over a long time, like until retirement. These are two entirely different directions.

As for an amount, you leave us with some nebulous figure to imagine, but then I wouldn't expect you to spill out all of you bank account worth and total of income and bills to a bunch of strangers like us (and some of us can be pretty strange).

As a poet once said, "Direction before distance". You see you either have a method or madness. The fabulously wealthy Warren Buffett learned from a previously famous investor named Benjamin Graham. Graham had a book about Value Investing and Buffett said the ideas in that book made him the wealthy man that he is. One of the ideas that Graham said, and were echoed by mutual fund genius John Bogle, is that simply picking stocks is no different from gambling in a casino. Bogle's answer to the investment problem is directed diversity, sort of a stock shotgun. Graham and Buffett, however, watched for intrinsic value to the business. When they saw great value that was not reflected in the market worth, then they bought, as the saying goes, 'with both hands.'

Today you have something going for you, and something strong going against you. It is kind of like rowing a boat one way while the tide is moving the other way. Check the books and business prospects. Many solid companies with little debt and a growing book of business are selling dirt cheap. In some cases, if you look at the balance sheet and income statements you can find increasingly profitable companies that may be actually selling below their per share book value. What this means is that if the total equity were divided by the number of shares outstanding and that is higher than the market price per share, then you need to look a lot closer at this company. A quick glance at the P/E will tell you if the company is making a profit and how much of a premium over the earnings is the price. If a company has a stock price lower than the book value (equity per share) and the P/E is less than 10 but still a positive number, then put this on your buy list.

Finally, when you go through your buy list and see some companies stock prices had been down and are recently starting to trend up, then you put this on your short list. If you have four or five companies of different industries (please leave banks and finance companies off, they could be quite lucrative, but they could also hold some disasters yet to come and I suspect you don't have the discerning powers to tell that right now), then leave yourself some cushion and divide what you feel to be a comfortable share of investable money to those you feel most comfortable with. This is a fair start. But leave yourself an out. Write down a number that says if this stock goes, say, 20% the wrong way, then I will sell it -- definitely, no questions, it is gone. That will save your bacon when the market turns against you.

Trading? How actively? How much capital are you starting with? What do you know already?

I don't know. But I want to find out.

-- Watching this question eagerly.

why not open an account, try it out yourself. if you want to open an account for first time personally, I think Sogotrade is best among all online brokerages. You can get a lot of free trades: about 100 free trades with 500 minimum deposits. It has very good customer services, it also has live help, and you can chat with representatives about any question. After that, only 3 dollar for each trade, pretty sweet when compared with other online brokerages. Referral code: 453934

Hello Farah
This is Ibrar, Investment Advisor from chennai.

First of all let me appreciate you for taking interest in investing in share markets.

Before giving any suggestions i want to tell u that if u can give some details about ur plans regarding ur investment, it will be helpful to advise. Becoz the objective should me met.

What are the tools u already aware for investing?
Do u have some expertise about financial markets?
like share markets, mutual funds, insurance..?
What % of returns you are expecting?
How long you can wait for the returns u desire to have?
How much risk you can take for investing? or not at all interested to take risk? i mean how much safety you like to have on your investments?

There are many things to consider before any investment.

I have tried to answer your query? if possible you can interact with me and i will try my best to conclude the best possible investment plan suitable to you.

For any clarification & details about investing in share markets feel free to mail me.
my id is ibrar3@yahoo.co.in

Thanks & Regards
Ibrar.k.

Enter Your Message or Comment

User Name:
User Email:
Post a comment:

Archive: Forum -Forum -Finance - Links - 1 - 2 - RSS - All RSS Feeds
The Causes and the Results. 0.014
Copyright (c) 2011 Financial Crisis Monday, May 28, 2012 - Terms of use - Privacy Policy