Money Forum World

PhatWallet · Joined: 08 Nov 2007 Posts: 2032

Im wanting to better understand how I can possibly make money in the short term like, short term, purchasing and selling small amounts of stocks. Not looking for big investment approaches, talking like $500 starting out or less.

Example: I purchase 100 shares of stock ACME which I pay $.50 per share plus a commission of $15 for a total expenditure of $65. Then, afterward that same day, the stock rises to $.80 per share, so I sell all 100 shares plus pay a commission of $15 for a total profit of $30. Does this work? I understand theres a lot involved with picking which stocks to invest in, but in hypothesis is it this simple?

Im wanting to get started using something like etrade but a service that only requires like $500 minimum to get started, or possibly using Sharebuilder.com?

Is it possible to use Sharebuilder, which doesnt require a minimum account opening balance to day trade and make money?

Im not wanting to reture here, just make some bucks each month. Thanks.

Angela Skinner · Joined: 08 Nov 2007 Posts: 2152

If you want to make some bucks each month, open an online bank account and put the money there. purchasing penny stocks is very high risk. . i.e. there's a big probability that you'll end up with nothing.

Penny stock are impossibe to predict or examine, since they trade on small volume and may be easily impacted by any sizable participant.

If a online saving account is too conservative for you, then purchase an ETF Exchange Traded Fund and hold it for the lasting. ..

But forget about penny stocks and short traiding, more now that the market is so volatile

best of luck

PhatWallet · Joined: 08 Nov 2007 Posts: 2032

well for a stock to go from .5 to .8 in a day, that's a 60% increase. I could want to bet that anybody could be happy with a return like that, let alone a day trader. day trading typically has people trading for a .25 to 5% get, if they're lucky. the key to day trading is that you need money to make money. and lots of brokerages know this. with any regular trading account, there's a bound to how many round trip trades you may be able to make throughout a week round trip means purchasing and selling the same security . If this gets recognized by the brokerage, lots of times they'll send you a warning saying you have qualified as a day trader. at this pt. they could cancel your account or penalize you monetarily because many times there are minimum account values in the range of $25,000 ie. that have to be met but most probably they'll just warn you to cut your activity down. E trade has really fast settlements and I have heard of ppl to get away with the day trading thing over there, but overall it's hard to do with $500 or so just because one round trip trade could cost you 5% of your capital alone meaning that the security you trade in must get at least that much to break which is rare in day trading unless you stumble upon a news feed before anybody else does,

Jeanne Humphrey · Joined: 08 Nov 2007 Posts: 2164

Open a brokerage account at Scottrade with $500.00

Sharebuilder is too costly for you at $15.95
Scottrade is only $7.00