Rules for Online stockmarket trading

Traders in shares, indices, forex or commodities should always have a backdrop of basic rules, which revolve around going with the trend, limiting losses and good money management. In other papers, we have covered these items extensively, together with how to avoid mistakes and other important factors to watch when trading CFDs. There are, however, some commonsense rules that do not have to be applied to rigorously, but add another level of comfort within what can be a very stressful process.

A simple first rule – watch the cost

Market makers and other brokers are not stupid, and the setting of prices and spreads (or slippage) depends on several factors including time of the day, volatility and before and after news items. If you have a system that is not tailored to quick, intra-day moves, and your chosen timeframe is to look for results within anything up to a month, then minute by minute timing is less important than getting the overall picture correct.

On that basis you need to reduce your slippage costs as much as possible, so the time to place trades should be when the spreads are narrowest. After a while you should be used to the normal minimum spreads on most shares, and unless there is a pressing need to immediately deal (maybe on a profits warning or takeover news), then it pays to always ensure the spread is at the minimum before dealing.

This means not trading in the first few minutes of the trading day as buyers and sellers position themselves for the session. Sometimes the whole market may not only be marked down, for instance on a heavy fall in Far Eastern stocks overnight, but spreads might be wider because of the frenetic nature of early dealing. After a while though the spreads should usually return to normal, and you can deal more comfortably.

Example: You have a system that uses 3% targets and 2% stops, and say you normally buy and sell Royal Bank of Scotland shares with a minimum 1p spread, which represents a 0.05% or 5 basis point spread. From time to time the spread widens and can be as much as 5p after an outside event or early in the morning. This means that if applied to both sides of the trade, dealing on this wider spread would cost an additional 0.4% or 40 more basis points and effectively negates almost half of the edge of your system, which is fairly serious.

Moving on from this, it pays to stick to the biggest and most liquid stocks for the majority of your trading and this is a quick list of the leaders in the UK and which have the narrowest spreads:

Banks: Barclays, HBOS, HSBC, Lloyds, Royal Bank of Scotland, Standard Chartered
Beverages: Diageo, SAB Miller
Food producers: Unilever
Food retailing: Tesco
Household Goods: Reckitt Benckiser
Insurance: Aviva, Prudential
Mining: Anglo American, BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, Xstrata
Oils: BP, Royal Dutch Shell, BG Group

Pharmaceuticals: Astra Zeneca, Glaxo Smithkline
Telecoms: BT, Vodafone
Tobacco: BAT Industries
Utilities: National Grid

Rule 2: Get to know a few stocks very closely and increase your knowledge

Many market professionals focus on one area of the market, and some simply trade a handful or even just one issue, be it a particular commodity, Treasury bond or stockmarket index. You will probably find that you become accustomed to the ebbs and flows of certain shares, and if you feel you are on the boil with these companies, then you have an edge.

If you decide to focus on say ten UK shares, you should get to know their trading ranges, average daily volume, sentiment to their particular sector, previous support and resistance levels, the tone of previous management comments and when news is due.

Furthermore, it goes without saying that when trading commodity stocks including miners and oil companies, you need to be aware of movements in the price and direction of principal metals and crude oil. Because there are other factors in play when institutions buy or sell in the market, such as dividend payments, overall market action or takeover hopes, share price movements can sometimes lag a rise or fall in the underlying commodity, but this is very important to each company’s overall profitability. Likewise, overall retail sales figures are important to the retail sector, which is obvious, and the health of the housing market and interest rates affect financial stocks.

A couple of extra rules

The ‘trend is your friend’ is a valid theme throughout swing trading, but it pays to only go long when the price offers further upside potential, or there is another volume and/or candlestick signal, otherwise you risk buying at the top. The aim is to ride an established trend, so while it is OK to miss the first part of a move, you should not buy when a trend may be about to reverse.

Broker upgrades and newspaper tips are a waste of time, because they are usually already factored into the market by the time it is your turn to place a trade. Whilst some analysis can be excellent and thought provoking, the persons giving the advice may sometimes have a different agenda. Price and volume action is the key when trading, but of course for longer term decision making the fundamentals must be examined as well.

How to trade stockmarket successfully

I had some spare time, so I thought I might as well post an article on the way the stock market can affect you when you first begin trading. This is on your way to making your first million.

In a “Bull Market” the prevalent conditions of rising share prices, resources boom and general market hype actually encourages novice traders to begin trading. The mind set they have is, “that making money is easy.” And any losses they do have are quickly recuperated and therefore no lessons are learnt from the mistakes they have made.

When their first “Bear Market” or a downturn comes along and share prices drop, this is when the novice pays dearly for any mistakes they make.

Trading in the market is not a game for the novice. For being poorly armed and ill prepared the novice quickly finds that the honeymoon period is over. To their dismay the original capital they started with has been quickly whittled away.

The novice who thinks that profit is the only thing to worry about is in for a very rude awakening.

The first emotions that the beginner will experience are “Fear and Greed.”(See past article.)

Fear will paralyse while greed will galvanise you into action. In other words
Fear makes you hold on onto a downward turning stock while geed encourages you to chase upward rising share prices.

The way the share price has moved in the past and also in the future can often be seen as fear and greed in action.

When any share transaction has taken place two things have happened. Firstly the “Seller” has sold to minimise any future losses. This is because He believes that the share price is not going any higher.

The buyer on the other hand believes that this stock is at a bargain price and that the stock will go higher still.

Helpful Hints For Beginners

A Basic Trading Plan in a Nutshell.

For those who are interested here is my “trading plan”. Here it is in a nutshell:-

1. Do your homework/research.

2. Know the amount you are investing in the stock. No more than 10% of your portfolio’s value.

3. Work out your profit margin. So you know how much you are going to make plus know your exit price. (The price you are selling at.)

4. Put your stop loss on so you will not lose more than 10% ($2,000 = $200 this includes brokerage).

5. Don’t get greedy, panic or fearful. (You can’t afford these emotions in trading.)

6.Have an up to date list of around 15 to 20 future prospects ready at all times.(If in doubt leave it out) and keep them up to date.

7. Dont become impatient; don’t go chasing share prices/ stocks. And make sure you are using “real time data” 20 minutes delayed price is for the birds.

Finding the Right Stocks Using Basic Criteria.

1. What is the outlook for pricing of the company’s products?

2. Can the company sell more? What is the outlook for unit sales?

3. Can the company increase profits on existing sales?

4. Can the company control expenses?

5. If it does raise sales, how much will fall to the bottom line?

6. Can the company be as profitable as it used to be, or at
least as profitable as its competitors?

7. Does the company have one-time expenses that will have to be paid in the future?

8. Does the company have unprofitable operations it can shed?

9. Is the company comfortable with analysts’ earnings estimates?

10. How much can the company grow over the next five years?

11. What will the company do with any excess cash generated?

12. What does the company expect its competitors to do?

13. How does the company compare financially with other
Companies also in the same business?

14. What would the company be worth if it were sold?

15. Does the company plan to buy back stock?

16. What are the insiders doing?

The Basic Things For Happy Trading

The first thing to do is to check last nights closing share price. [presuming you have started buying already]

If you were going to sell, has the share price reached or dropped at your pre selected exit point?

If the share price went down, was your stop loss activated? (If you are not familiar with stop losses, please see a previous article on this to clarify.)

If you were buying stock .A TIP for you here do not leave open overnight AT MARKET orders. You will most definitely end up paying more than you bargained for.

Always LIMIT your order to the price you want to pay. Once this is done and you are up to date with your share portfolio then you can progress to you next task.

After the buying and selling of stocks is under control I then start to identify my next trading opportunities.

I select a stock from a list that I have compiled earlier. I scan the stock’s data base; check the bar charts and the trendlines. If everything looks good , and presuming I have capital available to purchase the stock ,I proceed to step three.

Firstly I recheck to see what the stock price is. Then how many of them do I want i.e. 5,000. Ascertain is it enough to make a worthwhile profit?

If your funds are limited to $ 500. (MINIMUM ASX PURCHASE) Then depending on your brokerage which on average will be $50.00 (that is for buying and selling) there is 10% you have to make just to break even. With such low capital, 20% profit nets you only $ 50.00 per sale transaction.

After you have purchased your new stock, [at the best price possible of course] set your exit target price goal so you know how much profit you want to make when the stock has been sold. Do not be greedy. Then set your stop loss into place.

Depending on the volatility of the stock keep a watchful eye on them .Try not to have too many irons in the fire when you first start off. One or two stocks are ample when you first start off.

This is only a very rough outline to get you started you will soon work out what suits you best depending on your time commitments etc. Happy Trading!

why invest in stock

Have you ever wondered why investors behave the way they do? For example, why do people invest in bonds or stocks or not at all? Since I am an advocate of stock investing, let me make the case for stock investing.

So, why invest in stocks? No, I won't just invest in any kind of stocks. There are goals associated with investing in stocks. For starter, stock investors would want to be compensated more than if they put their money in the bank. Anything else? Yes. Stock investors would want to be compensated more than the risk free interest rate which currently yield around 4.7%. For your information, risk free interest rate here is the 10 year Treasury bond which is backed by the United States Government. These bonds are deemed to be free from the risk of default.

Therefore, when we invest in stocks, we would want a return in excess of 4.7%. How much more? That varies within individuals. Some wants a 5% return. Others are satisfied with 6% return. Personally, I would want at least 7% return for my stock investment. There are reasons for this. Stock investing is relatively volatile and full of uncertainty. Interest rate goes up and down which will hamper our return as stock investors. For example if interest rate rises to 8%, would aiming a 7% return for your stock investment worth the risk? Probably not. In this case, most people prefer to put their money in the bank and enjoy the higher return.

Having said that, we need to know how much stocks have given investors historically. For the US stock market, the return for the last century has been in the neighborhood of 10%. That, my friend, is the sole reason to invest in stocks. Not because you want to own a piece of corporate America. You invest in stocks because historically it gives you a better return that other investing alternatives. No other investments boast that high of a return over the last century, not even real estate.