Transition from Stocks to Futures

[Dollardogs]

What are your transaction costs with QQQ?
If you are trading with a zero commission broker you can increase your leverage with TQQQ & SQQQ. This also allows you to go short without borrowing shares.
Why day trading? Why not longer term?

Why day trading? 100 reasons. Suits my personality and risk tolerance better. I love closing out at 3:55 everyday, not waking up to gaps down. Also I feel like I'm able to be 95% technical, 5% fundamental with daytrading, which is where my interests lie, whereas when I would try to swing trade in the past, I'd always feel like due diligence required too much of the stuff that bores me to tears: earnings reports etc etc.

I use TDAmeritrade, the fees for QQQ are so nominal I don't worry about them. And if I'm not mistaken, the leverage on TQQQ and SQQQ is only triple right, however, the price action seems to be a lot jumpier. I like how QQQ moves, just eventually want to benefit from the futures leverage without blowing my acct out in the process.

 

[Dollardogs]

Trading-wise, there's no difference in price movement between NQ futures and, say, QQQ. There might be an insignificant delay with one of them, but for the most part, they move pretty much in tandem. The primary benefit to trading the futures over stocks is there are no damn rules: PDT, uptick, borrowing short, and all the other crap that comes with the baggage. Second is it trades 24x6, so you're able to get out of the position should something happen overnight. Finally, massive leverage (obviously).

Anyway, I suggest you backtest for at least a few months in real time to see how your system stacks up.

Thanks! Reassuring points. I wanna level-up to it eventually, but I am taking the move very seriously. I doubt I'll even demo until I've had over 6 months of consistent gains with my current system.

 

[Dollardogs]

These ETFs are not enough leverage. Once you get into futures, you’ll be addicted, purely gambling.

I'm addicted already. Long story short, I started learning about the markets when Covid hit and my day job switched to work-from-home. Had a lot more free time on my hands, needed a hobby, and 3 years later, I can't get enough stock books to read, and I'm fantasizing about quitting the day job someday, hopefully in 5 years.

 

[murray t turtle]

View attachment 319832

Welcome to trading futures.

My progression / This is how I level up.


I started with investing in stocks in various countries

Then trade stocks
- position trading
- then swing trading
- then day trading

Then forex trading

Then day trading Russell index futures

Then options trading index futures

Then day trading various index futures,
energy futures, food futures, currency/bond futures...

Then spread trading various futures

Then back to
day trading various index futures,
energy futures, food futures, currency/bond futures...


LEVERAGE
Many people say the higher it is, the more dangerous it is.
I say the lower the leverage, the better it is.

Is high leverage dangerous?
Q is similar to
Is a sharp knife dangerous?


You have to try various things and see which fits you.

%%
ACTUALLY a sharp knife is better= less effort to cut most any thing.
Did ES + more leveraged futures ;
but i still do some cash ETFs, occasional dividends= no auto liquidation
[Yea i know foreclosure always happens to someone else or with leverage. different market anyway LOL]
I like to target shoot \ could be much more dangerous than a knife so i use both + sometime leverage.
So i dont have to have thrills just from capital markets.
Good post

 

[deaddog]

Why day trading? 100 reasons. Suits my personality and risk tolerance better. I love closing out at 3:55 everyday, not waking up to gaps down. Also I feel like I'm able to be 95% technical, 5% fundamental with daytrading, which is where my interests lie, whereas when I would try to swing trade in the past, I'd always feel like due diligence required too much of the stuff that bores me to tears: earnings reports etc etc.

I use TDAmeritrade, the fees for QQQ are so nominal I don't worry about them. And if I'm not mistaken, the leverage on TQQQ and SQQQ is only triple right, however, the price action seems to be a lot jumpier. I like how QQQ moves, just eventually want to benefit from the futures leverage without blowing my acct out in the process.

A quick look at the QQQ's shows a gain so far this year of over 40%.
What's the gain on your trading account?
(Chuckle) Mine aint close to that.
LOL might have to switch to buy and hold

 

[HobbyTrading]

I love closing out at 3:55 everyday, not waking up to gaps down.

This is much less likely to happen with futures such as /NQ and /MNQ as there is no long halt in trading hours. Just make sure that there is sufficient liquidity in the "slow hours" to suit your trading style.

 

[Dollardogs]

A quick look at the QQQ's shows a gain so far this year of over 40%.
What's the gain on your trading account?
(Chuckle) Mine aint close to that.
LOL might have to switch to buy and hold

Ever heard of cherry-picking? What if I had bought in December 2021 and held until now. How would things look then? Or should I have just known to buy on 1/3/23?

 

[Overnight]

Ever heard of cherry-picking? What if I had bought in 2021 and held until now. How would things look then? Or should I have just known to buy on 1/3/23?

Depends on when you bought in 2021. If bought at end of year you'd still be underwater, as the peak was Jan 3rd, 2022. So yeah, it's easy for a lot of people to see what currently is without seeing where we have come from.

 

[Dollardogs]

God you guys love to talk in circles. To play along briefly, the best case scenario from 2021 to today is to buy the dead low of 3/1/21 at $298. You'd now be up about $85 per share. That's only $40 per share per year. The worst case scenario is to have bought the ATH in 2021 at 408, and 20 months later, you'd almost be back to breakeven. I do much better than either of those two scenarios, daytrading.

 

[TheLiveTradingChannel]

Stay away from NQ at the beginning, I would say start with trading MES with NQ on a side monitor to see their correlation.