Company Director
CurrentInformation GatheringA day trader's day starts hours before the market opens. He begins checking the financial news for developments in the economy, politics, company news, analyst reports and market information, including after-the-close trading results and technical indicators. Most day traders depend on information supplied by subscription services or in-house market analysts -- all of it important to know if the trader is to make split-second decisions all day.Checking… Show more Information GatheringA day trader's day starts hours before the market opens. He begins checking the financial news for developments in the economy, politics, company news, analyst reports and market information, including after-the-close trading results and technical indicators. Most day traders depend on information supplied by subscription services or in-house market analysts -- all of it important to know if the trader is to make split-second decisions all day.Checking PositionsThe next task in a trader's day is checking trade confirmations from the previous day against her trading blotter, where she maintains her activity notes and positions held overnight. Any errors must be fixed immediately, because their cost -- which can be hundreds of thousands of dollars -- is normally charged to the trader. The next step is to ascertain that all trades have been settled successfully and to check how much cash and margin are available in her trading account. If a security purchased the day before has not been delivered to her account, or the counterparty to a sell has not paid for the securities, these problems must be addressed because they will affect her ability to trade.TradingThe market open is the most important part of the day for a day trader. Before the open, he puts in orders to be executed at the open. Depending on his trading style and his goals for the day, he may spend the next hour entering follow-on trades to sell, buy or cover short sales. The bulk of the day is generally spent monitoring the financial news, price charts and quantitative analysis services that track market movements and apply mathematical analysis. In the hour before the market closes, the day trader generally closes out all positions before going home for the night to avoid risk of overnight surprises. Show less