Is day trading worth it?

Have you ever dreamed of becoming a millionaire by trading stocks from your laptop? Do you envy the glamorous lifestyles of Wall Street traders who jet around the world and drive fancy cars? Do you think you have what it takes to beat the market and make a fortune in a few hours?

Come on, admit it. I know you want this lifestyle, I know I am. We’re humans, after all, we’re never satisfied. We always want more, more money, more power, more cheese. Yes, that’s right, cheese is happiness!

Er, going back, day trading is a form of trading that involves buying and selling financial instruments within the same day, often multiple times. It can be very lucrative, but also very risky.

Many people wonder if it is worth pursuing this career path, or if they are better off sticking to a regular boring job, but with a secure source of income. In this article, we will explore the pros and cons of day trading, and help you decide if it is right for you.

Questions to ask yourself

To answer this question, you must first be honest with yourself. What are your goals, motivations, personality traits, and weaknesses? Are you really ready for all this?

First, you need to have a clear understanding of your own personality, strengths, weaknesses, and goals. These are the questions to ask yourself:

Do you have enough time and resources to dedicate to day trading? Day trading requires constant attention to the market, research, analysis, and execution of trades. Are you willing to sacrifice your social life, hobbies, sleep, and sanity for the thrill of making (or losing) money in a matter of minutes?
Day trading involves taking calculated risks based on your analysis of market conditions, trends, patterns, and indicators. Do you have a trading plan and a risk management strategy? Or are you just gambling with your hard-earned money based on your gut feelings, or tips from random strangers on the internet?
Going full-time trading is stressful and exciting, and it can trigger various emotions such as fear, greed, overconfidence, frustration, and regret. Are you mentally prepared to handle all these things?
You will inevitably face losses, setbacks, and challenges along the way. You need to be able to accept your mistakes, learn from them, and move on without losing your motivation or confidence. Can you do that? Or will you spiral into depression, anger, or denial every time the market goes against you?

Second, you need to have a good knowledge of the market you want to trade in and the strategies you want to use. Some factors to consider are:

What are the characteristics of the market you want to trade in? You need to understand how these factors affect the price movements and the risks and rewards of day trading in that market. Maybe you’re just following the advice of some scammy online trading guru.
You need to find strategies that match your personality, preferences, objectives, and risk tolerance. Only you can answer this question.
You also need access to trustworthy and affordable brokers who can provide you with the services and support you need. Do you have access to them? If not, you’ll be having a hard time achieving your trading goals.

Once you overcome these questions and decide for yourself that you are ready and mentally prepared to handle all rigors of full-time day trading, let us move to the good part. This is where we learn if day trading is really worth it.

Spoiler alert: it’s not easy.

The benefits of day trading

The benefits of day trading If you are positive, ambitious, and passionate about trading, day trading can offer you many benefits. You can become wealthy and live a free life where you can make all your dreams come true and have a fancy lifestyle. After all, this could be the best-paying job in the world. Like the Wolf of Wall Street, well of course minus the illegal activities. We don’t want to go to jail right? Unless you are into that kind of thing. No judgment here.

For example, with the right trading size, 4 E-mini points a day is enough to match the salary of lawyers and pilots. If you trade $1,000 per point, 4 points of profit will already earn you $4000 daily. And that is no utopia; some people earn their entire year’s salary daily with 1 or 2 scalp trades. How awesome is that? You could buy a yacht, a mansion, or a private island with that kind of money. Maybe just a lot of cheese. Or maybe I just want some pizza?

To some, this is one of the most important, where you can also be your own boss and have more flexibility and control over your work schedule, location, and income. You don’t have to answer to anyone else or follow someone else’s rules. You can choose when, where, and how much you want to trade, as long as you have access to the market and the necessary tools and resources. You could trade from your bed, your couch, or your bathtub. You could trade in your pajamas, your underwear, or naked if you want. You could also trade while listening to music, watching Netflix, or eating pizza. The possibilities are endless.

All of these sound fantastic, where you can have a jet-setter lifestyle, be your own boss, and have all the time in the world for leisure and yourself. Surely you would know that all of these come with all the challenges, and drawbacks that come with day trading. But hey, nobody said it was easy. If it was easy, everyone would do it. And then it wouldn’t be fun anymore. So don’t let that stop you from pursuing your passion and living your dream.

The challenges of day trading

Let’s be frank, day trading is not for everyone. It requires a lot of discipline, patience, and perseverance. It also involves a lot of stress, uncertainty, and emotional pressure.

You have to deal with constant market fluctuations, technical issues, and unexpected events. Like when your internet goes down, your computer crashes, or your cat walks on your keyboard and sells all your stocks. Or when you get a margin call, a stop loss, or a tax audit and lose all your money. And then you get hacked, scammed, or sued and lose even more money.

You have to manage your risk, money, and time effectively. And most importantly, you have to develop a profitable strategy that suits your style and personality. This is not easy, as statistics show that only a small minority of day traders become consistently profitable. The rest either break even or lose money. And sometimes lose a lot of money. Like seriously a lot of money. Like enough money to make you cry yourself to sleep at night.

Day trading is a risky and uncertain activity that involves taking calculated gambles based on your analysis of the market. However, there is no guarantee that your analysis is correct or that the market will behave as you expect. Not only, that you may encounter unexpected events or situations that can affect the market or your trades negatively. Remember, one tweet from Elon Musk is enough to make the markets go crazy!

The right mindset

So, you want to know if day trading is worth it? Let me ask you this: is breathing worth it? Is eating worth it? Is living worth it? Of course they are! Day trading is not just a hobby or a job, it’s a lifestyle. It’s a way of expressing yourself, of challenging yourself, of growing yourself. It’s not something you do for money, it’s something you do for passion.

But passion alone is not enough. You also need to have the right mindset. You need to see day trading as a long-term journey of learning and improvement, not as a quick way to get rich or get out of debt. You need to be willing to work hard, study the market, analyze your trades, to learn from your mistakes. You need to be humble, disciplined, and resilient.

After all, we only see the few professional football players who made it to the big time. What about the countless athletes that fell short, and never made it? What about all the singers joining all the competitions singing in vain, hoping to be discovered? None of them asked whether it is worth pursuing what they dream of.

They just do what they love, work hard to better themselves, and grow, focusing on the process, not the end goal. Well, maybe some of them did ask that question, but they didn’t let it stop them from trying.

So the answer to the question: “Is day trading worth it?” is quite simple.

Day trading is very worthwhile for people who are willing to invest in themselves and have the will to keep learning. Even if they know the chances of succeeding are small, they don’t let this discourage them. So the question is not whether day trading is worth it, but whether you are worth it.

Think about it: how many people can say they have the courage and the opportunity to pursue their dreams? How many people can say they have the freedom and the flexibility to work from anywhere in the world? How many people can say they have the potential and the possibility to achieve financial independence?

Not many. But you can.

And even if at the end of the day you find yourself failing at day trading, isn’t it better to live with the knowledge that you have gone for something that can potentially change your life, than to spend the rest of your life walking around with thoughts of “what ifs” and “wish I had”?

Is day trading worth it?