Bill Fitzpatrick, you need to “Know Everything.” Before you buy a single share, before you purchase that investment property, you need to know everything there is to know that might influence that investment. Otherwise it’s a fool’s gambit.
You need to know the company behind the stock, its financial health, and any events that might be taking place, such as reporting earnings. You need to have an acute and tacit knowledge of the industry, sector and market conditions that will likely influence investor sentiment. You must know how to analyze the fundamentals of this company, as well as the fundamentals of the market and industry it belongs to. You need to be a skilled chartist, and be able to perform technical analysis of the stock and markets to understand resistance and support levels, price/volume momentum, contrarian indicators, patterns, and much more.
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Trading styles can be categorized in to one of three categories; Day Trading, Swing Trading, and Position or Trend Trading. The styles differ essentially by the amount of time the position is open or in play. Traders that day trade, like the name implies, open a position and close it within the same day or trading session. Swing traders have longer horizons, where their trades can be open for several days or even weeks. And Position traders can have positions in play for many months.



