Ever dreamt of giving up
the daily grind? Want to strike out on your own and work from home, but
don’t know what you could possibly do to make a living? Full time Nasdaq
trader Harvey Walsh wondered just that, and now he asks “Is day trading
the ultimate work from home job”?
We’ve probably all had the same thought at some time or another, as we
trudge off towards another day at work – the same work we’ve been doing
day in day out for years – “surely there has to be a better way?” Slaving
away to make somebody else rich just doesn’t seem right somehow, but what
alternative? Setting up a new business, or buying an established one, are
both expensive and risky prospects. So how can the disenchanted employee
ever hope to make the switch from wage-slave to total independence?
Those are thoughts I had almost every day, before I quit the safety of
full time employment and decided to strike out on my own. I asked myself
the same question day in and day out; surely there has to be a better way.
What about the internet, I wondered, isn’t that supposed to be bringing
new and exciting opportunities to all? I researched a lot of so-called
work-from-home opportunities that promised untold riches, apparently mine
for the taking just by sitting in front of my PC. Needless to say, in
reality those schemes turned out to be about as fulfilling as, well,
filling envelopes for a living. No, I knew there had to be another way –
something real – something where I could be in control of my own destiny.
And then one morning on the train to work, I read about a couple of Wall
Street boys who had struck it rich thanks to some huge bonuses, and were
now going it alone setting up their own day trading shop. That was when I
discovered day trading, and I realised that this was exactly the
opportunity I had been searching for. I decided there and then that I was
going to make a full time living from the stock markets, whatever it took
to succeed.
The advantages of day
trading as a job are numerous to say the least; there is no boss to answer
to, no customers to satisfy, no suppliers to let you down, no waiting for
invoices to be paid, I could go on. In fact, I will: trading is a
location-independent activity – I can work from anywhere with an internet
connection, which effectively means anywhere in the world with a telephone
line. I regularly trade from my laptop whilst travelling. I can trade when
I feel like it, and take time off when I like, which means I can spend
quality time with my family.
Now let’s get this straight, trading can be a risky activity, there is no
doubt about that. So is driving a car to work, but the risks of getting
from A to B on four wheels are well understood and are managed
accordingly, to the point where we don’t think twice about getting behind
the wheel. And in the same way, provided a trader is disciplined in their
approach to the job at hand, and understands the associated risks of the
work, so those risks can be managed.
On the subject of risk, day trading is almost unique in that it can be
learnt and practised with absolutely no financial risk at all, by means of
paper-trading – that is - trading using freely available simulation
software. Thus in the same way a trainee airline pilot won’t be let loose
into the skies without having learnt and rehearsed their skills in a
simulator, so a new trader can employ the same technique before they start
trading real money. I “sim-traded” before I gave up the day-job; it made
it easy to leave the safety-net of a monthly pay check knowing from my
simulated trading sessions that I could already make money in the markets.
And that brings me to the most satisfying aspect of trading for a living;
money. On an average day trading the Nasdaq, it is not unusual to make
more money in a couple of hours than I used to make in a whole month
working full time as a wage-slave. There are bad days of course, days
where things just don’t work out, but they pale into insignificance over
the course of a week or a month. It certainly took some intensive studying
and a lot of practise before becoming a consistently profitable trader.
But the end result of that hard work is an immensely valuable life skill
that nobody can take away, and which allows for incredible freedom.
Since I first started trading, the learning curve has become even easier
for the aspiring day trader, with a multitude of new websites, training
courses, and books all covering the subject. I envy anyone starting out in
this business today – they certainly have many more learning aids
available to them than I had at the same point in my own career.
So is day trading the ultimate work-from-home job? No. I firmly believe
it’s the ultimate work-from ANYWHERE job!
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