E-mini Trading Basics
So You Want To Day-Trade for a Living-Part One: Time Needed
By Jared Putnam
Jan 23, 2008 - 4:26:00 PM

  Perhaps due to curiosity, ambition, even necessity you are considering day-trading as a means to produce cash-flow. While the potential earnings, lifestyle and personal satisfaction are what appeal to most, the following three-part series focuses instead on what it takes to start out on the right foot.
  It has been tailored to those that desire to inventory their time available, skills that promote success in day-trading and capital available for risk. As the legal system conducts preliminary hearings which allow for “discovery”, to gauge the plausibility of a matter, check your current circumstances against what is recommended. If at the end you make your case, by all means…proceed.
 
Part I: TIME NEEDED

  This consideration of the amount of time needed to day-trade for a living has been divided into three areas: 1) Education 2) Daily routine 3) Business management, preceded by a word of caution.
  Ironically in a business as technical, highly leveraged and ever-changing as trading is, those pursuing it need to be reminded that there is no substitute for sound education! A string of successes some time ago, your ability to memorize stock symbols and see macro-economic scenarios will fail to sustain you in the long-run.
  It takes time to find, consume and absorb day-trading education. You must learn how to gauge a market’s strength or weakness, how to ascertain entry areas with favorable probabilities, how to manage wisely your open position(s) and advisable areas to focus first, to be considered further in part II. Since learning rates are subjective, how much time you will need to spend each week to best take in this facet is for you to fill in. Two, eight, thirteen hours? Write your answer down on a piece of paper.
  A day-trader’s daily routine revolves around market hours. Thanks to streamlined exchanges and access to currency trading, the number of available markets is unprecedented. Therefore, active trading occurs practically anywhere on the clock! The constant to factor in is that you must be at the ready while what you trade is most liquid and it’s behavior is most reliable. You may or may not trade the open and close, so go ahead and write in six hours for this aspect.
  Managing your day-trading business starts with comparing your goals for the day with your performance. If the trade-platform you use records (like TIVO), you can re-play your problem and commendable trade choices. Repeating our good moves and not repeating our mistakes is a must, so take the time to note these in a trade-diary. Before closing, be sure pertinent trade-metrics have been logged. To give this effort it’s due, figure one to two hours. 
Education and habits such as these lead to key development. Now, consider skills common among successful day-traders in part two of the series, So You Want to Day-Trade for a Living…-Skills Needed.