Guides

ETFs

GLD carries no leverage: the SPDR Gold Trust holds bullion. The nearest leveraged version is Direxion's UGLD, which since May 2026 targets 2x GLD's daily move.…

ETFs

Inverse ETFs on stock indexes: SH, SDS, SPXU and SPXS on the S&P 500; PSQ, QID and SQQQ on the Nasdaq-100; DOG, DXD and SDOW on the Dow; RWM, TWM and TZA on the…

ETFs

The liquid index ETFs traders use for short swings are SPY, QQQ, IWM and DIA, with sector funds such as XLF, XLE, XLK, SMH, KRE and XBI. You can sell one short in a…

Swing Trading

Swing trading terms sort by the stage of a trade: price structure (swing highs and lows, trend, pullback), levels (support, resistance, breakout, retracement),…

Dividends

A dividend ETF suits you if you want broad, low-effort income where one company's cut barely registers. Individual dividend stocks suit you if you want to choose…

Retirement

Up to 50% or up to 85% of your Social Security benefits can be subject to federal income tax, depending on your provisional income, which is half your benefits added…

Investing

Own enough stocks, spread across enough industries, that losing any one company costs an amount you can live with. With ten equal positions a total loss in one costs…

Retirement

Estimate your yearly spending in retirement, subtract guaranteed income such as Social Security and pensions, and divide the gap by a withdrawal rate. With $60,000…

Options

No single legal minimum applies. Buying one call or put costs the premium times 100, so $250 for a contract quoted at $2.50. Selling a cash-secured put ties up the…

Options

Historical volatility measures how much a stock has actually moved, calculated from past prices. Implied volatility is the future volatility that current option…

Prop Trading

It depends on whether you already have a tested process. If you do, a prop evaluation can give you a larger account for a small fee. If you are still learning, your…

Retirement

Pick a traditional IRA if you expect a lower tax rate in retirement than you pay now, and a Roth if you expect a higher one. At the same rate the two leave you with…

Technical Analysis

Technical analysis is a way of making trading decisions from price and volume history. Analysts read the trend, mark support and resistance, and use indicators and…

Earnings

A stock moves after earnings on the difference between expectations and results: earnings per share, revenue, margins and, above all, guidance for the coming…

Dividends

A dividend yield is too high to trust when it rose because the share price fell, not because the dividend grew, and the payout is no longer covered. Watch for a…

Technical Analysis

A pullback that holds 38.2% has kept 61.8% of the move, a sign that buyers stepped in early and the trend is strong. One that reaches 50% has given back half the…

ETFs

ProShares Ultra Gold (UGL) and the Direxion Daily Gold Bull 2X ETF (UGLD) both target twice gold's daily move. UGL follows a COMEX gold futures index; UGLD…

ETFs

Gold mining shares are leveraged to gold through their margins: the closer the gold price sits to a miner's all-in sustaining cost, the harder profit swings on each…

ETFs

QID (ProShares UltraShort QQQ) targets -2x the Nasdaq-100's daily move and SQQQ (ProShares UltraPro Short QQQ) targets -3x. On one day SQQQ gains or loses half again…

ETFs

RWM, TWM and TZA all bet against the Russell 2000 one day at a time: RWM at -1x and TWM at -2x from ProShares, TZA at -3x from Direxion. RWM is the one to hold as a…

ETFs

SDOW, DXD and DOG are ProShares funds that each aim for the opposite of one day's move in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, at -3x, -2x and -1x. All three use swaps…

ETFs

SDS suits a bearish view measured in days: it needs no options approval, but its -2x daily reset drifts in choppy markets and it can lose the whole stake if the…

ETFs

TZA, from Direxion, and SRTY, from ProShares, both seek -3x the Russell 2000's return for a single day and reach it mainly through swaps on the index. Their…

ETFs

A market cap ETF such as SPY, IVV or VOO sizes each S&P 500 company by its market value, which hands the biggest names the biggest slices. An equal weight ETF such…

Technical Analysis

The golden pocket is the band between the 61.8% and 65% retracement of a completed swing, where traders watch for a deep pullback to turn. The 61.8% line is a…

ETFs

Yes, most IRAs can hold QID, because buying it is an ordinary cash purchase with no borrowing or short sale, though some brokers limit geared funds in retirement…

ETFs

RWM holds no small-cap stocks. ProShares lists Russell 2000 swaps with several large banks, E-mini Russell 2000 futures, and cash held in a ProShares money market…

ETFs

Buying SDS needs only an ordinary account, owes no dividends or borrow fees, and cannot lose more than you paid, but its -2x exposure resets every day. Shorting SPY…

ETFs

A TZA reverse split swaps a block of old shares for one new share, so you hold fewer shares at a higher price and the same total value. Direxion's last one was…

Earnings

Each weekend, list the reports due next week for every stock you hold or watch, mark each date confirmed or estimated and before the open or after the close, and…

Technical Analysis

Write the entry, stop and exit rules exactly, choose the chart and test period in advance, then scroll forward one bar at a time and record each trade in R, with…

Technical Analysis

Pick the most recent clear swing on the timeframe you trade, then draw from the swing low to the swing high in an uptrend or from the high to the low in a downtrend.…

Swing Trading

Open a cash or margin account, fix a risk per trade such as 1% of the account, write rules for the entry, the stop and the exit, trade liquid stocks or ETFs, and…

Technical Analysis

Trade the 38.2% to 50% zone only when the trend is strong on both the weekly and daily charts. Wait for a bar that closes back up inside the zone, buy on a stop just…

ETFs

Multiply the portfolio's value by its beta to the Russell 2000, multiply that by the share you want hedged, and buy that dollar amount of RWM. A hypothetical…

ETFs

Estimate how many dollars of your portfolio move with the Nasdaq-100, choose how much of that to hedge, and buy half that amount in QID, since a -2x fund doubles…

ETFs

Multiply each day's Dow change by -3 and apply it to wherever the fund closed the day before. In a steady decline SDOW can finish ahead of three times the Dow's…

ETFs

In a choppy month SDS ends lower even when the S&P 500 finishes flat, because each day's -2x move compounds from a new base. Track it by comparing your stake with…

ETFs

Before buying TZA, read its -300% daily objective, confirm it holds swaps and cash, and size the position so a sharp one-day Russell 2000 rally costs a set share of…

Technical Analysis

A bull flag is a steep rally (the pole) followed by a short, shallow pullback between two parallel lines that slope down (the flag), with volume heavy on the pole…

Dividends

Buy the shares no later than the trading day before the ex-dividend date, hold through the open of the ex-date, then sell. You collect the dividend, but the stock…

Swing Trading

An inside bar is a bar whose high and low both sit within the range of the bar before it, called the mother bar. Buy a move above the mother bar's high or sell a…

Technical Analysis

Confirm a 38.2/50 pullback by checking that sellers are finished: RSI cools to the 40 to 50 area and hooks up, volume shrinks during the dip and expands on the turn,…

ETFs

Write SDOW exit rules on the Dow before you buy: a stop about half an ATR above the support it broke, sized so a hit costs a set dollar loss; a time stop a few…

Investing

The core free sources are SEC EDGAR for filings, FINRA for broker checks and short interest, the Federal Reserve and FRED for rates and economic series, the BLS and…