Trading or Scalping. Is There Really a Difference?
Scalping vs Trading – The Strategies Require Different Skills
Trading and scalping are both legitimate strategies for day traders. Both techniques are successful when practiced by experienced traders who have acquired the skills that each technique embodies. Most new and novice traders are scalpers. Scalping requires only a basic knowledge of how to trade and read candlesticks, indicators, and candlestick patterns. This low-level of knowledge can be learned by information generally found online and in combination with paper trading experience. Nevertheless, it is always recommended to enroll in a trading course. To become good at anything, trading included, requires an education. A good basic course will include in its curriculum the basic trading concepts such as candlestick patterns, indicators, and how to read them both. Learning how to be a trader, on the other hand, goes beyond basic concepts and includes such insights as how to measure the market and where prices are likely to be “taken” on a given day. To be a “trader” requires knowledge that not only builds on the basics of trading, but goes far beyond them. Traders know how to measure the market by learning to study various market metrics and know how to apply them to formulate trading decisions. This video explains some of the differences between scalping and trading.
Anyone who wants to learn how to day trade S&P emini futures needs to have as much information as possible. Scalp trading requires less in-depth market knowlege but can be a very successful technique. Trading is not easy to do because it is impossible to know the future with any degree of certainty. But the market does give off signals and a wise trader needs to know how to interpret the signals. Market prices seem to move erratically, but with enough information, trading S&P emini futures can be done with a greater assurance of success. An S&P emini futures trader who has Information about market signals and knows how to use them makes knowledgeable traders much more successful than others who use “seat of the pants” method.
Some of the information that S&P emini futures traders should have are:
- The Trend
- The Intraday and / or Low
- The Calculated Trading Zone via Taylor’s Book Method
- The daily calculated range
- Support and resistance levels
- Stochastics
- Candlestick patterns
These are some of the bits and pieces of information every trader needs to have in order to assess a trade. Of course, that is not to say that even with all this information a trade will work out, but having this knowledge puts the odds of success more on the trader’s side.
Having as much information as possible gives S&P emini day traders a big advantage over “seat of the pants” traders. It cannot be stressed enough that without learning as much as possible about the market, it is highly unlikely that a trader will succeed at making money by day trading S&P emini futures, much less in a trading career.
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