Checklist before proceeding

To recap this guide, I made a checklist so you don’t have to read every chapter again in detail. You should use this checklist and only proceed with other guides (mentioned in the next chapter) when all boxes are checked. Reread chapters in this guide if you are not comfortable yet.

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1. Healthy personal finances

The first major important step in your trading and investing journey is having a healthy personal financial situation. Never invest or trade money you need in the near future. Never borrow money to enter positions unless you exactly know what you are doing. Only risk money you can comfortably lose. Only trade and invest money if you have zero regret of losing it.

Action: Did you check all the steps mentioned in chapter three: The basic principles of money management?

2. Invest time

The next major step is investing time. If you want to be a successful investor or day trader, you need to spend hundreds or even thousands of hours learning and testing. You should not think this is exaggerated. Be prepared to give up certain things in your life if you have the goal of living from money earned by trading or investing. Close your knowledge gap by reading books, guides on this website, youtube videos and more. 95% of all investors and day traders lose money in the long term. Because they simply give up or have no clue what they are doing because they didn’t invest time in learning the details. Prevent being one of the 95%.

Action: Are you prepared to invest hundreds or even thousands of hours to master the skills needed to become a successful investor or daytrader?

3. Goals

Have you determined your goal and is this a healthy goal based on how much time you want to invest? If your goal is to make a lot of money, you need to invest hundreds and probably thousands of hours. If your goal is to make a lot of money but you have no intention to spend time on achieving this goal on a daily basis you will most likely fail. Make sure your goal is tied to the time you want (or can) invest.

Action: Have you determined a clear and realistic goal?

4. What kind of trader do you want to be?

This is an important step because you can’t do everything at once. Have a realistic goal and pick the best market that is complementary to your goal. You should not trade crypto if you have a hard time mastering your emotions. Some people can’t stop panicking when prices collapse. You know yourself best, can you master your emotions? Pick a strategy and market that fits your personality. Not everyone can be a day trader. You have to be a determined emotionless robot that trades consistently with predetermined strategies.

This is also tied with healthy personal finances and investing time. Because it’s much harder to become emotionally attached if you lose money you already know you can lose with no regrets. You need to invest big amounts of time to figure out and test trading strategies that are profitable on a consistent basis. If you want to be an investor buying stocks you need to know everything about fundamental analysis (reading and comparing income statements) and if you want to be a day trader you need to know everything about technical analysis (chart psychology and using several indicators). I got both covered in two in-depth guides you'll find on the next page..

Action: Do you have a clear vision want kind of trader or investor you want to be based on your goal?

5. Conclusion

Becoming a successful investor or day trader is hard. Especially if you have the goal of living your life as a trader making thousands of dollars a month. There is a simple reason why 95% of all investors and day traders fail: they have no clue what they are doing. If you want to be a successful investor or day trader you need to do exactly what successful investors and day traders are doing. Warren Buffet did not become the most successful investor in the world by occasionally looking at income statements. He’s been looking into financial data for the last seventy years (!) on a daily consistent basis. Just like athletes are busy with their sport all day every day. It’s a lifestyle. This is where the successful 5% is separated from the failing 95%. 95% fail because they only think about making $$$ and not putting in the time to find out why strategies work or not or blindly copy strategies while they have no idea how the strategie actually works.

This is not meant to scare you. Just be aware that making money with trading and investing is not a simple task. In the next chapter I'll guide you to the next steps.