Are you ready to be #1?
Earnings season is just about over, and markets have just made fresh all-time highs. Bitcoin has skyrocketed back to everybody’s attention as it recently broke above $60,000 once again. It is also time for our Winter #1 Best Traders competition, sponsored by Cobra Trading! So, before we jump into the charts for February, we wanted to say a few words about how best to approach the #1 Best Trader Competition from an educational perspective.
The #1 Best Trader Competition gives you the opportunity to trade with live data on a the powerful DAS Trader Pro platform. The simulated data allows you to place trades while not risking real money. It also allows you to feel the tug of human emotions by having a real-world reward as the prize for the competition. This competition is better than ever, as we have Cobra Trading sponsoring the competition and offering additional prizes aside from free access to DAS Trader Pro and a visit to the Nasdaq market site for the closing bell ceremony in New York’s Time Square. The prizes offered in this competition are as follows:
- First Place: A Trading Computer, A short locate credit worth $1000, Access to DAS Trader Pro for 9-months and a private tour of the Nasdaq Market Site in NYC.
- Second Place: Dual Trading Monitors, A short locate credit worth $300, Access to DAS Trader Pro for 6-months and a private tour of the Nasdaq Market Site in NYC.
- Third Place: Stream Deck, A short locate credit worth $150, Access to DAS Trader Pro for 3-months and a private tour of the Nasdaq Market Site in NYC.
If you’re ready to try your hand in trading and for a chance to win these awesome prizes, be sure to sign-up today and use the discount code: dastrader50 at checkout to save $50 on the entry fee!
Advice on how to win the competition
With all that said, let’s jump into how the competition is best approached: it’s simple, trade it as if it were real money, so that whether or not you win the competition, you will get a tremendous trading experience from the educational process. In the #1 Best Traders competition everyone’s a winner if you approach the game as if it’s real. You learn consistency by sticking to your trading plan and making small gains or losses that accumulate over the duration of the competition. After years of hosting this competition, we have noticed that very often just being positive and not losing too much money at any time by following your traders’ risk rules gives you a good chance of making it into the top 10 by the end of the competition. Now, certainly increasing your risk, and therefore increasing your reward, as the competition comes to a close in the final two weeks, seems to be a good tactic for those that have managed to maintain positive P&L and stay in the top 10 trading positions. Also, remember that the competition is not over until it’s over; we’ve seen drastic turns of events even in the final days. We just want to reiterate that everybody is a winner from an educational perspective if you just approach the competition as a battle against yourself, meaning that if you just try to keep your trading plan consistent as if it was real money, at the end of the competition you will be a winner from the experiences gained.
Bitcoin & AI – The Talk of the Town
First off, let’s talk a little bit about the Nasdaq 100, as represented by the $QQQ, which has led the markets higher on the back of its star performer Nvidia, ($NVDA). No single stock represents the excitement around the potential uses of artificial intelligence more than Nvidia. With that said, the stock is up over 40% this year alone. This has carried the markets to new heights. This has also benefited other technology plays such as bitcoin, as represented by $GBTC.
$GBTC is an ETF that tracks the price of bitcoin, but bitcoin and cryptocurrency had a bit of game-changing news of its own, when the SEC allowed cryptocurrencies, and more specifically Bitcoin, to be included in exchange-traded funds, which dominate the markets and trading the way mutual funds did in the 1980s and 1990s.
Take Caution
Just a note of caution: when markets get to extremes like all-time highs, very often volatility increases as traders and investors start to worry about high valuations. Profit taking increases as traders and investors want to lock in gains. This sets up great volatility swings for short-term traders and sets the stage for what will surely be an interesting #1 Best Trader Competition! To our traders and future #1 Best Trader contestants: trade smart!
Written by Michael DiGioia, Director of Education
Mike is available for One-on-One Coaching. Learn More
