Are you curious to know how much money day traders make? A quick glance at Instagram and Twitter shows numerous claims of day traders making thousands of dollars daily. Heck, one just posted profits of $115,000 in one day.
Or what about the penny stock trader who turned $12k into $5.4 million? I could name names, but you probably know who they are. Let’s say these returns are outside the norm but not outside of reach. Day trading can be a lucrative career if you use the right strategies and techniques.
Day Trading Course
Table of Contents
How Much Do Day Traders Make?
Do you know how much day traders make? This can vary depending on whether the person in question does it professionally or as a supplemental income. The average day trader typically makes $80,000 a year. However, there’s no easy answer to how much day traders make. Read more to find out how to be a successful day trader.
Day trading is buying and selling stock within the same trading day. A day trader aims to profit from the market’s daily moves.
Surprisingly, the moves don’t need to be big. You can make a substantial profit from a small stock price move. Unfortunately, many new traders are eager to win big, risking their hard-earned capital. According to the North American Securities Administrators Association, 9 out of 10-day traders lose money and eventually deplete their trading capital.
But, those who follow strict trading rules can easily make an income of over $100,000 per year or more.
Likewise, the national average salary for day traders who work for a company is $122,724 (source: Glassdoor). You can see below that this average varies based on where you work.
Salaries of Day Traders
- City Equity – $154, 260
- Bank Of America – $275, 000
- Morgan Stanley – $276,000
Does this answer the question of how much do day traders make? Remember, these are individual trading salaries.
Another consideration is that you can earn substantially more as a fund or hedge fund manager.
If you want to be your day trader, ensure you have good technicals. Tradestation indicators can work for you quite well.
COMPANY |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|
| DESCRIPTION | Trade stocks, options, futures, and crypto on a platform built for active traders. Tap into real-time market data with desktop, web, and mobile platforms | Leading online trading solutions for traders, investors and advisors, with direct global access to stocks, options, futures, currencies, bonds and funds | Get access to a powerful trading platform with unique customization tools, and technology built for performance and speed |
| HIGHLIGHTS | Ease of use • Great customer service • Solid order executions • Low commission fees • Good short locates Learn More | International • Ok customer service • Solid order executions • Low commission fees • Good short locates Learn More | Modern platform • Great customer service • Fast executions • High fees • Great short locates Learn More |
Salaries of Day Traders at Firms
If you’re wondering how many days traders make at a public firm, your guess is as good as mine. But, you will often find that top traders venture out to hedge funds.
I could give a few different reasons, but the main one would be the freedom to make their own trading decisions and the potential for sky-high pay.
It’s nothing for a top trader to out-earn their boss; I’m thinking of millions. Don’t forget that they have the best laptop for stock trading.
With the lure of lucrative returns, many are quick to jump in. But before you jump off the cliff, you need to ask yourself a few questions first.
Can I Make a Living Day Trading?
If you want to make a living at day trading, you must be good at it. That sounds simple. It’s not. It requires time and practice. How much do day traders make? You have to decide how much you want to make. Then, work towards that goal before going live. You can also decide what style you will trade—for example, trading outside stock market hours.
Some experts consider day trading to be a form of compulsive gambling. And they’re right, to a point. The roller-coaster excitement and the chance to make a fast buck are luring people into the profession more and more.
The desire for quick cash may leave inexperienced traders with a depleted bank account if they don’t properly manage their risk.
Like any undertaking in life, you must protect yourself at all costs. It’s common knowledge in casinos that the house always wins.
Luckily, if done skillfully and artfully, trading can put you in the position of the house. Your goal is to trade like a casino, so you know how to make money day trading.
A casino is not in the business of making predictions; they manage their risk and let their edge play out. So, how much do day traders make?
How to Be the Casino
Did you know that your position size is more important than your entry and exit points when day trading stocks?
Even if you have the best strategy on the planet, you will lose if you don’t manage your risk. You want a way to minimize losses, which is accomplished by following the 1% risk rule. The rule is simple: Don’t risk more than 1% of your account size. You take your account (whatever size it is) and multiply it by 1%.
Think of it like this: By risking only 1 percent, you must lose 100 trades in a row to wipe out your account. And if you happen to find yourself losing 100 trades in a row, it’s time to take a step back and reflect. How much day traders make depends on how they apply the 1% rule when buying stocks.
Mistakes That Hurt Traders
- A focus only on profit and losses and not on the process. If your strategy is sound, you only need to worry about the consistent execution of your trading plan, and your profits will take care of themselves. Summed up: follow your rules; more on that below.
- Constantly changing strategies. Learn one or two that work for you and master them. Bonus for reading this far: a list of strategies you can easily implement! You’re welcome.
If you want to be profitable and know how much ay traders make, ensure you have the best day trading system.
SERVICES |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|
| DESCRIPTION | Bullish Bears offer trade rooms in our Discord. Our chat rooms include penny stocks, large caps, options, and futures | We offer stock signals and trade alerts through our watch lists and Discord bots using Tradytics | Swing trade and day trade watch lists with hand-picked symbols that have the best chance of breakouts. These are stocks to watch |
| INCLUDED | Trading courses • Live streaming • Discord • Real Time Teaching • Scanners & Bots Trade Rooms | Watch lists • Symbols • Support and resistance levels • Discord bots and scanners Trade Alerts | Swing trade watchlist • Day trade watchlist • Alert levels mapped out • Watch lists updated daily Watch Lists |
Is It Profitable to Be a Day Trader?
How much do day traders make to be profitable? You have to decide for yourself how much you need to be profitable. Do you want to do this for a living? What are your expenses? Are you good enough at trading to cover those expenses? What happens if you have a bad week?
We can all learn to trade for a living if we want to, but we need the right rules and attitude. Traders who face the same opportunity must trade the same.
Personal feelings can’t interfere. Unfortunately, those proper rules and attitudes collide directly with fundamental human nature.
Sadly, many panics and sell when the market turns against them or hold on to losing trades for too long. Ensure you know the four tips new traders should follow to know how many days traders make.
“ You are not smarter than the market. You must follow your entry and exit rules based on your trading plan.”
Picking the Right Stocks
If you want to make a living day trading stocks, it is important to understand the qualities of a stock that make it a good candidate for day trading.
As a rule of thumb, these factors are liquidity and volatility. Liquidity in a stock allows you to buy and sell stock at a reasonable price easily.
Alternatively, volatility dictates the stock price range throughout the day. But remember, higher volatility brings a chance for greater profits but a higher risk of loss.
How much do day traders make? Does it depend on you knowing the intraday meaning? Intraday trading makes you a day trader.
Day Trade Watch List
Practice Makes Perfect
Let’s say we ask 100 random strangers to hit a fastball going 95 miles an hour. How many do you think would hit it? I would dare to say less than 0.5%.
Likewise, the same rule applies to trading stocks. What would happen if 80 out of 100 people never practiced trading and threw money into a brokerage account? I think you know the answer.
The real question is, how long does it take before a trader begins to make money? That depends on how much time and practice you put in. So before you up and quit your job, make sure you can turn a profit.
If you cannot make money trading a $5,000 account, you will not make money trading a $50,000 account. For these reasons, you need to practice in a simulator. You can’t expect to be raking in six figures a month immediately.
Final Thoughts: How Much Do Day Traders Make?
The lingering question remains: how much do day traders make? Some make enough to support their families. Some don’t make enough to cover their brokerage commissions.
Make no mistake; day trading is hard if you don’t have the proper rules and system. The moral of this story? Instead of focusing on how much money you can make day trading, focus on the process of making the right trades. Once you have your system in place, the money follows.
We understand that no two traders are alike. Luckily, Bullish Bears is in the business of tailoring systems for individual traders. Therefore, check out our day trading course.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can day traders make a lot of money? Yes, it's possible, but the reality is that most traders are not profitable. The best day traders can make six figures or more per year.
For a day trader to make 100k a year trading, they need to make $397 per day since there are 252 trading days. Most day traders are not profitable, though.
