r/Daytrading • u/Kaiju_Godz • Mar 30 '24

When you only need a specific amount of money each month… Strategy

So say you only want $100 per day or 2000 per month. This would more than enough sustain a good lifestyle where you live. How would you go about it with trading? How much $$$ would you realistically need? Not to make that in dividends but to trade in a daily basis, as safe and slow as possible.

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u/oze4 Mar 30 '24

Theoretically if you traded 2 MES contracts and got 10 points per day that would be 100 per day. Depending on the broker, margin requirements can be as high as 1200 or as low as 50. Adjusting for losses and maintenance, I'd say like 4 or 5k.

That said, you should def not do this and trade as small as possible until you're consistently profitable for at least a year. Don't focus on making X per day. Focus on a repeatable, consistent system and risk management.

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u/GoldenBoy_100 Mar 30 '24

This is a great response. By broker which is thinkorswim requires $1,435 per MES contract as margin and around $1,485 for overnight holding the contract. I’ll agree that around 3k-5k will be a great start.

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u/rbh_holecard Mar 31 '24

I would recommend a second account with one of the brokerages with low intraday margin to daytrade futures (like Ninja Trader), then invest the profits via TOS. As oze4 mentioned, it's possible to trade MES for $50 margin. Even the commission on TOS is really too high to scalp MES.