A Day in the Life of an Equity Trader
An Equity Trader actively trades the firm’s capital for profit. The primary responsibility is to execute intra-day trades on an advanced trading platform with the objective of making as much profit in the market as possible. On a daily basis there are many ups and downs for an Equity Trader. The following outlines a typical day for a trader in the Halifax office.
Note: All times are expressed in Atlantic Standard Time.
9:30 AM to 10:30 AM – Pre-market
Arrive at the office and start logging into my trader station and trading software. After making some minor modifications to my screen layout I make a trip to fill up my water bottle then check some emails. While I’m doing this I’m keeping my ears open for any interesting pre-market news on CNBC and BNN. I’ll spend the rest of my time until the opening bell reading news stories and chatting with other traders about symbols I’ll be watching for the day.
10:30 AM to 12:15 PM – Morning session
Every morning I love watching them ring the bell on the trading floor in New York. I can always feel myself getting excited when I hear it ring and I say to myself “So where am I going to make money today?”
For the first 30 minutes or so after the opening bell I tend to play things fairly conservatively. The early morning market tends to be relatively thin and as a result conditions can be quite volatile. The morning trading volume is decent, however, and opportunities are always there for the taking. I know that given the proper set-ups I can put together some highly profitable trades and capitalize on some of the volatility.
Today the EIA Petroleum Status Report is being released at 11:30AM. The report provides weekly information on petroleum inventories in the U.S. I spend a lot of time watching stocks in the oil industry and have been working on capturing quick price movements as the number is released. I’ve had success on some days in predicting these movements but today isn’t one of those days. I just haven’t been able to predict these movements with enough consistency so I think I’ll back off when the petroleum number is released from now on.
12:15 PM to 3:15 PM – Lunch session
During the lunch session trading volume really slows down. I always find it challenging to adjust my trading strategy to the lunchtime market conditions. Sometimes I can find good situations throughout the lunch session and I won’t stop trading the entire time. Today things are pretty slow and there isn’t anything really great that has caught my attention. Although I made a consistent number of trades throughout this session, I had plenty of time to grab lunch and read a few trading psychology articles.
3:15 PM to 5:00 PM – Afternoon session
The afternoon session is where things really start to pick up and is generally the most profitable part of the day. Trends and ranges have been established and top volume symbols have been identified. I can feel the energy on the floor as all the traders are back from lunch intensely focused on their LCD monitors. Some traders wear their emotions on their sleeve as they either pump their fists in the air in triumph or yell at the market for not doing what they wanted.
Today is a good day. This afternoon I noticed that Research in Motion (symbol “RIMM.NA” or “RIM.TO”) had been in an up trend all day long. This stock is usually too volatile for my liking but today the moves are much more predictable. Research in Motion has just announced the release of their new Blackberry model and the stock is doing heavy volume. I’m able to work bids, offers and short offers to pick tops and bottoms all afternoon with a high success rate.
5:00 PM – Market close
The market has closed and all my positions are closed for the day. It’s not more than five minutes after the close and I’m out the office door on my way home for the day. Tonight I’ll go over my trade lists and results. I’ll also keep a close eye on the news to learn what the “street” is saying. Tomorrow promises to be a busy day as a number of earnings announcements are scheduled and there is plenty of chatter about the upcoming Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting.
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