US stock market overview is for those who are new to the stock market and want to know about US stock market. In this blog I will explain the basics of US stock market, how to buy or sell a stock and some important facts about US stock market.
Introduction
Here are some stock trading basics that you need to know before you place a trade in the stock market if you do not know already. Stock Market Quotes or Bid and Ask Price A particular stock, also known as equity or share or any financial instruments you want to trade, have two prices attached to them at all times.
How to buy or sell stocks on US stock market
If you want to buy or otherwise known as long, you use the Ask price. If you want to sell or otherwise known as short, you use the Bid price.
The price you see quoted in most newspapers and free stock quotes websites if they are not mentioned is the middle price.
These are the Bid +Ask divided by two. Some stock brokers only quote the middle price when you want to trade with them, while others give you a Bid and Ask price.
Types Of Order Most stock brokers nowadays can offer more than stock trading basics orders. You can specify what price you want to enter & exit the trade.
How to manage orders on US stock market
This is a great way to enter the trade & you don’t need to keep watching whether the price is hit. You enter the trade via stop & a limit order.
For example, Vodafone is trading at 100p now. You want to buy it when it’s above 105p. You want to cut your losses when it drops below 95 and take your profit when it reaches 150p.
From your online stock trading account, you click on order, then change the order type from market to stop and enter 105 or 105.00 click or adjust to buy click on if done order type in a required sell stop-loss price as 95 or 95.00 type in required sell limit price to take profit as 150 or 150.00 leave expiratory to Good Till Cancel or Day if you want it to be valid for today only.
A buy or sell limit order, is an order to buy or sell at a better price. Say Vodafone now is @ 100p. You want to buy it when it drops to 80p. You place a buy limit of 80.
If you want to sell at a better price than 100, you place a sell limit order above 100.
Once you are in profit, you can adjust your stop loss to lock in a profit should it drop below your entry price. And of course, you can call your brokers to do these as well.
Facts that can affect the price of a stock
Stock Market News That Could Affect Stock Price You need to know when these stock trading basics market news are due before entering a trade, especially if you want to day trade.
I have seen stock prices & currencies often react violently on many occasions just before & after the news is released. This news is Economic data, such as GDP, Home Sales,s etc. Company reporting earnings.
Interest rate announcement & accompanying reports US Federal Reserve Ben Bernake speaks at Capital Hill Prices tend to rise if the news is better than expected & drop if they are bad. You can click here for the stock trading basics economic calendar.
When stock market will open and close
Also, you can get up-to-the-minute stock market basics news from Bloomberg or watch live Bloomberg tv. Click on the required channel for the country you are interested in. Stock Market Trading Hours Most stock market exchanges open @ 8 am & close @ 16:30.
I know this is basic stock trading, please check with your stock broker. It certainly caught me by surprise. Depending on what you trade, 24-hour stock trading especially spread betting on futures stocks, indexes, and currencies can be traded from Sunday at 11 pm GMT to Friday at 9:15 pm GMT.
Even though the market is officially closed, the trade is still open. After-hours stock trading can move against or for you at this time.
Also, for UK spread betting, if you don’t close your trade @ around 10pm GMT,on some sites like CMC markets.com & cityindex.com, your trade will be automatically rolled over to the next day.
How to trade with stock market trends
Trading against the stock market trends can cost you a fortune unless you know how to time the market. I will cover these under Elliot Waves, Delta & Market Matrix & some other simple strategies.
Generally, you need to trade in the direction of the market. You need to know where the stock market is generally going.
One simple way is to know what stock market stages we are in. You can also look at stock market charts. These charts basically plot the price of financial instruments like Google share price over a period of time.
You can get these free stock market charts from most stock trading websites. I usually use tradingview.com. It has both UK & US stock charts as well as some useful fundamental data. You need to register with them to access these free materials.