How much money do you need to begin trading stocks and actually make some money?

Question

Make some money in 6 months?

Answer 1

If you need a strategy for making a significant amount of money in 6 months- investing in Stocks is not appropriate for you. - You'd be better off with Lottery tickets.

You would not have either enough time, nor enough capital to do this- you would end up with a very undiversified portfolio and a "all or nothing" strategy, whihc you would almost certainly lose on- commissions and fees alone would put you in the red from the start.

Try a buying a short term CD at the bank, or a money market account or Mutual Fund if you are serious about learning and long term investing

Answer 2

The problem with the stock market is that its really unpredictable over the short term. It could easily go up 10% or more over the next six months, but it could just as easily drop by the same amount.

If you need money in that time its probably safer to just buy money markets.

If you're interested in investing in general though, you don't need a minimum amount of money to open an online brokerage account generally. However make sure the broker you choose doesn't charge an account maintenance fee just for holding an account, because that can be a big expense for small accounts. I think Scottrade and Tradeking don't do this.

Answer 3

Making $$$ in the market is more a factor of choosing the right stocks than starting with X amount of money.

Virtually any investment (except a money market fund) can lose money with 6 months. There are no sure things.

Answer 4

You can make money immediately if you're in the right stocks but it's all relative. If you have $50 and make a return of 10 percent (which is great in 6 months) that's still just $5 in your pocket BEFORE commissions.

But, I started very small and over time built a large portfolio on BuyandHold.com, which I highly recommend.

check out my blog http://everincreasingwealth.blogspot.com/

Answer 5

If you go to a stock broker allot of them will have a pretty high minimum because they need to make their percentage, I checked a few years ago (in Canada) they had a minimum of $2000.

If you do it online, like at etrade.com, I think they have lower minimums because they deal with so many people.

As for the actually making some money part, thats up to your stock picks and how they perform and when you sell them.

Answer 6

Depends on how much you have, how much risk you want to take, how much you want to make etc.

If you have a decent starting position, good knowledge of the stocks you are trading in and an eye for seeing trends to get in and out at the right time, you can definitely make money quickly.

Answer 7

$5.00 USD.