Learn how to identify zombie companies with key indicators like poor cash flow, problematic debt, and stagnant sales. Protect your investments with these tips.
Premarket and after-market trading hours might be keeping you up at night. Here's why traders should consider trading in the late hours before the sun comes up.
Using stock chart indicators with buy and sell signals can help your trading decisions. Here are three charting tools to consider when you run into false signals.
What is forex trading? The forex and equity markets have several similarities but also a few differences. Learn the differences between these assets, the basics of forex trading, and see examples of forex trading.
Looking to use more platforms for your trading? thinkorswim desktop, Web, and mobile are all synced, so anything you set up on one will show up across the suite.
Selling call and put options can be risky, but when used wisely, experienced traders can pursue investment objectives. Discover the basics of shorting options.
Traders can use the beta-weighting tool on the thinkorswim® platform to view the overall risk of all their positions as a whole instead of looking at risks of individual assets.
The value of an option tends to decay as expiration approaches. Discover what is theta in options, and learn about three options trading strategies that target time decay, also known as theta decay.
Learning how to trade stocks can seem complex. TD Ameritrade helps simplify the hoops that traders and investors need to jump through to get the trading education they need.
Suppose you buy a call option at a given strike price. Now what? The Theoretical Price tool on thinkorswim can help you assess what it could mean for your trade if the underlying stock reaches your price target by a certain date, if it goes the other way, if implied volatility changes, and more.
Learn how to use the Volume Profile indicator on the thinkorswim® platform to help identify potential support and resistance levels.
A stochastic oscillator is designed to identify overbought or oversold stock. The indicator can be used to help identify potentially overbought and oversold conditions, divergences, and trend direction.
Learn how the Risk Profile tool in the thinkorswim platform can help options traders visualize different scenarios and make trading decisions a little simpler.
What is fintech? It is short for financial technology, and the future of fintech could mean massive changes in banking, investing, and everyday transactions.
We often hear about traders selling options. But why (or when) might a trader buy options?
There are many ways a trade can play out. How do you prepare yourself? You might consider Price Slices, thinkBack, and onDemand on thinkorswim.
Have you been paper trading on a simulator? Is it time for the real deal? It’s not just about money; it’s also about emotion. Here’s what you should know about paper trading vs. live trading.
Learn how investors can use seasonality charts to potentially identify stock trends.
Trading futures in an individual retirement account (IRA) comes with benefits as well as risks and limitations. Here’s what you need to know.
Learn how the thinkorswim Mobile Company Profile tool can help investors discover what's creating a company's value.
Volume is an important technical indicator to pay attention to. Understanding the relationship between price and volume can be a useful skill for both day traders and long-term investors.
When you’re looking for critical information about your trading accounts, account positions, and how your positions are doing, you want to have the key data points at your fingertips. The Monitor tab on thinkorswim® allows you to access this information.
Is the market pricing in a greater-than-typical move in a stock? Check the Market Maker Move indicator on thinkorswim®. Its magnitude can help inform your trading decisions.
If an options position isn’t going the way you thought it would, you might consider rolling it using the thinkorswim Strategy Roller®. It could take out some of the guesswork for when and how to roll options positions.
The Market Maker Move (MMM) indicates the expected magnitude of an upcoming move such as earnings. It can provide some useful info that you can use when trading options.
Learn how to use some of the essential tools on the thinkorswim platform and understand how to add technical indicators to charts, maintain watchlists, place trades, and monitor positions.
Consider using company cash flow data as you survey stock investments. It’s a basic, fundamental measure of potential earnings and dividend growth.
The housing market has historically been a bellwether of the stock market and of the economy in general. Learn about housing starts, building permits, and other indicators that can help investors assess the state of the housing market.
Looking to pick stocks worth trading? You can lay the groundwork for a sound stock selection strategy with a few relatively simple components.
Looking for a trading simulator? Try paperMoney®, the free stock market simulator from TD Ameritrade. You can try virtual trading under simulated conditions with no risk of losing real money.
Explore options statistics on thinkorswim—implied & historical vol and percentiles, the Sizzle Index, and the put/call ratio. Learn how options stats can help traders and investors make more informed decisions.
thinkorswim has developed an interface dedicated to researching the effects that earnings announcements have on the prices of stocks and options.
Options trading involves risk, but these risks can be analyzed, monitored, and simulated with the thinkorswim® Risk Profile tool.
Yearning for a chart indicator that doesn't exist yet? Why not write it yourself? All it takes is knowing your thinkScript® ABCs.
Learn the thinkorswim platform's Order Entry tool and how multi-leg trades, or option spreads, can make sense for qualified traders during earnings season.
Trend direction and volatility are two variables an option trader relies on. Combining trend following, momentum, and trend reversal indicators on the thinkorswim platform may help you determine which direction prices may be moving and with how much momentum.
Traders sometimes talk glowingly about thrilling options trading strategies without considering the risks. There are some alternative strategies such as short out-of-the-money verticals that you could consider to better manage your risks.
Maybe volatility is low and you believe a breakout is about to happen. But you don’t know which direction price will move. Or maybe you believe the markets are high and you don’t know when they might fall. What options strategies could you trade?
Trading bond futures may not be as risky as you think. A step-by-step guide that explains bond futures contract specs, pricing, and margin can go a long way. Walk through a 10-day bond trade and get a feel for day-to-day price action in the bond futures markets.
Trade certain securities 24 hours a day, five days a week, excluding market holidays, with TD Ameritrade.
Learn about the three basic trading chart types and their advantages: line charts, bar charts, and candlestick charts.
New advanced time frame tools and extended data for charts may help traders and investors get an edge in the markets.
With the earnings calendar tools available on the TD Ameritrade thinkorswim Platform, you can be in the know when it comes to the earnings season.
Fundamentals research is a core strategy for many traders and the thinkorswim platform makes it easy for traders to browse research in a time-efficient manner
With the scan tool traders can choose from and modify hundreds of predefined scans or create custom scans based your their search criteria.
Some economic indicators create more noise than others—learn to create trading strategies based on how markets might react to economic data.
Learn how new drawing tools on thinkorswim can make custom drawing and annotation simple and easily accessible.
The Company Profile tool uncovers what drives a company's value, tests different scenarios, and helps make trading decisions.
Thinking of some liquid assets for your portfolio? Booze stocks may fit the bill.
You know what they day: practice makes perfect! Improve your trading skills by practicing with thinkorswim's paperMoney.
Investment in alternative energy companies and ETFs may offer rewards, but also come with risks. Here are some considerations.
Managing risk variables you didn’t know you could control—lessons learned in 2016 about direction, time, and vol, and what mistakes to avoid this year.
TD Ameritrade is giving you the ability to create your very own candlestick pattern in their latest thinkorswim platform release.
We've all heard the adage, "buy low-sell high," but what about buying high and potentially selling higher?
Arbitrary entry and exit points in futures trading can be futile—learn how to place your trades using a price range based on volatility and probability.
Investors feeling flooded by all the data generated every day may want to try a new tool that puts all the numbers in one place for comparison and easier unde
The S&P 500 finished August with one of its smallest monthly trading ranges. Learn how the Market Forecast indicator might help you make sense of these ranges
Coffee may wake you up in the morning, and coffee can perk up a portfolio, too. Learn how investors can gain exposure to coffee and diversify a portfolio.
Having trouble selecting a strike price for an options trade? Learn how the Risk Profile tool can help select options that align with your trading strategies.
Earnings—a quarterly company check-up— are one of the most important “known” events that allow traders to align a strategy on the thinkorswim platform.
thinkorswim has been completely redesigned in its upcoming reskin, and it's more than just a pretty face.
Trying to time the market? Add sentiment analysis to your stock trading approach to help narrow the time horizon around an underlying security’s move.
To gauge a stock trend, it's all in the charts. But what about its options? You may not be trading options, but ignore them, and you may be missing the bigger picture.
Traders often think of options in small denominations because that’s how the bid/ask quotes appear. But beginning investors in particular must remember to use a 100x multiplier to help determine correct position sizes.
How to build a chart that displays the ratio of the Dow Jones Industrial average to the price of gold using thinkScript in the thinkorswim platform by TD Ameritrade
Fundamental analysis for momentum traders is easier with the new Fundamentals page for thinkorswim®.
Fundamental analysis for momentum traders is easy with thinkorswim’s new Fundamental page.
Our chief market strategist breaks down the day's top business stories and offers insight on how they might impact your trading and investing.
thinkorswim platform’s ® Today’s Options Statistics divvies up the market by call and put volume, delta values, historical volatility, and more.
When calculating risk, you can use all kinds of tools to compare a stock's current volatility to its past volatility. However, one of our favorites is fast beta.
If you're new to trading futures, keep your eye on three critical reports: Petroleum Status Report, U.S. Treasury Auctions, and USDA Crop Reports. Here's why.
Quick Links
Trade
Invest
Service
Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information
Content intended for educational/informational purposes only. Not investment advice, or a recommendation of any security, strategy, or account type.
Be sure to understand all risks involved with each strategy, including commission costs, before attempting to place any trade. Clients must consider all relevant risk factors, including their own personal financial situations, before trading.
Market volatility, volume, and system availability may delay account access and trade executions.
Past performance of a security or strategy does not guarantee future results or success.
Options are not suitable for all investors as the special risks inherent to options trading may expose investors to potentially rapid and substantial losses. Options trading subject to TD Ameritrade review and approval. Please read Characteristics and Risks of Standardized Options before investing in options.
Supporting documentation for any claims, comparisons, statistics, or other technical data will be supplied upon request.
This is not an offer or solicitation in any jurisdiction where we are not authorized to do business or where such offer or solicitation would be contrary to the local laws and regulations of that jurisdiction, including, but not limited to persons residing in Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, UK, and the countries of the European Union.
TD Ameritrade, Inc., member FINRA/SIPC, a subsidiary of The Charles Schwab Corporation. TD Ameritrade is a trademark jointly owned by TD Ameritrade IP Company, Inc. and The Toronto-Dominion Bank. © 2023 Charles Schwab & Co. Inc. All rights reserved.