Is day trading on Coinbase profitable?

[chriswen]

Also note that you can both long and short which means you can profit off of any direction.

What are you left with if you open a short position and you never close it?

If the price goes too high you'll get margin called.

And with okcoin futures contracts expire.  You might have a weekly, biweekly  or quarterly contract.

When the contract expires it'll get settled against the index.

If the settlement price is lower than your entry price you make Bitcoins, if its higher then your entry price you lose Bitcoins.  If you get margin called you lose all your Bitcoins you used for the contract.

[DavidHume]

I've been watching the BTC price for what seems like forever.  Coinbase charges 1% in fees.  I figure if I can (for example) buy at $225 and sell at $228, then I've made over 1%.  It doesn't sound very hard.  I will have my coins instantly if I register my credit card on Coinbase, right?

EDIT: Plus then I get to spend more time reading the hilarity scrolling up the BTC-e trollbox.

Spread on coinbase is too large to be a viable trading platform.

[Orhan1337]

I use it all the time.

[chriswen]

I use it all the time.

Sure, how profitable are you?

If you really want to get profit from trading you need to use leverage on a liquid exchange.  Smaller spreads and lower fees help.

[bitcoinrocks]

So leverage basically makes your profit and loss increase faster than it would without leverage?

[Pentax]

I use it all the time.

Sure, how profitable are you?

If you really want to get profit from trading you need to use leverage on a liquid exchange.  Smaller spreads and lower fees help.

Yep.  Every nickel, every tick matters.

Fees add up fast, as does everything else.   When doing a cost analysis it is important to factor these things in. 

I've traded the commodities markets and lost money because the fees ate the profit on the position.  I'm sure others have as well.  Look at all the numbers involved before doing anything.

Learn how to trade, how to read charts, etc.  That's boring stuff but will save tons of money in the long haul.  If people do not, they are at a relative disadvantage and will eventually be eaten the vast majority of the time.

[chriswen]

I use it all the time.

Sure, how profitable are you?

If you really want to get profit from trading you need to use leverage on a liquid exchange.  Smaller spreads and lower fees help.

Yep.  Every nickel, every tick matters.

Fees add up fast, as does everything else.   When doing a cost analysis it is important to factor these things in. 

I've traded the commodities markets and lost money because the fees ate the profit on the position.  I'm sure others have as well.  Look at all the numbers involved before doing anything.

Learn how to trade, how to read charts, etc.  That's boring stuff but will save tons of money in the long haul.  If people do not, they are at a relative disadvantage and will eventually be eaten the vast majority of the time.

What's interesting is that futures with 0.03%, their fees can also add up.  Especially with the leverage you can use.  There's someone on tradingview who's quite an active scalper that was able to rack up 21 BTC in fees.

[BTCjust]

daytrade is batter to trading on other exchanges for more profits, here are more choose https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=695082.0

[AwesomeTRADER]

I've been watching the BTC price for what seems like forever.  Coinbase charges 1% in fees.  I figure if I can (for example) buy at $225 and sell at $228, then I've made over 1%.  It doesn't sound very hard.  I will have my coins instantly if I register my credit card on Coinbase, right?

EDIT: Plus then I get to spend more time reading the hilarity scrolling up the BTC-e trollbox.

Trading doesnt sound very hard.  just increase your balance 1% a day and you're rich!

The catch is that its very hard to win consistently.  The days where you lose will
make it like taking 1 step forward 1 step back...add in the 1% fees and you
start to see its not so easy.

Yes, every day cant be lucky for you, I've experienced stuff like this, and though I made some money, I couldn't make it everyday.

[chriswen]

So leverage basically makes your profit and loss increase faster than it would without leverage?

exactly, its a good tool to use.

[Mt. Gox]

So leverage basically makes your profit and loss increase faster than it would without leverage?

exactly, its a good tool to use.

What leverage does is it amplifies risk and reward. You stand to gain much more with leverage but you also stand to lose much more as well. With 10x leverage and $1,000, your effective trading position would be $10,000. Because of this, a 10% drop would be enough to completely wipe your balance out (since 10% of $10,000 is $1,000) but on the other hand, a 10% rise would end up doubling your money (from $1,000 to $2,000).

[Amph]

So leverage basically makes your profit and loss increase faster than it would without leverage?

exactly, its a good tool to use.

What leverage does is it amplifies risk and reward. You stand to gain much more with leverage but you also stand to lose much more as well. With 10x leverage and $1,000, your effective trading position would be $10,000. Because of this, a 10% drop would be enough to completely wipe your balance out (since 10% of $10,000 is $1,000) but on the other hand, a 10% rise would end up doubling your money (from $1,000 to $2,000).

but there is one thing to mention, the fact that with another leverage you can pay the previous one until you regain the lost money, but in this way you are building a continuos debits, thus raising the over all risk

still the best option for professional traders that are shorting all the time

[Bitcoin_BOy$]

Hello , Coinbase problem is the verification that take on funding option sometimes you will
need to send some money to your account via Bank , but they will take a lot of time to
confirm it , at that time you may loose if you buy or the market can made changes .

Bitcoin Boy .

[Mt. Gox]

Hello , Coinbase problem is the verification that take on funding option sometimes you will
need to send some money to your account via Bank , but they will take a lot of time to
confirm it , at that time you may loose if you buy or the market can made changes .

Bitcoin Boy .

I admit I've never used Coinbase before but with day trading, I would think that your balance (both fiat and USD) would already be stored in the exchange itself with buy and sell orders being placed seconds after submitting them. So after the verification process and initial deposit, you would rarely need to send fiat to the exchange from your bank account, no?

[Bitcoin_BOy$]

Hello , Coinbase problem is the verification that take on funding option sometimes you will
need to send some money to your account via Bank , but they will take a lot of time to
confirm it , at that time you may loose if you buy or the market can made changes .

Bitcoin Boy .

I admit I've never used Coinbase before but with day trading, I would think that your balance (both fiat and USD) would already be stored in the exchange itself with buy and sell orders being placed seconds after submitting them. So after the verification process and initial deposit, you would rarely need to send fiat to the exchange from your bank account, no?

You may have right , but don't forget that the price may be go down in a day you don't have
fund , and you are needing to buy urgent cause you know that you will earn a lot, so that
the verification process will burn your profit if you send from bank again

But I can agree too with what you say .

Bitcoin Boy .

[Mt. Gox]

Hello , Coinbase problem is the verification that take on funding option sometimes you will
need to send some money to your account via Bank , but they will take a lot of time to
confirm it , at that time you may loose if you buy or the market can made changes .

Bitcoin Boy .

I admit I've never used Coinbase before but with day trading, I would think that your balance (both fiat and USD) would already be stored in the exchange itself with buy and sell orders being placed seconds after submitting them. So after the verification process and initial deposit, you would rarely need to send fiat to the exchange from your bank account, no?

You may have right , but don't forget that the price may be go down in a day you don't have
fund , and you are needing to buy urgent cause you know that you will earn a lot, so that
the verification process will burn your profit if you send from bank again

But I can agree too with what you say .

Bitcoin Boy .

I see what you mean. The only exchange I've ever used was BTC-e and I remember they had a variety of options for transferring fiat and some were supposed to be faster than others so that might be something worth looking into. I think 3 days is usually the standard time it takes for funds to be transferred from a bank account to an exchange. In any case, it's probably a good idea to keep some USD on the exchange for situations like those.

[Buttknuckle]

I have spent a few days looking at different exchanges, and the prices seem to be different at coinbase.  Their spreads are larger too.  I get the feeling that they will take a bigger chunk regardless of how small their fees are.

I chose them to buy coins because they had a pretty easy and cheap way to transfer from bank.  However after looking at other options I wonder if paying a higher fee up front might have saved me money.  Sure the fee is "only" 1% to send money from the bank, but after I bought I noticed that the price of btc was about a buck lower at btc-e.  In any case I am only using them to buy the coins, any other trading type stuff will be done on a better exchange.

I have been doing this a short time only, but I have been trading in stocks for a long time.  Sometimes execution speed and smaller spreads are more important than trading fees.

[kinnu]

If you have good strategy and knowledge then day trading is always profitable otherwise it will erode your account balance. Benefits of daytrading is no overnight tension.

[chriswen]

Also one thing to learn is that you don't always need to be in a position.  Currently we're mostly going sideways with chop, we're not in a trending market.  As a trader you don't need to trade this.

[PenguinFire]

Unless you have much experience I don't think it is.  Obviously there is a risk which is why I wouldn't advise most people to give it a go.