Specific hours provide the greatest opportunity for trading, so trading only during day or night hours can help you maximize your efficiency. You need to find your own time: in many cases, even professional day traders tend to lose money outside of these ideal trading hours.
Let’s look and compare the charts from daytime and nighttime trading.
As a rule, the prices are more volatile during daytime and more stable during nights.
So, the daytime chart looks like this:
Trading during the first one to two hours that the stock market is open on any day is all many traders need. The first hour tends to be the most volatile, providing the most opportunity. Although it sounds harsh, professional traders know that a lot of “dumb money” is flowing at this time.
Many day-traders also trade the last hour of the day, from 3 to 4 p.m. ET. By that time, traders have had a long break since the morning session, allowing them to regroup and regain their focus.
The last several minutes of trading can be particularly active, with big moves on high volume.
And during night, you might see this:
If you choose your trading time wisely and apply relevant strategies, you will increase your profits at any time of the day or night!
Closing times for stock market exchanges vary. Major stock market exchanges are the Shanghai Stock Exchange, Swiss Exchange, London Stock Exchange, New York Stock Exchange, and Nasdaq.
Depending where you are, you will have to make an adjustment to the local time. Of course, all foreign stock exchanges have their own rules and hours of operation.
Here is a table with market times (in GMT) for major cities around the world:
We live in a global economy. And while many of the world’s largest publicly traded companies are based in China, Russia or Mexico, there are countless more that trade on stock exchanges based elsewhere.
Keep the bigger picture in mind, too, beyond the hourly grind. Monday afternoon is usually a good time to buy because the market historically tends to drop at the beginning of the week, particularly around the middle of the month. Many experts recommend selling on Friday before that Monday dip occurs, particularly if that Friday is the first day of a new month or when it precedes a three-day weekend.
