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The end of the year is here, and before the actual Christmas, New Year and CNY frenzy starts, there are shopping sales like 12.12 and later, Boxing Day sales, to look forward to. Naturally, it’ll be nice to have money to spend then!
However, with inflation still at a high, we’re all trying our best to save more and spend less. Argh, there goes our shopping dreams…or not?
For savvy investors, there’s one way to get hold of more cash — through maximising investments so they can ride out the high inflation while making some gains that can be used at the upcoming sales events and festive periods.
So how do we step up our investment game? We speak to the latest investment broker to hit Singapore shores, Webull, who has tips to help us go from Level 1 newbies to veteran Level 11 traders.
Level 1: Learn
In order to become a more profitable investor, you need to improve your investment knowledge. A platform that offers great learning materials is the way to go.
The Webull Learning Centre offers educational resources that will teach you more about topics such as growth stocks. The Webull Learning Centre’s resources are ideal for beginners and explain basic concepts in easy-to-understand language.
Note: If you’re an experienced trader, you can zoom directly ahead to Level 5 on this list for more advanced tips!
Level 2: Ask
When you have a burning question, don’t keep it to yourself! Ask the friendly users in the Webull community for their help or opinions. These friendly users comprise not just traders like you and me, but you’ll also be connected to experienced, global investors who offer their help and share their deep insights with the community.
Click the Community tab on the Webull Singapore mobile app and you can read and comment on other users’ posts on their favourite investments, tips and more. You can create your own posts so that other users can offer a second opinion, and set up polls so others can resolve your queries by voting.
Level 3: Monitor
Monitoring your assets such as stocks is the key to making sure you don’t miss golden opportunities. It can also be helpful for you to get a feel of the movement of assets you are eyeing or a way to monitor the general movement of the market (it’s pretty obvious when you login and everything you’re monitoring is all in the green, or in red as we’re seeing these days…).
Creating a watchlist that will enable you to keep tabs on your favourite stocks, like a “shortcut” list of sorts as well.
To create a watchlist on the Webull Singapore app, simply open the watchlist, click on the “three horizontal lines” icon on the left of “Symbol”, and then click all the watchlist items you want to see displayed on your watchlist.
Level 4: Practice
Before you’ve built up the skills and confidence to trade profitably, it’s a good idea to start with paper trading. Paper trading involves making simulated trades without using real money. This lets you test out various trading strategies to find out what works best for you without having to worry about losing money.
You can paper trade using Webull Singapore’s stock trading simulator, which lets you trade stocks virtually without using your funds. We did have some issues as paper trading didn’t allow us to execute more complicated trades, but it works fine for plain vanilla stock trades. You can check out our review here: 8 Things We Like (& Dislike) About the Webull App.
After you’re comfortable with paper trading, and when you are eventually ready to fund your account, remember to check out the funding promo below (Level 11 on this list).
Level 5: Observe
Stay abreast of market trends to ensure you can spot opportunities when they arise.
Check out the Markets page in the Webull Singapore app to access the latest market data and news. You’ll be able to see the top gainers and top losers, the most popular stocks and ETFs, and the top industries.
There’s also a heat map that lets you see at a glance the names and performance of the biggest stocks in key industries.
Level 6: Stay alert
To boost the profitability of your trades, it is important to seize opportunities when they arise.
One way you can heighten your chances of spotting and grabbing trading opportunities is to set alerts in the Webull app (yup, stay alert with alerts). You can programme alerts based on stock prices, price change %, price movement or strategy based on certain technical indicator conditions.
For instance, you can programme the app to send you notifications when particular stocks cross a certain price threshold. So, if you want to buy a particular stock when its price falls below, say, $10, you can set up a Webull Singapore alert to notify you when that happens.
Level 7: Get scientific
Trading apps like Webull Singapore have various indicators that can help traders identify trends on their price charts to make better trading decisions.
Indicators supported by Webull include Fibonacci, MACD, RSI, Bollinger Bands and many more.
For instance, Fibonacci lets you connect any two points on a price chart, such as a high and low point, and works out the ratios at which the price movement stalls or reverses.
Level 8: Get “live” updates
Being able to access updated prices in real-time is crucial if you want to be able to quickly jump into the market to take advantage of a fleeting trading opportunity or react at lightning-fast speed.
This is particularly important when you are trying to profit from small market movements. Especially with the current volatile market situation right now, the slightest lag in your quotes can eat into your profits (or even cause a loss) as you won’t be buying or selling at the price you think you are getting.
Webull Singapore offers live updates via their Nasdaq Level 2 TotalView (for stocks) and OPRA (for options) real-time quotes. By the way, it’s not a feature to be taken for granted. Not all brokers offer Level 2 real-time quotes, but Webull does!
Level 9: Use orders
Programming orders into your trades enables you to execute more sophisticated trading strategies. Some of the orders Webull supports include market, limit, stop, stop limit and Good ‘Til Cancelled (GTC). You can use this in tandem with Level 2 quotes to ensure you snag or sell your asset at the price you really wanted to.
- Market orders simply get the platform to execute a trade for you at the current market price.
- Limit orders trigger a trade when a limit price set by you is reached or exceeded. This is either a maximum price which triggers a buy order, or a minimum price which triggers a sell order.
- Stop orders trigger a trade when the price reaches a stop price entered by you.
- Stop limit orders let you limit your losses by setting a bottom line, and can be very useful for limiting risk.
- GTC orders are orders to buy or sell a stock that remain active until the order is completed or cancelled, enabling you to automate some routine transactions.
As you can see, orders really let you fine-tune how you buy and sell your stocks and can also help you manage risk and limit your losses.
Level 10: Use options trading & seize market opportunities
One of Webull Singapore’s strengths also lies in options trading. In fact, there’s a whole section on the Webull Singapore site dedicated to this type of derivatives trading. Investopedia also ranked it Best Broker for Low-Cost Options Trading.
For those not in the know, options trading can be a riskier kind of investing as you’re not buying or selling stock (part of the company), but a contract around the price of this asset. Essentially, you’re betting on whether its price will rise or fall, aka speculation.
You’ll be glad to know that the Webull Singapore app is packed with tools for experienced options traders, to help them seize market opportunities. These include real-time data (Options Price Reporting Authority (OPRA) and Cboe Streaming Market Indices (CSMI) and multiple order types (LIMIT, MARKET, STOP, STOP LIMIT).
Did we mention that Webull Singapore has 0 commission* and 0 platform fee as well?
Level 11: Maximise rewards
We’re all in the investment game to make money, so it makes sense to maximise what you get out of it.
Investment brokers like Webull Singapore run promos and offers all the time, so don’t forget to check their promotions often and claim as many rewards as you can.
For instance, Webull offers a funding reward when you open a new account. To qualify, simply fund it with at least 2,000 SGD, execute at least one stock or ETF trade and one options trade on the US market within 30 days. The rewards consist of 0 commission* trades for US and HK markets and 150 USD cash voucher.
Webull also offers a generous referral reward. The first 300 users who successfully refer 10 friends will get a USD2023 cash voucher*. MoneySmart readers will get an exclusive SGD15 as well. T&Cs apply.
Ready to take your investment game to the highest level possible? Consider downloading the Webull app as a platform to start learning, practising and trading today.
*Terms and Conditions apply. For detailed terms and conditions and full disclaimer, please refer to Webull’s website at https://www.webull.com.sg/. This advertisement has not been reviewed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore.