YOUR GUIDE TO

This guide can help you get up and running with SwingTrader

in a few short minutes. Print it out or bookmark it, and call our

Customer Success Team at 800-831-2525 if you have questions

about your account.

Here’s how swing trading compares to two other popular trading strategies.

01 The Basics of Swing Trading

Swing trading is a stock trading strategy that takes advantage

of short-term price swings to generate profits. The idea is that smaller

gains, reinvested and compounded over time, can add up to big profits.

Q u i c k P r o f i t sL e s s s t r e s s L e s s a c t i v e ,

s l o w e r p r o f i t s .

Day trading relies on stocks being bought and sold within the same day, sometimes within hours or minutes. It’s very fast-paced and requires constant attention during market hours.

Swing trading is the sweet spot between position and day trading. It relies on quick trades (most fall within a 5 to 10-day timeframe) and smaller profit targets, compounded over and over.

Position traders hold stocks for weeks, months or years. The daily hands-on time commitment is low, but it can take a long time until you realize profits.

D ay T r a d i n g

S W I N G T r a d i n g

P o s i t i o n T r a d i n g

U lt r a - f a s t, l o t s o f e f f o r t

Hold stocks for a shorter period of time

Take smaller profits

Cut losses quicker

To enable alerts on your desktop

computer: Click “Allow” and you’ll receive

instant noti�cations.

02 The Keys to Swing Trading Success

Every morning, log on to swingtrader.investors.com to check the Market Action (found in the top-right corner of the SwingTrader homepage).

If the arrow is pointing sideways or down, this is a more risky time to trade, and you should approach trades cautiously.

Finally, pay attention to SwingTrader

alerts and be ready to take action

when you receive an alert.

When it says “Market in Uptrend”

and the arrow is pointing up, that

indicates it’s the most favorable

time to swing trade and generate

big profits.

Create a daily routine - the most important key to success with SwingTrader

After reviewing the Market Action, take a few minutes to look at the stocks on the Current Trades list at the bottom of the SwingTrader homepage.

Check out the charts, the buy zones, the profit goals and the stop losses.

SwingTrader typically locks in profits at 5-10% so you won’t

risk giving back your gains if you hold on too long and the

stock later reverses, which is called “roundtripping the trade.”

Swing trading success is all about having a plan before you

go into every trade. You want to know the exact price to pay

for the stock, the price to sell it for a profit or the time to

cut your losses and move on to another trade. SwingTrader

gives you all three in the Trade Setup area.

SwingTrader cuts losses quickly at 2-3% so you can move on and find

another stock that’s going up instead of down. Not every trade will work,

but holding on to a falling stock too long and trying to “hope” it back up

can make losses worse and hurt a portfolio.

02 The Keys to Swing Trading Success

If you buy and sell SwingTrader stocks as close to the optimal times that our

team recommends, you’ll have the best chance to maximize your profits and

minimize any drawdowns.

Plan your trade, trade your plan

Find the free SwingTrader

app in the App Store or

Google Play.

Since swing trading relies on speed and timing, we’ve created a free

SwingTrader app as a companion to the desktop experience. With the

app, you can receive instant trade alerts when a stock is added to

SwingTrader or when a stock reaches a buy/sell point.

02 The Keys to Swing Trading Success

Download the free mobile app

03 The System and the Strategy Behind SwingTrader

SwingTrader generates market-beating returns in part because it’s based

on the time-tested CAN SLIM® Investing System. This system was created

by legendary investor William O’Neil based on decades of research into

one question: What makes a winning stock?

O’Neil found that the best stocks throughout history shared seven

characteristics; these characteristics are each represented by one

letter in the acronym “CAN SLIM.” The system is designed for mainly

position trading, but by adapting its rules for a swing trading

environment, SwingTrader has a unique and powerful advantage that

no other swing trading product offers.

Many traders employ either fundamental analysis or technical analysis to guide their buy and

sell decisions. SwingTrader combines both: fundamental analysis to identify the stocks, and

technical analysis to determine when to enter and exit the trades.

relies on examining

stock charts for clues

about when to buy and

sell a stock.looks at the

underlying

attributes of the

companies behind

the stocks.

F u n d a m e n ta l

A n a lys i s

Technical

Analysis

SWINGTRADER

SWINGTRADER

Thu 10:31 AM

Thu 10:24 AM

We’ve got about a 2.5% profit in ITBand we’ll take 1/3 profit here at 57.48.

Starting a full position in CRWDAdding CRWD at 143.76 as it getsabove the Sept. 23 high. We’ll use a

For a video tour of the SwingTrader interface, go to

investors.com/swingtutorial

ENTRY POINT: Buy a stock when it’s in

the IBD® Buy Zone. If you enable desktop

notifications or download the mobile app, you’ll get

a Buy Alert when the stock reaches a price in the

IBD Buy Zone. Execute the trade with your broker

of choice.BUYING TIP FROM OUR EXPERTS Sometimes a stock

will jump in price quickly—or almost instantly—after a

SwingTrader Buy Alert is sent. If you receive an alert but the

stock is out of the IBD Buy Zone by the time you’re ready to

trade, don’t chase it. Wait to see if it comes back into the Buy

Zone, or move on to the next trade.

04 HOW TO USE SWINGTRADER

04 HOW TO USE SWINGTRADER

SELLING TIP FROM OUR EXPERTS Based on your risk

tolerance and trading style, you may not want to set a

hard stop-loss order with your broker based on the

SwingTrader Stop Loss. This is because our team will

sometimes wait until the end of the trading day before

issuing a Sell Alert to see if the stock rebounds above its

Stop Loss price. If you’re able to be flexible and wait for a Sell Alert

instead of setting a “hard stop,” you can avoid prematurely selling a stock

before it has a chance to rebound higher.

EXIT POINT: Sell a stock when it reaches

either the stop loss price or the profit goal price.

Keep in mind that we’ll send you alerts when

either of those prices are reached, but we may also

send an alert and advise you to sell a stock and take

partial profits along the way. This can vary

based on market conditions.

IBD Buy Zone

Profit Goal

Stop L os s

Buying the right amount of shares is almost as important as the

stock you’re buying. Too many, and you’re taking on more risk.

Too few, and you’re not generating the type of profits that grow

a portfolio rapidly.

How many shares should you buy?

For example, you receive a SwingTrader Buy Alert for a full position of

XYZ. Your swing trading portfolio is worth $100,000, and XYZ is currently

trading at $30.

If you wanted to make the trade, you would buy 300 shares of XYZ at

$30 to create a full position worth 9% of your overall portfolio ($9,000).

Now say you receive a Profit Goal alert the next day because the trade is

succeeding. The alert says to take 1/3 profit on the position – so you

would sell 100 shares, or 1/3 of your 300 shares.

04 HOW TO USE SWINGTRADER

Each full position on SwingTrader

represents 9%-12.5% of a total portfolio

Post-Analysis05

Open a daily stock chart for a past trade and mark the day and price

where you initially bought the stock, making note of how many shares

you purchased at that price. (Printing out the charts is very useful for

this, which you can do at investors.com or your charting platform of

choice, like MarketSmith).

Next, mark the point(s) where you sold the stock, either for a profit or

a loss. If you bought and sold several times (e.g. you take partial profits

on Tuesday, then sold the rest on Thursday) before closing the position,

note those days and prices as well.

Now, compare your chart to the SwingTrader chart for the trade, which

you can find by clicking on Past Trades in the navigation bar at the top

of the SwingTrader homepage.

Here’s how it works:

Post-analysis is the process of examining your past trades after they

have been closed to determine what you did right, where you may have

made mistakes, and what you can do to improve in the future.

Think of it like an athlete watching replays after

the game to gauge performance and correct mistakes:

they’re trying to improve for the next game by

watching the last one.

05 Post-Analysis

Did you buy close to the price

listed on SwingTrader? If you

bought above the buy zone, that

can decrease your overall profit on

a trade or increase losses if a trade

goes against you.

Did you hold the stock after the

sell price(s) listed on SwingTrader?

Holding onto a winning stock for too

long in the hopes that it continues to

climb can cause you to give back a lot

of the profits. The idea for

SwingTrader is to enter a trade,

make a quick profit and cash

in your winnings.

Of course, not every trade will succeed, even if you pay the optimal

price and sell at the right time. But by keeping your losses small and

reinvesting your gains, you can keep your portfolio growing.

ask yourself

As a SwingTrader member, you’re invited to join our monthly virtual

meetup, Scorecard! It’s a great opportunity to hear from the experts

behind SwingTrader and ask them questions. During these virtual

meetups, our experts will conduct post-analysis of SwingTrader

stocks from the past month and discuss big picture market trends.

Watch the experts conduct post-analysis every month and pick up some

tips on doing your own! At SwingTrader, we’re dedicated to helping you

improve your trading—and your bottom line.

We’ll post details of upcoming Scorecard meetups

(as well as a recording of last month’s meetup) in

the message bar at the top of the

SwingTrader homepage.

On behalf of everyone at Investor’s Business Daily®, thanks for being

a member!

-The SwingTrader Team

© 2020 Investor’s Business Daily, Inc. Investor’s Business Daily, IBD and CAN SLIM and corresponding logos are registered trademarks owned by Investor’s Business Daily, Inc.

05 Post-Analysis