The odds are you will lose. 93% of traders lose money overall. I suspect the 7% that make any money could have made more using a buy and hold strategy. Day trading is a game stacked against you because of the commission scheduals. Even if you're only forking $9.99 for Datak trades, you're still looking at a major drag on your earnings, especially if you're working with less than $100,000. The less money you have, the bigger the commission bite.

Online trading has other pitfalls beside the obvious potential to lose your '79 Pinto. It can become an addiction, and the internet can become a substitute for work and family. You may not be able to leave your computer monitor for 10 minutes for fear that you will miss a hot stock or your position may downtick. If your streaming quotes go down, you'll wet yourself. If you make a bad trade or fall behind in a position, you might "double up" or over-trade, trying to make it back all at once. These are symptoms of compulsive gambling.

And then there are taxes. 40% on your short term gains, 20% on stocks held at least one year. If you hold at stock for 5 years or more, uncle Sammy takes only 18%. Further, you can only deduct $3000 per year in losses -- the rest have to be carried over to future years. All this adds up to pretty good odds that you'll lose your shirt, your car, your wife, and your girlfriend.

Don't worry though, you can still say "I made a full point on the closing shorts" at all those office parties. Just don't tell them that after the 40% tax bite and commissions, you've lost money. Tell them the Pinto exploded in the driveway.