Is it worth it to start to trade as a 15 year old with only 100 dollars abvailable to spend?

I think you should start with demo . But treat it like a real acct . I don’t recommend using real money . Or a small prop firm acct like maybe apes when they have this 90% sell . A 25k acct is like $15 .. if you can’t pass an apex and get funded then cash out . Stop and demo trade more DONT keep buying more prop firm accts .

Gotta be 18 to invest. I wanted to start at 14 but had to wait a long 4 years. Had 20k at 17 from working and couldn’t do shit with it until I turned 18. The U.S. is bs with their age limits

I think thats illegal

Do 15 year olds pay capital gains tax? If not imma adopt a kid and open a trading account in their name.

Paper trade. For now work n save. Start a lil business like cleaning things, moving things, etc

Start paper trading if you like gambling and loosing your then you can start trading with $100 or if your making your first trade and trynna learn the options market and how they move

You’re 15, you have PLENTY of time to learn how to trade , your future self will thank you . Don’t ever give up and learn how to JOURNAL it is a necessity.

Start investing in index funds like SPY or QQQ. Then take some fun money say 20% of your portfolio to just trade and learn.

So start by paper trading.

Honestly man I would wait a year until your 16, then get a job and try to start with a couple thousand.

I love how half the comments are like “don’t gamble your life savings!!”.

Look put it all in an option and you’ll be giving advice like everyone else here before you know it. 

You are 15, if I could go back and tell my 15 year old self any advice about trading, I would say it is gambling and to just invest.

You have the opportunity to really set yourself up well by starting at such a young age, most people don’t realize until they are in their mid 20’s how easy it would have been to put away a few bucks a day

Who else would market makers sell GME 6/28 125c to at 1000% IV?

Leverage that $100 into $1000. Then start trading.

No I would invest instead.

Just paper trade until you're both: 18 AND a goddamn master=profit.

Yes it definitely is with these caveats:

-Do not risk any money until you have a model or strategy which you have proven probability for

• explore prop firms to increase level leverage with minimal capital risk

• get a really good mentor and commit at least 6 months of very deep study, and I mean deep as in it comes before anything in your life

YES do it while working, learn, and u can be rich at 20 something unlike me. If I started at ur point at 17 like I said to do I would’ve been a millionaire but I didn’t do it. Learn from YouTube Ricky Gutierrez and others mark minervini look for upward momentum, you got it man don’t make the same mistake I did

It's next to impossible to consistently beat 10% growth per year trading. So if you want to turn your $100 into $110 (minus fees) by next summer, then sure.

Takes money to make money. If you want more, you should get a summer job.

No it’s not

No. Go get a job and work on gaining skills that will help you later on when you become an adult. Save that money, put it into something boring like a low-cost index fund or BRK.B and just save and study. Do the paper trading thing on the side if you really want to learn, but just know that if you wanna do it right, you better be picking up books. If not, then you’re just gonna be gambling your money away. Don’t be stupid.

No.
Just paper trade. And when you're down $30,000 of paper money, you'll be glad you did.

Learn a strategy and master it on paper. Absolutely no reason for you to risk capital right now if you have $100. There is a 100% chance you will lose it.
i mean that. 100% chance.

Start with paper trading to get an understanding of it. Come up with a strategy, follow your rules and journal your results. Also follow strict risk management. Try to learn from your mistakes and keep making slight adjustments to your strategy until you find that you’re consistently profitable, and then once you’re ready, start trading. This whole process won’t be quick and should take a few months minimum. In the meantime you should try to save up more money on the side so that you can have more capital to work with. Let’s say you save up $1000 by the time you’re ready. I would still start out slowly by only funding the account with $100 to make sure your strategy is still working and if you can properly manage your emotions when real money is on the line. If it does then keep scaling in until your full $1000 is in.

Remember this is a marathon not a sprint. If you’re looking for a get rich quick scheme trading is not going to be it. Unless you’re planning on taking on huge risk which in that case is just gambling. Also don’t set huge unrealistic expectations for yourself. Most hedge funds return around 10% a year, and they’re a lot smarter than you are so don’t expect to instantly start making 10% a week. More than anything just focus on being consistent and profitable and go from there. Always keep learning

Yes given that you have at least a mild interest in it. As long as you can get “addicted” to learning and this “game” of trading then it will probably be lucrative for you to invest most of your time into it.

All the young millionaire retails traders under 25 started around this age (forex). If you take it seriously and find success you’ll most likely find it at a very young age and be richer than most people (younger and older). I wish I started that young but I was focused on sports which I don’t regret but it is what it is. The majority of the young millionaires I know of, started focusing on money around 14-17. Most young people (at least in the middle class and above aren’t focused on money around this age). The fact that it’s caught your attention now is promising.

I suggest buying courses off of a pirated site (shame on me) but courses these days are expensive and saving up small amounts of money to afford them will just delay you. Also some courses just aren’t good so this will save you money that would’ve been wasted trying to find the good ones.

There are sites where you can get access to hundreds of good premium courses for free just for a one time payment of $25 to get a membership. A resource like that is literally invaluable to someone starting out with hardly any money. You’ll save so much time. Before I knew about these I paid for courses and I have no regrets and will absolutely pay for a course if I have the money. But it took a lot of time to save and I was broke because they are pricey (expect mid 3 to 4 figures) and some courses require you to pay for a subscription so it’s tough.

There are also similar sites for books and what not as you’ll probably end up wanting to buy self improvement books too that could shift your mindset in an ideal direction as well. Good luck. You’ll probably want to get a job to keep money coming in because of you’re trading forex or options you’re likely to blow the $100 you have—which is totally okay and to be expected. You just wanna be able to replace it. A lot of people on here are going to tell you to trade with fake money but real money is going to prepare you more imo. Personally, I came from the gambling world so I was pretty numb to losing money already which I think makes me a better trader but that’s my take.

Focus on what’s simple and beware of exposing yourself to too many strategies and schools of thought. I personally only learn from about 2-4 people but when I started it was just 1 guy I got my foundational understanding from.

Yes, now is the perfect time to learn. You probably will lose all $100. In a few years, when you have a job, you will have a better idea how to invest your savings.

Paper trading while you have the time!!!

I wish I started from 15 and had the time to backtest my strategies before committing to something with real money that has an edge

As a 15 yr old, maybe do this. Put $45 per month or bi-weekly into an index fund tied to the S&P. Something like VOO or VFV if you’re Canadian. Do this regularly and avoid looking at peaks and valleys. Just add to it regularly. The compound interest and growth you’d likely see will make you a millionaire before retirement. Just never pull it out. You can buy partial amounts though E*Trade or fidelity in the states or wealth simple in Canada.

Buy a book. Learn theory. Then do paper trading. Loads of backtesting.

There are two kinds of people: those who go live before they have mastered the game. 90% of those lose money. And those who master the theory and backrest their strategies and only jump into the pool when they have mastered the art of swimming. Most of those make lots of money.

why don’t you stick to learning matrix math, calculus, and probability before wasting your money and time

i would do it only if you are interested and might want to pursue this in the future. needing to make money to buy things is a bad mindset to have as even experienced traders lose money everyday. Im 16 right now trading stocks because i want to get into IB in the future, and i find it really interesting. But i look at % rather than how much money i’ve made because that’s most important to me. If you really want to make money with that $100 the only thing i would suggest (NOT FINANCIAL ADVICE) would be sports betting on a normal app or 2-man bets on prize picks which is STILL GAMBLING, but if you have a sport you like watching you could potentially make money from your knowledge. This would be a better way to MAYBE make money, but i would not partake in the stock market if you are just starting and need to make money.

Don’t try to trade, only buy stocks and assets you like and hold them for many years. That is the advice I would give myself if I could go back 20 years and would have made a shitload of money compared to trading which is just gambling.

how are you gonna have an account when they ask your id everywhere? and without any knowledge of trading

I mean it's a good thing you can learn at this age

Don’t use your real money, you will loose a lot before u make money. But if you stick with it you can make money 😄

You can do paper trading with a trading view account. I don't know where you can trade under the age of 18.

When starting out, don’t think about the monetary value of it. Take the next 1-3 years studying and back testing strategies. Test theories with whatever amount of capital that you’re 100% okay with losing. If you test with unrealistic money you’ll find yourself getting numb to the numbers on the screen. And especially since there is no skin in the game it’s very easy to get false confidence. Finding a strategy that works for you is just the tip of the ice berg. The reason why over 90% of traders fail is because of emotion and mentality. The hardest part to master is discipline and sticking to your strategy and not revenge trade. I discovered the financial market journey at the same age, it’s a blessing. Don’t let it go to waste. You got this💪

Yes it is!

Buy in! Forget it for a year

Never use real money when starting out. You need to backtest your strategy on a demo to make sure that your strategy works. If it works consistently like for a month you can then use real money.

I wish someone told me this when starting out. There's nothing like money you are willing to use. Keep that money and use it when your strategy really starts to work.

100%. I wish I started as young as you as it took me 3 years to become profitable & become a full time trader. You will not see REAL gains for a couple of years so if it’s quick cash you are seeking, trading is not for you.

Only do it if you’re okay losing that $100. What makes you think you’ll be successful on your first few stocks

Be aware...there is a lot nonsense about investing on the internet. From tomorrow the market will crash, China will take over, China will crash, only gold, only AI.
listen to everything, believe nothing, build your opinion and best thing to learn is loosing money.
Loose $50, learn and be better next time.

yes! In 1 year it might be $110 and you get another $100.
Take Excel. Put $100 in the first cell and than in the next =A1*1.1 (for say 10%)+100

When you are 65 year old you have 116.000
It might not interest you what you have with 65, but believe me you ask yourself why you didn't do it when you are 65.

Yes!!!!! Why? TIME. You’ve got so much time on your side.

Make your mistakes now, early in life.

FYI there are sites available that let you track a fake portfolio to test your strategies. Heck you can do this using Excel.

I say yes bc the reality is you should be able to execute any strategy flawlessly with the lowest risk possible before you size up anyway.

You're in the learning phase. Just like with any martial art it takes time. I wish id started when I was younger on both those. Go forth young one. Learn. Again it's not about making money it's about learning with the least duress possible.

Everyone telling you to demo or wait. I’ll be here for devils advocate.

Put that 100 into an easy platform like Robinhood or Webull. Start trading with it, make small trades and a bunch of them. The goal isn’t to make millions but rather learn from the trades, they will be more meaningful because it’s real money and all you have.

Learning to trade with that $100 (which you will most likely lose) is way more valuable than any course or YouTube video. Try different strategies and find the ones you like.

When you are ready and have more saved up, you will have the basics, understanding, strategies, and be more familiar.

Step one. Work on increasing your cash flow by investing in yourself.

Step 2: setup auto payments to a Roth account as soon as it makes sense.

If you start studying young something you will be ahead in life at young age. If it's trading You have to find the right material and not fall for all the youtuber course that are paid by brokers to make money on you. First thing is maybe to learn how brokers make money on traders...especially day traders. As retail traders you are the product with how they gain money with commissions, margin, interest, selling your order flow, betting on the other side of your trade, lending your shares, etc, etc. Ask yourself why they would take the risk of allowing 30x leverage to someone...Would you do that ? Because they make money on traders and don't care you blow yourself. The more you trade the more they make money. And all the dumb technical analysis courses you see everywhere, these people get money from brokers to continue teaching these methods that give brokers money from you using this way you trade... Best way to win money is to not loose it...Most retail traders loose all their money. Some also have luck and in reality didn't knew what they were doing. So take your time. Seems you have plenty of time to learn how to not loose your money and how professional do. Also financial markets are heavilly manipulated by big money and média. The fuckery there is inimaginable. They cause the crash of 2008 with huge fuckery and are doing it again with other things now. Watch the statistics, the probality. Don't fall into the story of one thzt got rich ald didn't even know what he was doing. There is always one guy out of 1000 who have luck. The other loose everything. Someone have to loose money for you to win...Or vice versa.

I’d try paper trading first and invest it once you get reliably good at it

Yes, but only to lose the $100.

Seriously. Hit it hard. Learn all the lessons you possibly can with that $100. By 18 you’ll be so far ahead. And years from now you’ll consider putting real money into it when you actually know what you are doing.

You need to iron the bad habits and non trading traits out of your system.

Yes. Never too young to learn and feel what it's like with real money on the table. Read and watch YouTube and learn some more, while the money is in the market. I wouldn't trade as such. Maybe buy a Google or nvidia share if you can stretch it or buy some fractions. If leverage is available, avoid it, or use very little. No more than 2x while you learn.

Yes. Win or lose, you will learn.

No.

I had an account with only $100 in it and turned it into $1000 in less than a year. That’s with me selling way too soon on a lot of things too. Just focus more on the percentage you are up than the actual dollar amount. You can grow an account relatively quickly that way. Plus it’s always fun to press buttons imo.

Yep. When I started there was a $35 commission per trade. Now it's $0. Get in and learn. $100 is plenty.

Put the $100 into an etf like QQQ, SPY & watch it grow. Keep adding to it whenever possible. Hold for 30 years & this trade will probably go in your favor & compounded interest will have done most of the work for you.

The infinite nature of the market can make your hundred dollars increase exponentially or decrease exponentially. Learn how to take trades, when to open, when to close. Watch every timeframe. The market will always flow. Learn to flow with it then put some flow in it. It’s less stimulating not having skin in the game, but you’ll lose less having nothing in the game. You can turn that hundred into $1,000 with the correct trade. You could lose it all with a bad trade. There are people trading with hundreds of thousands of dollars that can safely risk that much, because risk management tells us no more than 5% of one’s trading account, or something like that. So technically, take $5 when you KNOW the direction and risk it. Or use a dollar (1%) when you know what you’re doing and why you’re doing it, risking more will make sense.

Buy a trading book for $100

Don’t trade, invest. Put that money in QQQ. And keep buying as you get money.

$100 might not be enough but… Yeah. Imagine the stuff you would never learn by never doing it. Find a very reputable person to mentor you.

Learn to trade now and join a prop firm when you’re 18.

You're not going to make any significant money with $100, what profit you do make wont come nearly as quickly as you're imagining. It's not going to be sufficient enough to make regular purchases for you and your gf

Start a demo account, you can’t legally open a real one until 18, but you can learn itmt

Short answer, yup.

I made 65k with Gamestop in three weeks with little knowledge and only 1500 bucks to start. And then the MVIS pump. SNDL. BBB. Hell, even CTRM.

Did it again with Dogecoin.

And then Shiba.

And even Santa Floki, lol.

The trick isn't knowledge or the amount of capital. The trick is simply finding the right scam/manipulation at the right time, and pulling the trigger.

100 bucks is plenty.

In terms of learning the basics of markets and becoming more familiar with any economy, yes. It doesn't matter where you start: stock shares, options, futures, crypto, etc. As long as you learn from your first failure, you'll get better. If you don't progress, then investing may not be for you. My two cents friend.

These kids think the stock market is a casino for intellectuals.

I suggest you to start learning how to do it now, open a demo acc and trade there, find a part time job and then start trading. U will blow these 100 bucks really fast if you dont know what you are doing

If you have a GF, you will never have enough money for trading.

What you think homie

No. Start reading about money, investing, debt and crypto.

Not if you can’t spell “available”. Ask mom and dad if you can use the UTMA account they opened for you when you were born and you’ll have way more to play with. But it’s a choice between college or trading!!

BARRON

You will blow that 100 in the first day. Take her to the movies and do sim trading first.

Whatever you’ve seen on Instagram and YouTube is a lie. They make money from selling courses and commissions from the broker.

Stay safe bro

Just paper trade

No but it is worth it to put it in the SP500

100(1+0.09)⁶⁰ =17.000 dollars

What you should do is paper trade for the coming 3 years, if you keep at it for all that time you’ll most likely be a profitable trader by adulthood

If you forget about the 'making money'side of things and take your learning seriously, you will understand what moves global markets, business, and just a huge bunch of things that will help you throughout your whole life.

So yes, go for it!

Don't chase big profits, focus on small wins. By the time your 18-20, those small wins accumulate into something worthwhile.

Yes for experience,

No for absolutely anything else.

Go for it kid

It is at least worth the experience, regardless if it's a good or bad one.

Here is my advice:

Don't listen to any advice. It doesn't matter who it's from. Listen to different opinions but make up your own mind, ppl tend to follow the latest things they heard about. It's a psychological phenomenon, but it does not mean it is the right thing to do.

Before you invest you should educate yourself. I recommend the revised version of The intelligent investor. If you dislike reading, you can hear the audio book.

Don't just consider stocks. Etf's can be a powerful tool for ppl with less money to invest in a wide rage of common stocks, bonds or REITs.

Don't invest more money that your comfortable of losing it.

Surely you can. You can even learn about it with 0 doing paper trading. Now for the part of making money, please understand that going from 100 to 200 would be incredible and likely a quite significant effort while doing small jobs will get you there much much faster. Working a summer job should get you several thousands and would also be a good life teaching.

I mean you could invest the $100 by trading and say you are exceptional and in the top !% tradder and after 1 year you have 500. You spend $250 for your and your girlfriend. You now have 250$. And you worked full time for a year.

Or you could take a summer job, have now 3000 invest 2500$ on an index fund for the long term and spend 500$ for you and your girl friend. I guess you see the difference ?

For the long term, honestly, you want to study finances, get a job as a trader or in a bank and invest other people money. You get a percentage of the assets managed. That way you make money all the times, that your trader go well good or bad. And you get a salary in the hundred thousands or even million if you are that good. You also have whole team that study the market, find trend, do in-depth analysis of the all the stocks, the economy...

Trading your own money is for amateurs and often end badly. It end badly because to make a significant return without unsustainable risk, you need to have more like a million than even 100K and that mean years and years of spending your time trading and having to live out of another job and saving the max you can... And people then leave their job too fast, take too high risk and lose it all. It is more gambling than trading.

The other solution is to to learn a job that pay well, and just invest your savings passively. After a few years of a good salary at 200K+ you will have that million saved or more. And the income you get from that, passively would allow you to stop working and retire. Maybe at 35 or 40. That's basically what we call fire (financial independence, retire early).

Why'd you go right into trading if you don't have any experience? First paper Trade. And if you do have experience assuming you started learning before, will you be profitable enough? Are you confident?

Buy three silver rounds.

Hope you watch this before trading! How 16 years old is managing $200k of prop fund.

For sure start with etfs, diversified world etf, try to buy every quarter with extra savings.(buy and hold!!) But no for day trading!

With a demo account sure

In demo yes

If you do it correctly, sure.

I started around the same age, maybe a year earlier (now 17). It’s a great way to help you learn how to manage your money and your emotions. Get a job, take a portion out of your check every couple of weeks. Put it into a brokerage account and begin with the fundamentals (risk management, position sizing, differing types of securities, etc.) By the time you’re 18, with skill and luck, you might have a decent amount of capital to trade with.

Some people act like trading ruins your childhood or something. Just don’t obsess over it all day, and don’t become a gambling addict, and you’ll be fine.

No. Lol

My parents were wonderful, but they didn't know shit about money, about investing, or about saving. So I in turn never learned anything about it until I was in my 50s. That's why I am still working at 65.

With that in mind, when my son was 13, I opened a brokerage account for him and began adding $50 a month to it until he reached age 18. During that time, I taught him about investing, about technical analysis, about risk, as much as I could about the market.

so, young Padawan, it depends if that's the only $100 you have. If it is, save it.

However, if you and your parents can come up with a plan that will allow you to invest a very small amount of money every month, Like many others here have suggested, I would learn, learn, learn.

In the meantime, have them open you a vanguard investment account and put small amounts in every month. For the time being, allow someone who knows about investing to do it for you.

Then, by the time you're 18, and you've done some trading, and you've learned, and you've read, then invest a very small amount, what you can afford to lose, and go from there.

Lots of good suggestions here, but most importantly - become educated!

Why do I see so many posts from teenagers pop up on Reddit asking for trading advice? Seriously, the best thing you can do is go live in the real world, work a few jobs, then maybe look at trading.

I don't mean any offense by this, but assuming you're not some trolling idiot, you're 15 years old. You literally know nothing about life. You're likely going to make poor life decisions for the next ten years. It's okay, pretty much everyone does.

Start learning about financial responsibility now, good. Start thinking you're going to get rich trading now, bad. Get out there and learn about real life. Experience things, get your heart broken a few times, learn what it's like living paycheck to paycheck, work for a few shitty bosses, learn what true work ethic is. Life will toughen up your mentality. You will be far more psychologically sound, ten years from now.

I feel like wherever you go if you’re caught for being under 18 they’ll just take your shit. So for now, save.

Awww that's so sweet you're doing it for your girlfriend 😭❤️

Honestly. No.

Regardless of what comments here say ‘wish I would have started sooner’ $100 is alot for a 15 year old and losing it is not a good lesson. What I would suggest is

1. Save. Try to save until you are 18 until you have at least $2500. Open a money market account and put every dollar you save in there. You will earn interest by doing nothing but keeping it in there and have zero risk vs. trying to trade without knowing what you are doing

2. Learn. Paper trade= set up a simulated account where you can practice or learn about your trades. Follow the market and how the market reacts to economic changes, and world events. This is more valuable than ‘getting in early’. You will have a better idea of what you are doing before you trade in a real money account and have a better feel for risk (although you won’t know risk until the $ is actually on the line). Risk Management is arguably the most important and most overlooked aspect of trading that you should learn. It is a skill that you need to learn, and even when you trade in a real money account, you will continue to learn.

3. Give yourself time. You are 15. Don’t be the guy that saw a video of people betting on options. Give yourself a good 2-3 years to understand the ins and outs of trading. Everyone knows somebody that bought something that went up alot without them having any clue how it went up. We also know somebody who thought they knew what they were doing and lost big. Don’t be either. Have an idea about how to rationally form a trade idea and why you are making the trade. You won’t know that at 15, and you might not even know that at 30. It all depends on how hard you work to learn all aspects of trading.

Lastly, it isn’t impossible your learning curve is faster, your savings reach $2500 sooner…and it isn’t impossible the first time you trade you lose the entire $2500. Point is, you are young and make sure you are aware of the risks involved. Learn as much as you can before you put a single dime in the market. Good luck

I started trading at 39 years old. If I could turn back time I would’ve started sooner. Probably as soon as trading went live online and not that phone calls and floor trading BS lol.

yep. you can trade one share at a time or something with 10% of your account and a stop loss. it’s a good skill to practice at your age and i totally wish i had known enough to get into it when i was younger instead of the dumb self-destructive garbage i was doing at that age.

just make sure to always use a stop loss and don’t trade more than 10% of your account at any given time. read books/listen to audiobooks and learn about strategy and psychology.

The education alone would've worth it - is further compounded by starting young makes it invaluable IMHO

100% no. 💯.

Invest.

Don't trade. You're too young with too small of an account.

Time value of money. Research Warren Buffet investing.

In 10 years you'll have the capital to trade successfully.

Be patient. It will be the most valuable asset you can have with your money.

Time in the market will ALWAYS beat timing the market.

Iykyk

I am 4x your age, young man. I wish you well.