Balancing Day Trading with a Full-Time Job

This blog is a transcript of the video found on our YouTube channel here: How to Day Trade While Working Full Time and NOT Get Fired, a video originally recorded at the 2022 Warrior Trading All-Star Summit. You can learn more about All-Star Traders in the Warrior Community here.

The results that these traders have experienced, along with Ross’s, are not typical. We do not track the typical results of past or current customers. As a provider of trading tools and educational courses, we do not have access to the personal trading accounts or brokerage statements of our customers. As a result, we have no reason to believe our customers perform better or worse than traders as a whole. You can read our full disclaimer here, and also view Ross’s broker statements here. 

How to Day Trade Without Getting Fired from Your Full-Time Job

Ross: Okay, so the topic of this episode is day trading while working full-time. I actually just did an interview with a student who has this million-dollar badge. He’s on the West Coast. He trades from 6 AM to 7 AM west coast time before work, and then he trades during his lunch hour from 12 to 1. He’s got his million-dollar badge trading around a regular work schedule, so it can be done. Of course, as always, his results are not typical. Neither are mine–trading is risky. Let me not forget to say that, but I want to open this up to the table here. We’ve got seven traders total here, including me, who are profitable traders, and some of them started while still working full-time. So let’s hear it. I suppose we should start with Manoli, who ended up…did you get fired, or did you quit? Haha.

Manoli: Haha, no. I quit.

Ross: Oh, okay. All right, so tell me how it went.

Manoli: So, at first, I was working a job that was like 70 hours a week. It was perfect timing for me on everything that happened. I just got done going to a new mortgage company that was only like 37 hours a week, and that was 10 to 6 Monday through Thursday and then like 10 to 3 on Fridays. As soon as I went to that new company–I think that was late February–COVID hit, and we were working from home. So that’s when I got back into trading. When we got back into the office…so before I signed up for Warrior, though, I called my manager. I was like, hey, can I switch my hours from 10 to 6 to 11 to 7 because I knew I would need the 9:30-11 period. They were cool with that. I was in a sales job, so there was little flexibility there. When I went back into the office, it was a younger environment. The managers were really cool at first because my production was fine, at first, I guess. Haha. 

Ross: Haha, at first.

Manoli: And I was actually bringing in my laptop and an extra screen and trading in an office before work. So I went in every morning at, like, I want to say, 8:00 I got in, and it actually made me more excited to go to the office because I was excited to trade every morning. So I got there at 8, 8:30, and I was trading up until usually on par with you, so right around 10:30-11. Umm, some days I did go over, and I had managers talk to me. 

Ross: Really? 

Manoli: Yeah, like they were going to shut it down because they’re like, “dude, it’s 11:15. I said 11 on the dot,” and then the president, they kind of didn’t like it.

Ross: Did people come in and, like, look over your shoulder?

Manoli: No, because I went into another room, and I shut the door, and at that point, I wasn’t making any money either. It was like new. I wasn’t doing too much. They were actually clowning me for paying $3600 for a course.

Ross: Yeah, yeah. Not anymore. 

Manoli: Right, right. So I was doing that, and I did that for eight or nine months. Well, at one point, I actually was making like…it was, I think, December of 2020 into January. That’s when sizing got crazy. So in my first…

Ross: And you were still trading work.

Manoli: I was still trading at work this whole time.

Ross: By the bathroom stall, or? Haha.

Manoli: Haha, no, but they did kick me out of that office, and so I actually had to hide it from the president. My manager was cool. He’s like, “Just do it on the work computer. Don’t let them catch you.” 

Ross: Yeah, they’ll never catch you. They’ll never know. Haha. 

Manoli: Haha, so I was doing that, and I was making like…then people started to join in because then I was making five, ten, 15 grand in a day, and they were just like, “Holy crap, like, what’s going on?” So at one point, I had the whole office trying to be day traders, not focused on selling at all. We were just looking at stocks all day long, and it was cool. But then I got to a point where it was early January, and I had my biggest green day in the office. It was like 30-some thousand dollars, and that was crazy. I was like, “Holy crap,” like I just thought that was so much money. I get up, and I still remember my manager because they’re all trading at this point. They’re like, “I don’t know, this looks really good here.”

I was like, “I’m done for the day. I’m gonna go get lunch.” They’re like, “I don’t know, this looks really good. You might want to sit back down.” I sat back down. And I went red 20 grand.

Ross: Woah, that’s a huge swing.

Manoli: It was a $50k swing, and this was before I was really making crazy money. So that was like…that hurt. That was devastating. I was livid. I went, and I told my bosses, like, “Listen, I got to go home.” I left work, and I thought about it. I talked to my wife, too, and I was like, “You know what? I might just have to give this a shot and go full-time. 

Ross: Yeah. Awesome. I love it.

Chris: It’s a great story. 

Manoli: And so I told my boss, I was like, “Hey, you know, I think I’m going to give this a shot.”  He said, “Take the weekend to think about it.” I took the weekend. I thought about it, and I decided I’m going to just go and try trading full-time. That Monday, I made like $55,000. I was so on tilt from that Friday, and I was just ready to go. So then it’s history from there, and I started working from home. I did make, I want to say, 250,000 to 300,000 roughly before I quit, so I made sure I was pretty profitable and consistent, and I was making way more than my work.

Ross: Well,  the natural question here is, okay, “I’m working, and I’m trading. At what point can I quit my job?” When I was talking to the student earlier this week, who’s got his million-dollar badge, he’s got a great job. It’s a good job. He doesn’t even really want people to know like he’s trading, you know, he’s got a good job. And he was like, “I don’t know, maybe I see how the next six months, next year goes trading…like we’re in a slower market. Maybe I can just keep doing both.” So the decision for you to go full time, I guess it seems like it was kind of forced just because of focus right now.

Manoli: Right, I see people mentioning, “It’s funny how you chose this after a big loss.” And yeah, the reason I did it was because I was like, “You know what? I take full accountability for what I did. I’m the one that sat back down.” But I feel like you have to realize how precious this is and how emotional it can get, and all of the things around you affect those emotions. I just realized I was like, “You know what? It’s now hurting me to be at this job because I’m making way more money trading, and I have too many other factors in my environment that are now affecting the success of that trading that I just want to be in my own kind of flow state.”

Chris: It goes back to it’s easier to control your environment than it is to control your willpower, which we were talking about at dinner.

Manoli: Exactly.

Ross: Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, that’s a really great statement there because if you know you have these triggers, if you know you have these distractions, whatever it is, forcing yourself to experience them every single day…at a certain point, it just makes sense to avoid those situations. So, no longer trading at work when you’ve got all those distractions. Yeah, that made sense. This is funny–I sometimes have dreams where I’m in high school or in college, and I’m like, “Oh man, I’ve got to go to class now. It’s like 9:00. I’ve got to get into trading.” And I’m like, “Why am I even doing this?” I don’t know why I have that dream so often, but, you know, the fact is, in those dreams, it’s like there’s no question trading is more important–it’s the priority. So, who else here was still working…haha I’m looking at Hemang.

Hemang: Yeah, I was. So, it’s a pretty interesting story. Right out of school, I was working at CVS, and I think a lot of healthcare professionals would be able to relate. I was making about 120, 130 grand a year, which is, you know, good, great money. But I was essentially just wearing golden handcuffs. From that point on, I tried so hard to try to get into the pharmacy side of things. It’s kind of hard as a pharmacist, but I made it there. Then after that, that’s when I started pursuing other things because that’s when I had more time on my hand. So I started off at Pfizer, and then I went to GSK. I became full-time. I was starting to learn how to day trade, and I was lucky enough to not have a boss for the first six months. So, you know, I didn’t have any calls from like 9 to 11. I just blocked off my schedule, haha, from 9 to 11 so I could trade. I was trading pretty much the whole day. Because I didn’t have a boss, you know, I had more freedom. Yeah, but as time went on, I was still trading with a job. Then slowly, I had projects come on. For the years 2020 and 2021, I started getting more projects. My calendar was still blocked off. No one ever found out why or how. You know, I was always working from home. Even when we did have to go in, like in the beginning, it was only in two days–it was really flexible. But in 2021, I didn’t go in. I knew that I didn’t feel comfortable enough to quit my job right away, and I think when I did the $100K interview, I was still working.

Ross: Yeah. Well, at that point, I mean, you know, you put a lot into your career. You’ve gone through college. 

Hemang: Eight years of school! Eight years of school.

Ross: This is huge. So you don’t want to just on a whim. You’ve got to be sure.

Hemang: So I was still, you know, in the middle of trading and just grinding through. I’ll be taking a meeting from like 2 to 3, but if something is running, I’m like, “Oh my God.” I’ll constantly be trading. I had my six screen set up, and I’ll be taking a call on this side and like, “Oh shoot, something’s running. So in the middle of a call, I’m taking trades, looking at the screens. Haha. But those days came on, and then finally, in July 2021, that’s when I decided. Actually, before that, funny story from what Manoli was saying. I had a meeting with my boss one time, and he was really nice about it, but he’s like, “You’re performing on the bottom 5%.” And I’m like, “Oh my God, no way. I’m a really hard-working person. I really try hard. Please, can you expose me to more projects?” And, you know, and in the back of my head, I’m like, “Yeah, you know, I’d rather trade than do this.” Haha, because it was already working out at that point, right? I mean, I was still in the middle, you know, one leg was trading, on the other side…

Ross: You were hedging your bets, and it was a smart move as you were getting started.

Hemang: Yeah, and at some point, I just got really confused. I’m like, I can’t do two things at once. But, you know, I did not want to quit, especially during my red days. I’m like, “What am I doing? You know, I’m already making this much money. Like, I don’t need to have a job right now.” Honestly, having that meeting or being at this job, I’m kind of distracted right now. I would rather focus on this. A lot of times when I had my red days, I would think about that. But I’m like, “No, I don’t want to leave this at my low. If I do, I’ll try to leave it at my high. At first, I didn’t even have a thought that I’m going to quit this because I was able to trade, I was able to make money, and I made more than $250K that month, I mean that year. And I’m like, “I don’t know anyone around me in my social circles that’s doing this.” So, I was kind of okay with that. But there came a point where I’m like, “Hey, enough is enough.” July 2021–It’s been more than a year now. I had a meeting with my boss. At first, I was kind of embarrassed to tell my boss, “Hey, I want to quit my job to day trade.” That’s a funny conversation because they didn’t know, right? You know, I was kind of hesitant, but I just told him anyway. I’m like, I don’t care if you think I’m a crackhead, but this is what I’m doing, and you can believe whatever you want. I was kind of nervous about it for some reason, and he was actually very nice. He took it well. He’s like, “No, this is the age to try it out. I wish I did something different.” Then I told my team as I was leaving. I gave them my two-week notice. Then the funniest thing happened. I showed them my setup. I’m like, “Hey, this is what I do,” just because they were interested. And they’re like, “Oh, so that’s why. We always thought you were looking around at meetings.” Haha, because I was looking at the screens thinking about charts, and that was a funny moment there. Then I finally quit my job in July 2021. As I was doing that, I was still afraid because I was letting go of the security. It was such a huge thing in my head to get over because I don’t have health care, I don’t have a 401k. They had a pension program. I used to get a 2% pension, matching 401K, and great incentives. I left all that–the security. I loved my job. I loved what I did. That was the other thing. But I’m like, “No, I know scalability is here. I know I’m doing well, and I can do a lot better.” So I let that go, and I was still always anxious. For a good six months, I was kind of still in disbelief. Is this happening? Am I doing it? After like a year, now I’m like still not completely over it. It still feels like, “Hey, am I really doing this?” But it’s over, I feel like, that point where I have to be worried that, “Hey, I don’t have that security of a job anymore.”

Ross: For sure. Yea, that’s a big one. Was anyone else here still working full-time or working? And you sold your business.

Chris: I was in the process of selling my business when I started Warrior Starter. I had sold the business, and I was on a 90-day retention. So I had to see the transition through the business, and I was already checked out. I was loving the beginning of trading and learning. I was still in the simulator at that point, but I would trade in the morning. Whenever they needed something, I would take care of it, but I was ready to move on. That’s the business I started and grew for seven years. 

Ross: That’s a lot.

Chris: It is a lot. And, you know, I still had 30 plus employees there and, you know, saying goodbye to everybody and going through that transition. But I hadn’t been successful in trading yet, either. So, you know.

Ross: But you sold the company, and you had an opportunity to do something different.

Chris: I sold the company. I was set financially, at least for a while. You know, I didn’t need money for a while. I was excited. Things luckily panned out.

Ross: Yea, that’s good. You know, I was not working full-time when I started trading, but I’m now kind of in a position where, you know, I started trading, and I’ve been trading for a long time. Now the role of running Warrior and everything that I do here has become a full-time job. So what often happens for me is I’ll have meetings on my calendar in the afternoons. I rarely will have any meetings in the morning. I mean, as much as possible. I do not let people book me in the morning, so my mornings are free for trading. But then, as early as 11, I can start having people pop meetings on my calendar, you know, meetings with the developers that work with scanners, meetings with my marketing team, meetings with the customer support team, etc. What I often will have happen is I’m in a meeting, and since I have my meetings at the same place, which is in my office, I have all the charts. And so, during a meeting, sometimes I’ll see something starting to move up, and I feel that distraction is like, “Oh, I want to start trading.” And sometimes I will. And then whenever I’m doing that, I’m 100% not paying attention to the meeting. I’m not there at all. Like, I’m there, but I’m not there. Someone could be like, “Hey, Ross, so what do you think of that?” And I’m like, “Restate the question.” I feel bad on two levels because I feel bad that I’m not serving as well as I could be in my role as the boss, you know, to make decisions. On the other hand, with trading, I feel like I’m not serving my trading as well because now I booked myself all afternoon with meetings, and I’ve missed the opportunity to trade this big momo stock that goes from $50 to $150 in the afternoon. Then I have this FOMO, and I’m like, “Oh my God, are you serious? I should have been trading that. I should just told everyone to clear my schedule. We’ll redo those meetings next week or whatever it is.” So I struggle with it now, and I’ve thought about it quite a bit with the scheduling thing because, at this point, I trade in the morning sort of the same as I always have. I trade from early in the morning, and then I’m pretty much done at like 11 at this point. For the most part, I try to shut down charts no matter what and not come back in the rest of the day. That way, you know, it’s not like, “Oh, I have some free time this Thursday afternoon. I guess I can watch the market.” No, I never trade past 11. So whatever I do past 11 will never interfere with trading because that’s outside my trading schedule. Now, the only problem with that is if we start seeing this pattern where we’re having more and more power hour momentum or things like that, then that’s when I start to feel like, “Oh, maybe I maybe I should rethink my calendar and start to change my schedule.” But, you know, I’m still trying to work full-time and trade full-time, and I cannot do both at the same time. I mean, I can check some emails while I’m like waiting on the setup, but I can’t be in meetings and make decisions. So for me, I really need to sort of separate my schedule from morning and afternoon. So the morning is dedicated to trading, and the afternoon is pretty dedicated to Warrior. You know, for other people at this table, Jess, I know you’ve got your fulfillment by Amazon business, and you’ve got some house flips and stuff like that. You know, those are things that can take your afternoon, but then it happens that you’re doing that on Tuesday and Thursday, and then those are the two days you have the 200% exact squeeze, and you feel like an idiot because you missed that move.

Jess: Yeah, how you’re describing it now is basically how I started. You know, we’d be buying like this huge inventory, and all this stuff would be coming in. We’d have to sort through it. And at the same time, I would see a big move of 100%. I’m like, “Oh man.” Then it became like this issue where, just as you were talking about, it’s like perfect timing. You’re doing something else when you should be trading. When you actively trade, there’s nothing moving, and you should be handling something with your business. It was just this consistent issue. It wasn’t until, you know, we would buy this inventory like $200,000 in inventory, and as we’d get the inventory, they would send us a cease and desist letter. I’m like, “What are you doing? You said we could sell this stuff.” That’s what really kind of pushed me towards, you know, trading. Like, “Alright, I think I’m just going to back down on this a little bit and focus more on trading.” It wasn’t until that push that it kind of guided me in the direction I wanted to go. But yea, it was really hard. trying to balance the two. It was very hard and, you know, you have a personal life. You have to have your wife, kids, and all this other stuff.

Ross: Yeah. Tanner, in the Warrior Room, said, “One who chases two rabbits catches none.”

Jess: That’s exactly it. Haha.

Ross: I mean, it’s true, though. So how many of you guys here are at current trading like 8 hours a day from, like, the very beginning to end of the day? 

Danny: I take a break. I’m there for a solid chunk of the morning. Then I take a break, and I usually come back in the afternoon.

Ross: Okay. Max, what about you?

Max: I wouldn’t say a full 8 hours, but maybe five or six during a regular day.

Ross: Are you there for the power hour close, or are you done by then?

Max: Depends on the day, but if it’s hot, I’ll tend to try and be if I can. Other times I’ll just try and find something else to distract me and not go back.

Ross: You two are both on West Coast time, so you’re up so early, and then what are you going to do? Just be done for the day at like 10 AM? Silly. What about you guys over here?

Chris: I’m usually at my trading station by 7 AM Eastern time, and I’m trying to wrap up by 11, 11:30.

Ross: And then you’re done.

Chris: I’m done for the day. I’m going to the gym. I’m going to the pool for you. I’m doing enjoying life stuff. 

Ross: And taking care of your head. Haha.

Chris: I do, shine and shave. 

Ross: Okay. Okay. Manoli, what about you? What’s your schedule?

Manoli: Yeah, mine depends on the market for sure and how I’m trading. So, you know, I’ll still shut it down early if I’m trading bad or I’m choppy. Lately, I’ve been staying a lot longer and kind of like Danny, I’ll be in front of the screens from 830 to 11:30/12, take an hour or two break, and then come back for like 2 to 4 action. 

Hemang: Yeah, I would say in 2021, I was trading all day from like 8:45/9 to like for 4:30 sometimes. After that, I used to be exhausted. Yeah. if someone told me if someone asked me a question, like if my wife asked me something, I’d be like, “What?” I would just not respond because I wouldn’t have the energy. This year, I mean, I did make money, I would say, by trading longer hours. But I think this year you can’t do that, and I think I’ve learned better ways. I’ve learned better risk management, and I’ve learned how to handle a loss or shut it down quicker. But right now, I’ll get in at 830, and I’m out some days by like 10. If I just get a good winner, I’m out of ten. But at the latest, I’ll go until 1130.

Ross. Okay. Yeah. I think that that’s a good strategy. I really do. Sometimes in this slower market, I’m like, “Beggars can’t be choosers. You gotta sit here. You’ve got to spend more time.” And then, on the other hand, I’m like, “This is a choppy market.” You get in. You get your $0.20 a share for the day, and you get out and do it again tomorrow. Base hits. So, different schools of thought, and it depends on a number of different factors–what else you’ve got going on in your life, what you’re trying to do, decision fatigue, and things like that. But one of the worst things for me is coming back at 3:00 and then blowing all of my morning profit and sitting there red on the day. That kills me. I get so frustrated when I do that. Then that can lead right into being off-center into the next day. So part of what we were talking about before–setting yourself up so every single day you’re closing, basically ready to come back and hit it hard tomorrow. It’s hard to end on a good note when you’re still trading at power hour, 4:00.

Hemang: Yeah, I will trade longer based on the market, like what Manoli said. I think if the market requires…if there are a lot of other players, if there is volume, and if there are moves happening, then I’ll stay longer. For example, in the first week of August, I was trading all day. And, you know, it was paying dividends. You were also trading a lot longer.

Ross: Yea, I was. The market called for it. Yeah, and I mean, that’s when it calls for it. It’s tough when it’s very hit or miss. Slow, slow, slow, and then one random hot day. Because then I’m like, “What am I supposed to be just sitting here every single day? There’s been nothing going on.” All right, well, this was some good stuff. So for those of you out there thinking about day trading while still working, it sounds like you could probably get away with it, and your boss won’t even notice. All right, I hope you learned something. We’ll see you for the next episode!