Futures or Stocks: Pick Your Market

I trade MNQ, micro Nasdaq 100 futures. It's how I learned. But the route works the same on stocks. What matters is that you pick one market and stick with it for all 30 sessions.

Futures (like MNQ)

• One symbol, every day. No stock picking. The market is your watchlist.
• Small size is possible. One MNQ point is $2, a tenth of the full-size NQ.
• Long hours. Trades nearly around the clock from Sunday evening to Friday afternoon (US time).
• Free plan catch: CME futures data is delayed about 10 minutes on the free plan. Fine for learning the platform; real-time needs a paid plan and a data add-on.

US stocks

• Thousands to choose from. The skill is finding the few that are moving today. Lessons 5 to 7 cover that: watchlists, the screener and relative strength.
• Hours. The regular session is 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Eastern, with pre-market and after-hours trading around it.
• Free plan data. On the free plan, US stock quotes come from a Cboe feed in real time. It isn't the full volume of every exchange, so volume can look lower than other sources. Check the data label on your chart.
• The $25,000 rule is going away. In April 2026 the SEC approved replacing the pattern day trader rule. Brokers have until October 2027 to switch over, so check your own broker's rules before you ever trade real money. On paper it doesn't apply.

How to pick

• Want one chart and fewer decisions? Futures.
• Want to find the strongest names each morning, or can only trade during stock market hours? Stocks.
• Not sure? Start with MNQ or a short list of big, busy stocks. Either is fine. Switching halfway is not.

Even if you pick futures, read lessons 5 to 7. Relative strength is how I read the big Nasdaq names that move NQ.

Your task

Write your market at the top of a blank page. That page becomes your plan in lesson 9. Then go to lesson 4.