The best stocks for day trading are usually the stocks of companies with high liquidity and volatility, allowing for quick trades and potential for profits. To begin with the day trading of stocks, a reliable platform is required that can offer efficient execution, low fees, and tools to assist in making informed decisions.
This article will overview some of the best stocks for day trading and help you determine the best platform for your needs.
Best Stocks for Day Trading at a Glance
Take a look at the top 10 stocks for day trading.
| Day trading Stock | Code | Price (as closing price of 7 Feb 2023) | Market Cap | Hedge Fund Holders |
| Tesla Inc | NASDAQ: TSLA | $196.81 | $622.7B | 495 |
| Amazon Inc | NASDAQ: AMZN | $102.11 | $1.05T | 884 |
| Microsoft Corporation | NASDAQ: MSFT | $267.56 | $1.99T | 973 |
| Carvana Co | NYSE: CVNA | $13.19 | $2.49B | 101 |
| Meta Platforms Inc | NASDAQ: META | $191.62 | $496.8B | 709 |
| Advanced Micro Devices Inc | NASDAQ: AMD | $85.91 | $138.5B | 380 |
| Alphabet Inc | NASDAQ: GOOG | $108.04 | $1.39T | 721 |
| Marathon Oil | NYSE: MRO | $26.87 | $16.37B | 198 |
| Devon Energy | NYSE: DVN | $62.21 | $39.31B | 283 |
| Permian Resources | NYSE: PR | $10.3 | $2.83B | 89 |
Pros and Cons of Day Trading Stocks
Day trading can be rewarding when done in the right way; however, there are significant risks associated with it.
Here are the top benefits and drawbacks of intraday stock trading.
- Possibility of High Returns _ There’s potential to make great returns regularly with small price fluctuations. Profits can be multiplied with margin and leverage trading.
- No Overnight Risk _ As trades can be carried out on the same day; thus, it reduces the overnight risks of the impact of sudden market price changes.
- Opportunities in the Bear and Bull Markets _ With the right strategy, day traders can benefit from the trending markets.
- Stressful _ Intraday trading requires constant stock market research and monitoring, which can be stressful.
- Multiplied Margin Risks _ When trading with margin and leverage, losing trades can liquidate your account.
Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA)
Tesla Inc is the world’s leading electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer. The company has seen a significant rise over the years, securing its foothold in the industry for the foreseeable future.
Tesla's largest shareholders are Elon Musk, Martin Eberhard, and Mac Terpening. The company went public following an IPO in 2010 and since then, it has cult-like following after diversifying away from the luxury vehicle segment.
It continues to use the unique Gigafactory model championed by the CEO, Elon Musk. The company’s past performance was influenced by production capacity, but that continues to improve, with five Gigafactories now in operation.
Tesla also runs an energy generation and storage business with two main products: Tesla Powerwall and Powerpack. The Gigafactory, energy generation, energy storage, and development of other technologies make Tesla stock a good prospect.
In 2022, TSLA stock was one of the worst performing, with a dip of 70% in share price. This resulted in a wipeout of more than $700 billion off its market cap. However, the company posted an increase in vehicle delivery, 40% more than in 2021. The stock has rebounded over 50% from its lows.
Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ: AMZN)
Amazon is the largest e-commerce company worldwide, founded by Jeff Bezos and went public in 1997. Besides online retail, Amazon operates various businesses, including Web services and advertising businesses. In addition to this, the company is also venturing into the healthcare and logistics business.
Amazon saw a rapid rise in market cap in 2021, buoyed by the covid pandemic. However, 2022 was a rough year when its stock price plunged by 50%.
As the company continues to seek business stability, the stock provides a great opportunity for day traders. Amazon’s foray into other business segments, macroeconomics, and competition makes the stock a good candidate for day trading.
Being a mega-cap company, Amazon experiences high average trading volumes. The beta (a measure of volatility) for the stock is above one, making it a good option for day traders.
Roku Inc (NASDAQ: ROKU)
Roku is a streaming service provider based in San Jose, CA focused on generating sales from hardware, OS licensing, advertising, and subscription services. The company was created in 2002 by Anthony J.
Roku experienced huge growth during the pandemic in 2020 and 2021, which has receded thereafter. The stock price has seen an 80% reduction since its launch; but the vision of the company is crystal clear, projected to approach $44 billion in 2026.
The Roku stock is good for day trading because streaming platforms are continually on the news cycle. The daily trading volume and volatility are all high, presenting an opportunity to experienced traders.
Carvana Co (NYSE: CVNA)
Carvana is a leading car dealer in the US, founded in 2012 by Ernest Garcia and two other partners. The company is headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, and had its IPO in 2017. It offers a unique e-commerce experience for used car purchases.
The firm generates revenue from vehicle sales, loans, and other commissions. As the used car stock market continued to grow steadily, the company’s fame is skyrocketing. It has been predicted that its revenue will grow 16.31% per year and it reached its highest peak of $12.84 billion with over 420,000 cars sold.
The company’s continued innovation, expansion, and legal issues are reasons why this stock is a good option for day trading.
Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ: META)
Meta (formerly Facebook) is the largest social networking platform, founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg. It has over 2.9 billion monthly active users through Whatsapp, Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger. The company recently rebranded to Meta in anticipation of taking advantage of the metaverse.
It filed its IPO in 2012 and continues to grow by utilizing its massive interconnected ecosystem. There are numerous apps operating around its core business intended to maintain social interaction. Ads are the main revenue stream, especially from Europe and North America.
Share prices are trending upward after a dip in the last quarter of 2022 with the highest of $328 and the lowest of $88 in the past 52 weeks.
The Meta stock is good for day trading due to its high volume, volatility, strong media hold, growth potential, and consumer trends.
Advanced Micro Devices Inc (NASDAQ: AMD)
AMD is one of the oldest semi-conductors manufacturers in the world with headquarters in Santa Clara, California. They are the manufacturers of a range of products, including chipsets and GPUs.
The focus on high-performance computing and graphics products has earned the company multi-billion contracts with manufacturers like Oracle and Microsoft. Innovation, high-performance products, and quality attract investors to this stock.
The stock is a good prospect for day trading due to its high trading volume. The growth in the gaming industry, cloud computing, and cryptocurrency mining provides a ready market for AMD products. Chip wars between the US and China also affect price swings, however, competition from Qualcomm and Intel makes for an interesting stock market.
The company’s performance in 2022 was affected by the sluggish uptake of personal computers (PC); however, it managed to shake off the concerns and get revenues of over $23.5 billion, buoyed by other segments.
The share saw a downtrend in October 2022, hitting lows of $55 but prices have recovered and are up by almost 30%.
Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG)
Alphabet Inc is a holding company formed in 2015 that owns the search engine giant Google. Besides the search engine, Alphabet operates the cloud business segment, Waymo, and YouTube.
About 85% of revenue is generated from ads and the remaining 15% is generated from the cloud business, smart home products, hardware, and Youtube. Its Google Cloud segment offers enterprise-ready cloud services, including Google Workspace and Google Cloud Platform.
Google’s shares dropped by 39% in 2022 after an impressive increase of 69% in share prices in 2021. Being an internet search engine giant, price volatility can arise from many areas, including
Macro-economic factors
News events
Effects of reduced Ads spending
Competition from Tik Tok and Amazon for Ad revenue
Competition from generative AI applications
The Alphabet shares observe massive trading volumes daily. There are also periodic price shifts, making the stock a great prospect for day trading.
Marathon Oil (NYSE: MRO)
Marathon oil is an independent company dealing with oil and natural gas exploration. It was founded in 1887 with the former name of USX and its headquarters in Houston, Texas.
The company conducts operations from US and internationally. The US segment explores, produces, markets, and condensates oil and natural gas products.
The stock is on our list due to the volatility it has seen in recent months. This stems from fluctuations in oil prices due to production adjustments from OPEC and other underlying macroeconomics.
Devon Energy (NYSE: DVN)
Devon Energy is an independent company focused on oil and gas exploration, development, and production in the US. The company was formed in 1971 by J. Larry Nichols and John Nichols with headquarters in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
With an average trading volume of 7.54 million and a beta of around 2.36, the DVN stock makes a good prospect for day trading. Risk-averse traders can utilize this volatility and leverage the stock to make good profits.
Permian Resources(NYSE: PR)
Permian Resources (PR) is an oil and gas exploration and production company based in Texas that operates in the highly valuable Delaware basin. The company was founded on October 6, 2014, with headquarters in Denver, CO.
The current valuation metrics of Permian Resources are noteworthy, including its beta of 4.59. Its average Forward P/E value is 5.42 which concludes that this stock is trading at a discount comparatively.
The trading volume is also decent, making it a good stock for day trading.
What Are the Best Brokers for Day Trading?
| Name | Score | Visit | Disclaimer | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | 9.8 | Visitplus500.com | 82% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money. | |
 | 8.7 | Visitetoro.com | Don’t invest unless you’re prepared to lose all the money you invest. | |
 | 9.1 | Visitinteractivebrokers.com | ||
 | 8.3 | Visitwebull.com | ||
 | 7.5 | Visitthinkorswim.com | ||
 | 6.5 | Visittradestation.com |
Interactive Broker - Best for Active Day Trading
Interactive Broker (IBKR) offers stocks from over 90 different markets. Investors can select between IBKR Pro and IBKR Lite.
The platform is the best for day trading, considering the low commissions with IB SmartRouting functionality which support the best trade execution by finding the best prices for stocks across exchanges and dark pools.
The feature offers a continuous evaluation of orders, re-routing them dynamically, seeking to achieve optimal execution.
IBKR also has auto trading capabilities. Traders can also get margin loan financing with rates from 4.83%. The mobile app has over one million downloads and positive customer reviews.
| Account minimum deposit | $0 |
| IBKR PRO fees | $0.0005 - $0.0035 per share. |
| KYC Required | Yes |
| Demo Account | Yes |
| Price | Free |
| Investment types | Stocks, Forex, Crypto, Futures, Options, Bonds, Mutual Funds, Hedge Funds |
| App | Yes |
Thinkorswim - Best for Experienced Stocks Day Traders
Thinkorswim is a powerful platform by TD Ameritrade. The platform holds exclusive features, including customizable stock screeners, technical analysis tools, charting, and backtesting capabilities.
The platform is designed for advanced traders enabling them to access the platform via a downloadable desktop application and mobile app.
The thinkorswim mobile app has over one million downloads on the Android play store. Reviews suggest that the app is intuitive and easy to use.
| Account minimum deposit | $0 |
| Stock trading commission | 0% |
| KYC Required | Yes |
| Demo Account | Yes |
| Price | Yes |
| Investment types | Stocks, EFTs, Mutual Funds, Futures, Forex, Bonds |
| App | Yes |
TradeStation - Best for Day Stock Trading With Margins
TradeStation supports high-quality fills through speedy trade execution and connection to a dozen stock markets. The platform packs a wealth of data, including intraday stock data dating 28 years ago. This assists day traders in researching and backtesting their strategy.
Day traders can get margins of 25% of their position where margin balances between $500k - $1,999,999 have an effective rate of 7%, while balances above $2 million default to a rate of 5%.
The TradeStation delivers an easy-to-use, intuitive platform for easy stock trading. The trader also gets powerful analysis tools on an advanced platform with fast execution.
| Account minimum deposit | Any |
| Commission | 0% |
| KYC Required | Yes |
| Demo Account | Yes |
| Price | Free |
| Investment types | Stocks, EFTs, Options, Futures, Crypto, Bonds, Mutual Funds |
| App | Yes |
What Are Day Trading Stocks and How Do They Work?
Day trading stocks primarily entail betting on the short-term volatility of stocks where day traders buy and sell stocks on the same day before the market closes.
Day traders can use digital platforms like Interactive Brokers and TD Ameritrade to access stock market. Many of these stock trading platforms charge zero commissions for trading stocks. However, trading cannot be termed free because of other charges.
How Much Money Do You Need to Get Started Day Trading Stocks?
Many trading platforms have scrapped the minimum deposit requirement while a few of them still have minimum deposit criteria to start with day trading.
The US government requires a legal minimum capital requirement of $25,000. In other countries, traders can start with a capital of less than $100.
The amount you decide to invest will depend on your risk tolerance, financial goals, and capital availability.
Are Day Stocks Trading Platforms Safe?
Trading platforms authorized and regulated by FINRA can be considered safe. In addition to this, these day trading platforms ensure the safety of assets and funds by segregating funds, using data encryption, and securing data.
Most platforms are part of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC), which protects clients’ securities. Some providers, like TD Ameritrade and Interactive Brokers, are considered the safest.
Trading platforms, however, are not without risks. Hacking and the risk of technical failures are inherent risks that can’t be ignored.
