If you have committed to the idea of investing for yourself or trading in the US markets then there will be many things you need to learn and study. It all starts with opening your brokerage account though and today we will go over the many things you want to know before you get started.

Type of trading - The first thing you want to consider is the type of trading you will be doing. Are you looking for the fun, fast pace excitement of day trading or will you be buying and holding for the long term, or maybe something in between. This will make a huge difference as to how you proceed. There are different rules, limitations, and regulations for how you proceed.

Minimum to get started - Once you know the answer to how you want to trade then we can talk about the minimum required to get started. If you chose to jump in and day trade then you will need to have at least $25,000 USD, though many will suggest you have $30,000 minimum to start. While not ever country has these high requirements, in the US they have decided that $25,000 is the minimum account balance you can have to day trade. For long term investing, or midterm trading then you can likely get started with $2000 or even less. Some brokerage firms may even only require $500 to start though it will be hard to offset commissions if you are trading actively.

Commissions - There is not really any way around it. You will be paying for the ability to trade in the US and that fee will come in the form of a "per-trade", or "per-share" commission. Active day traders will usually pay a small rate per share that they trade, while the long term investors find it is more advantageous to pay for each transaction. Commissions will vary on the frequency that you trade but you should expect anywhere from $4-10 per trade depending on your brokerage firm of choice and the features you want to have.

Margin - This is a highly misunderstood concept but its really straight forward. If you have over $2000 in a brokerage account then you can apply for margin. This is just a fancy word for saying that the brokerage firm will loan you half of whatever you spend. If you spend $2000 on a trade then half is your capital and half is the brokerage firms. So with a small, $2000 account this means you can spend up to $4000 on a position or group of positions. Be careful here as the brokerage firm will not let you lose too much of their money before they issue a margin call.

If you have over $25,000 and wish to day trade then you may borrow more money. Essentially you can day trade with 4 times the amount you have in your account. So with the minimum $25,000 account balance you can day trade with $100,000, but you have to return the money at the end of they session.