Eric is a short-term trader

Joe is a long-term trader

• Eric makes multiple trades per week.
• Eric has a high tolerance for risk because he often trades highly volatile stocks.
• He makes trading decisions based on how he thinks the market will react in the short term, not necessarily how much a player is really worth.
• He monitors the market frequently. When he hears breaking news, he rushes to his laptop.
• Eric likes to take his gains immediately and move on.
• He likes challenges with unlimited trades.
• Notable short-term traders: cwfoot, Skilletman, dmgeist

• Joe buys stocks and holds them for months.
• When Joe checks his portfolio and sees that a stock is down, he evaluates it over the long term and doesn't sweat short term price fluctuations.
• Joe doesn't mind waiting until Earnings Day to get the full value from a buy or short - when he knows that the player's price will exactly match his performance on the field.
• Joe may not make as many PROTRADE dollars as Eric, but he's also not spending as much time trading.
• He enters challenges with limited trades.
• Notable long-term traders: Troy Aikman, mkerns, oldtimer, RangerFanatic

• Take a look at the price movement for Apple (yes, a real world market example) over the course of a day.
• See how the price moves throughout the day? Short-term traders try to profit from that volatility. They aren't necessarily thinking about what the stock should be worth, but what other investors are doing.
• Short term trading is for someone who has the time to regularly monitor the market.
• PROTRADE Example: A story breaks that Chris Carpenter needs surgery and will be out for weeks. Eric hears the news and shorts him; many other traders do the same. As Carpenter's stock moves down, Eric anticipates that other short term traders will want to take their profits and move on by the end of the day (pushing Carpenter's stock back up as they cover). So he covers his position and re-invests his cash elsewhere... even though Carpenter is still significantly overvalued.

• Take a look at the price movement for Apple over the course of three months.
• Notice how the price trended upward over time. Long-term traders try to profit from the price trend over weeks and months. They look for undervalued stocks with the expectation that it will eventually reach a much higher value later in the season.
• Long term trading is for someone who doesn't sweat the daily ups and downs of a stock and for someone who wants to invest, but doesn't want to monitor the market on a daily basis.
• PROTRADE Example: A story breaks that Chris Carpenter needs surgery and will be out for weeks. Joe hears the news and shorts him. Many other traders do the same and Carpenter's price falls. Short-term traders, anxious to make additional profits elsewhere, cover Carpenter's stock by the end of the day. This sends Carpenter's stock up even though his price is still way too high. Joe doesn't mind because he knows that he's made a solid investment and that Carpenter's stock price will fall significantly in the future. He's happy to wait.