Trading from scratch: a 90-day plan and what training you need

Trading for beginners from scratch: where to start

Trading for beginners is first a question of money and time. If you are deciding how to get into trading from scratch on your own, the course, strategy and terminal can wait. The money in the account should be money you won't mind losing entirely. You need time every day, otherwise there is no one to keep a trading journal.

The Empirix school, in an article on where to start trading, advises allocating no more than 10% of capital to it, even if that is 100 dollars. If you have loans, debts or a mortgage, the school advises not to start at all. The law does not require this; it is the school's opinion.

Brokers in Russia hold beginners back at the regulator's request. Since 01.04.2025, the Bank of Russia has introduced a category of clients "with an initial risk level": those who have no experience trading securities and derivatives. Their leverage is reduced, and the broker is obliged to warn in advance if an order will lead to a leveraged trade. So at the start of trading, you won't be allowed to trade much on borrowed funds.

Another filter appeared earlier, on 01.10.2021. An unqualified investor takes a test before complex products: margin trades, derivatives, repos. In the first month, brokers conducted more than 2.5 million such tests. The hardest were tests on foreign stocks and stocks outside the quotation lists: only 28 and 29% of investors answered all questions correctly. You can retake them as many times as you like. If you failed the derivatives test, put futures aside and go back to theory.

Who a trader is in simple terms and what this job is

A trader buys and sells stocks, currencies, futures or cryptocurrencies for the price difference. An investor holds securities for years, a trader - for days, hours, sometimes minutes. A private trader trades their own money through a broker. A prop trader trades on a prop company's simulated account according to its rules and receives a share of the profit. More about the profession and markets - in the article trading in simple terms and who a trader is.

There is no profession with a "trader" diploma, and there is no license for a private trader either. A certificate after a course confirms only that you completed the program.

In games the word means something else. In Murder Mystery 2 (mm2 for short), a trade is an exchange of in-game currency and items. A trader in tf2, cs2 or FC resells skins and player cards; this has nothing to do with an exchange.

How to start earning from trading from scratch: what the numbers say

ESMA collected data from EU national regulators. Between 74 and 89% of retail CFD accounts typically lose money, and the average loss per client ranged from 1,600 to 29,000 euros. After that, ESMA restricted CFDs for retail clients.

The harshest numbers came from a study from Brazil. Fernando Chague, Rodrigo De-Losso and Bruno Giovannetti took everyone who started day trading futures in 2013-2015. Of those who lasted more than 300 days, 97% lost money. 1.1% earned more than Brazil's minimum wage, and 0.5% earned more than a bank teller's starting salary. The work is called "Day Trading for a Living?", and the authors write that living off day trading is "practically impossible", whatever the course sellers say.

Sources: ESMA, abstract of the paper by Chague et al. (1.1% rounded to 1), Bank of Russia study as retold by Interfax and Vedomosti, verified 11.11.2026. In the Brazilian sample, 97% are counted among those who traded more than 300 days, not among all who started.

The Russian figures are softer, but the sample consists mostly of investors. The Bank of Russia studied clients of the largest brokers with portfolios from 10 thousand to 10 million rubles for 2023-2025. The average annual return came out to 2.9%. 63% of clients ended in profit, but 41% received only 0.1-6.7% per annum, less than the Moscow Exchange government bond index. Another 5% lost more than 10%. According to the Central Bank, derivative instruments more often worsened the result.

US regulators write about the same thing. The SEC calls day trading extremely risky: it can lead to substantial losses in a very short time. FINRA adds that frequent trading carries increased costs and taxes, and on margin you can lose more than you deposited.

Profit is also taxed. According to the Federal Tax Service, personal income tax on securities transactions for a tax resident is 13% if the tax base for the year is no more than 2.4 million rubles. 15% is taken from the amount above that.

Learning trading from scratch: a 90-day plan

The plan is designed for someone deciding how to start trading from scratch on their own and without a paid school. It does not promise income. After 90 days you will have an answer to a different question: whether it is worth continuing and on what terms.

Days 1-30: theory and one market

Trading lessons in the first month are vocabulary and trade mechanics. Figure out what the broker does and how much they charge per trade, what a lot, pip, spread and leverage are, how a stop-loss is placed. Without a stop, one bad trade can eat a month of work. There is a separate breakdown on stop and take: how to place a stop-loss and take-profit and calculate risk.

Choose one market and one instrument. Moscow Exchange stocks, a currency pair, an index futures or bitcoin: each has its own trading hours, its own volatility and its own costs. Technical analysis at this stage is needed in its simplest form. Open the daily chart and find candles, trend and levels on it, leave indicators for later.

In parallel, take one book and one free course. Move on to the second month when you can explain in words where the stop will be and how much money you will lose if it triggers.

Days 31-60: demo account and trading journal

The second month is practice without money. Open a demo account with a broker and the trading platform you will later use to trade your own money. How a demo differs from a cent account and a prop account is covered in the article demo account, cent account or prop.

Before the first trade, write your trading strategy on one page. When you enter, where the stop is, where you take profit, how many trades per day maximum. In the journal, for each trade write the date, instrument, reason for entry, stop, result and whether you broke your rules.

Demo deceives in one thing: there it is not scary. Therefore the main indicator of the second month is how many trades went strictly according to the rules. Profit on demo means little.

Days 61-90: small account or challenge

The third month is the first real money, but small. There are two options. Your own account for an amount you don't mind, with a risk of 0.5-1% per trade. Or a prop company challenge, where the loss is limited in advance by the price of the attempt.

At the end, compare the demo journal and the real account journal. If with money you more often move the stop, enter without a signal or try to win it back after a loss, go back to demo for another month.

How to trade without blowing your deposit: risk per trade

Risk management starts with one number: what share of the account you are willing to lose on a single trade. The working rule is 1-2% of capital; various blogs advise beginners to use 0.5-1%. Regulators do not set such a norm; it is the traders' own practice.

Why so little becomes clear in a losing streak. Ten stops in a row at 1% risk take the account down 9.6%, at 2% risk - down 18.3%. And to get back to the start after an 18.3% drawdown, the account already needs to grow by about 22%.

Position size is calculated from the stop: multiply capital by the risk percentage and divide by the stop-loss size. For example, a $1,000 deposit and 2% risk is $20. If the stop is 5% from the entry price, the position will be $400. At 1% risk the same formula gives $10 and a $200 position.

We calculated the drawdown rows ourselves: each stop takes 1% or 2% of what is left in the account. Add a daily loss limit to your strategy rules. If you lose, say, 3% in a day, close the terminal until tomorrow. Similar limits are in the rules of all prop companies in the PMC catalog, so the habit will come in handy there too.

Free trading education from scratch for beginners

You don't have to pay for your first course. Free material is enough for the entire first month of the plan.

The largest library is at the Moscow Exchange School. As of 11.11.2026, the catalog of free courses has 64 entries, with sections including the stock market, derivatives market and algo trading. The course "Investing from Scratch" is suitable for a start: 17 lessons and 4 tests. It covers a goal and a financial cushion, risk profile, the balance of risk and return, choosing a broker and an account. A separate lesson teaches how to tell an opportunity from a scammer's scheme.

For futures and options, the exchange has 17 courses, some of them free. For example, "Derivatives Market - the Key to Financial Independence" with 8 lessons for beginners, "Options. Basic Course" with 19 lessons and "Introduction to the Derivatives Market" with 16 lessons. The first one's title sounds grand, but inside they break down how futures and options work.

The exchange's broadcasts are also free. As of 11.11.2026, the schedule has five streams, the first one that same evening. Then 16.11 on macroeconomics basics, 17.11 on dividends, 18.11 on economic cycles and crises, 24.11 on trading by open interest.

If you're interested in prop trading, PMC Academy has 4 open lessons: what Prop Trading is, how to read challenge terms, how to choose a prop firm and a challenge to suit your style. The first lesson takes about 10 minutes. Its main idea: prop trading is not an easy way to make quick money.

Free trading education from brokers and schools can be an entry point to a paid product. In Komsomolskaya Pravda's roundup, the Gerchik "Trading Basics" course is described this way: 4 free lectures, then a paid extended version.

Trading courses from scratch: how much training costs

Paid programs from online schools cost from 30 to 85 thousand rubles. Prices are taken from the course pages on 11.11.2026. Two of the three schools had promotions running that day, so the numbers change quickly.

Netology sells a 5-month program for 84,900 rubles in a single payment; the price already includes a 10% discount. This is the promotional price that was valid until November 11; after that the figure may increase. The cohort starts on November 24. A certificate of advanced training is awarded for defending the final project and completing 80% of the homework assignments. Practice takes place on a demo account or your own account in QUIK. The school promises to refund the money if the training doesn't suit you, and mentions a 13% tax deduction, but the refund terms are not disclosed on the page.

SF Education offers a 2-month course: 4 modules, 40 practical assignments and more than 200 hours of practice. The price starts at 2,508 rubles per month with an interest-free installment plan over 12 months, which is 30,096 rubles. A graduate receives a certificate of advanced training; it is not a trader's license.

Skillbox offers 3,134 rubles per month with a 60% discount and an 18-month installment plan, totaling 56,412 rubles. The page includes modules on risk management and calculating position size.

The exchange itself also has paid courses, and they are cheaper: "Trading Futures on the Moscow Exchange" for 3,150 rubles (21 lessons), "Encyclopedia of Technical Analysis" for 7,000 rubles (12 lessons), "Futures: A Tool for Your Growth" for 8,900 rubles (46 lessons).

We did not find the shares of graduates who trade profitably on the public pages of Netology and Skillbox. Learning trading from scratch at any of these schools provides knowledge and a document confirming completion of the program. The document does not confirm the ability to avoid losing money in the market.

Trading school: how to check it before paying

The Bank of Russia states directly that the law prohibits guaranteeing returns. The higher the potential return, the higher the risk, and it is impossible to guarantee a high income in advance. If a trading school promises a certain percentage per month, you can stop reading there.

Three signs from the Central Bank's memo "Caution: Fraudsters!" also apply to schools: they guarantee high returns, invite you to "refer a friend", and pressure and rush you. Pressure is easy to spot on a course page. On 11.11.2026, Skillbox displayed the text "Course start: November 13", "Spots left: 7" and a timer reading "Discount valid for 0 days". The same page also sells "lifetime access to a chat with a top trader with a trading capital of $1.5 million" and promises that you will "build an algorithm that will lead to success".

The most dangerous scheme is one the Bank of Russia described in 2023. It is "trading training" during which students make transactions in low-liquidity instruments with a predetermined counterparty. The Central Bank considers this market manipulation. Trading accounts may be blocked, and the investor themselves may be held liable, even though the trades were suggested to them during the training.

Before paying, check two more things. Look for reviews of the course on trader forums and in chats where people from Russia write, not only on the school's website. And ask which account the practice takes place on: a demo account, your own account with a broker, or an account opened through the school.

Trading book from scratch: what to read in the first month

One book, Elder's, is enough for the first month. Douglas will be useful in the second month. Both books have been published in Russian.

Alexander Elder, "Trading for a Living" (Russian edition: «Как играть и выигрывать на бирже»), originally Trading for a Living (1993). Alpina's edition has 472 pages, and the subtitle names three topics: psychology, technical analysis, and money management. This is exactly the first-month set. Brazilian scientists, by the way, titled their paper almost the same way, only with a question at the end.

Mark Douglas, "The Disciplined Trader" (Russian edition: «Дисциплинированный трейдер»), SmartBook, 2009, 288 pages. In the annotation, the publisher writes that success in trading depends 80% on psychology and only 20% on methodology. These are the publisher's words; they are not confirmed by research. The book is useful to read in the second month, when the first violations of your own rules begin on the demo account.

How to become a trader and test your skill: prop challenge

After the course you will have a certificate, and after the demo - a journal. Neither shows how you trade under the pressure of rules and money. An independent test is provided by a small account of your own or a prop challenge.

Prop firms for traders work like this. You pay for an attempt, trade on a simulated account, and must reach a profit target without breaking the loss limits. Pass all stages - you get a share of the profit, usually 80%. How this works as a whole is covered in the article what prop trading is and how a challenge works.

For a beginner in a challenge, the loss limit is important. A bad month will cost the price of an attempt; the deposit will not suffer. According to the PMC catalog as of 11.11.2026, a two-phase challenge for $10,000 costs:

• The Funded Way, Starter way program: $92, targets 6% and 6%, daily limit 3%, overall 6%, overall rating 4.1.
• Era Trade: $99, targets 8% and 5%, daily limit 5%, overall 10%, overall rating 4.6.
• Hash Hedge: $99, targets 5% and 6%, daily limit 5%, overall 10%, overall rating 4.8.

From Russia, Era Trade, Hash Hedge, SpiceProp, The Funded Way and Vanta Trading are available via the PMC catalog cards. From Kazakhstan, HyroTrader is also available; its one-phase Hyro Core at $10,000 costs $39 with an overall 5% limit. Keep age in mind: The Funded Way was founded in 2025 according to the card, Vanta Trading in 2026, and their payout history is short.

Buying the challenge is worth it no earlier than the third month of the plan, when the journal shows discipline on demo. You can find a program for your budget and rules in the challenge calculator.

Summary

Trading from scratch should start with a free foundation, a demo account, and a journal, and in the first months you should pay only for experience on a small amount. After 90 days you will have facts about your trading. Continue your studies with the free lessons of the PMC Academy: they explain how a prop account works and how to read the challenge rules.