How to Bet on the Stock Market

Learn about market behavior, financial and fundamental analysis, and technical analysis of trading charts. The more you know, the better your decisions will be, particularly in a fast-moving market. The North American Securities Administrators Association (NASAA) has a good online course in investing basics, and Investopedia has an introduction to technical analysis.
Practice your trading strategies using an online fantasy stock market. Read Investors Business Daily every day, and decide whether you want to buy, sell or wait for a better investing opportunity. Choose an ETF (exchange-traded fund) that interests you and fantasy trade that until you're ready to branch out into other stocks. Continue fantasy trading for at least three to six months. You are training yourself to react wisely to unexpected developments in the market and learning how the market moves in relation to economic indicators and company earnings reports.
Allocate only a small portion of your total trading account to your first few trades. Always keep a reserve in case you make a bad trading decision and take a substantial loss. As you make profits, take out and set aside your original investment amount in your trading reserve.
Control your risk by investing in mutual funds and ETFs, which give you maximum diversification for minimum investment. Diversification tends to protect against the risk of a single credit, or sector.
Use dollar cost averaging to avoid the risk of investing all your money at a market high. Invest a fixed amount at regular intervals in the same stock each time until you have established a full position. For most people, this means buying one or two different stocks, an ETF or a mutual fund. One of the best places to do this inexpensively is Sharebuilder.com. Investing a fixed amount at regular intervals in a variety of things does not achieve dollar cost averaging.

How to Pull out of the Stock Market (5 Steps)

Place sell orders for all of your stocks and stock mutual funds. Sell your shares at market to get the fastest execution and current market price. If the markets are tanking on the day when you do this, place your orders immediately. If the market is rising that day, you might be wise to wait a little while to see if you can get a slightly higher price.
Contact your variable annuity or variable life insurance carrier and tell them to move all of your money out of any sub-accounts that invest in stocks. Move the money either into the fixed account, the money market fund or other sub-accounts that invest in bonds, real estate or other asset classes.
Place limit orders on your stock sales if you are not in an urgent hurry to get out of the market. If the stock has been vacillating in a price range for a while, place a limit order near the high end of the price range and wait for the stock price to rise to that level. This strategy can make a big difference in how much you end up with, particularly if you have a large number of shares to sell.
Wait until you have held your stocks for at least one year before selling if you are near that threshold already and aren't in a desperate hurry to sell. This is wise if your stocks have appreciated substantially, because you will pay a lower rate of tax on your gains if you have held your stocks for at least a year to the day before selling them.
Wait at least until the market rebounds somewhat if you are selling because the market dropped severely in a single day. The stock market is almost certain to take a dead cat bounce back up at some point, and waiting for this to happen can be a wise choice in many cases.