Before you start — three things

1. You don't have a broker yet? Start there.

This guide walks through a complete trade using the dashboard. None of it matters if you don't have a place to actually execute trades. If you've never opened a brokerage account, do that first — it's a 10-minute signup and a 1-3 day approval.

2. You're not expected to know this already

If this feels technical, that's because trading uses a specialized vocabulary. Good news: it's a small vocabulary. Maybe 40 terms total. Once you know them, every market conversation suddenly makes sense.

This guide explains each term the first time it appears, in a blue "📖 What does X mean?" box. You'll also see links to deeper lessons. Don't try to master everything at once — click a link when a term is fuzzy, get clarity, come back.

3. The Academy + Supplemental together cover everything in this guide

The Wanderer Financial Academy teaches trading fundamentals — charts, strategies, risk management. The Supplemental course fills the gaps — concepts the academy skips (R-multiples, regime, daily bias, broker setup, etc.).

The mental model

The dashboard is not a trading platform. It has three jobs:

• Launchpad — one click to everywhere (broker, charts, calendar, research).
• Discipline — checklist, bias, regime. Forces the 60 seconds of thinking most traders skip.
• Memory — journal + playbook. The two things that actually compound.

The five tabs

The walkthrough — NVDA long, April 15

The trade we'll use as our running example

There are 7 technical terms in that thesis. Let's define each:

Sunday night — weekly prep

Before the week starts, you do two things on the dashboard:

• Click through Quick Links to your research tools (Finviz Heatmap, ForexFactory, TradingView).
• Type your weekly thesis into Scratchpad. Short. Like this:

WEEK OF 4/14
- SPX above 20MA, trend intact
- Semis leading (SMH +4% last week)
- Wednesday CPI — reduce size Tue close if holding
- NVDA: retest of 135 breakout. Long on confirm.
- AVGO, ORCL: watchlist for relative strength follow

That short note contains 5 more technical terms:

Monday 7:30 AM — pre-market prep

This is the most important 5 minutes of your trading day. Three things happen, in order.

1. Set your Daily Bias

Click Bullish, Neutral, or Bearish. Then type one sentence into the "Why?" box.

For our NVDA day:

• Bias: Bullish
• Why: "SPX holding above 20MA, semis leading, NVDA setting up for breakout retest. Trend day likely."

2. Set your Market Regime

Four options: Trend, Range, High Vol, Risk-Off.

For NVDA day: Trend regime selected. Breakout Retest is a valid setup here. ✓

3. Run the Pre-Market checklist

Five boxes. Check them off one by one.

Monday 9:35 AM — size the trade

Market is open. NVDA is testing $138. You see the reversal candle you were waiting for. Before you place the order — stop. Size it.

Step 1: Apply a preset

At the top of Risk Tools there are three presets:

• Day Trade — 0.5% risk
• Swing — 1% risk
• A+ Setup — 1.5% risk

This is a swing, not a day trade. Click Swing — 1% risk → Stock. Portfolio ($100,000) and Max Risk (1%) fill automatically.

Step 2: Fill the trade fields

Step 3: Read the output

Optional — same trade as options

Same NVDA view, but using call options instead of shares. You look at the April 18 $140 calls trading at $2.10 with a 0.45 delta.

Four new terms in that sentence:

Fill the calculator

Output

📚 Learn more: GammaS · ThetaS

Monday 9:37 AM — log the trade

Order filled. Before you do anything else, log it. The discipline is critical — if you wait until end of day, you'll forget the thesis and the emotional state at entry.

Click + New, fill in:

Example Notes:

NVDA — Entry $138.50, Stop $135.80, Target $145.25
370 shares, R:R 2.50, Risk $999, Target +$2,497

Clean retest of 135 breakout zone, strong buyers at 137.80.
Felt calm, not chasing. Volume confirming on 5min.

📚 Learn more: Trade JournalingA

Monday 11:45 AM — mid-day management

NVDA has moved to $141. You're up $925 on paper. The midday checklist has two items. The key action: move your stop to breakeven.

You're at +1R profit (stock moved $2.70 = your 1R distance). This is the standard trigger to move stop to breakeven.

11:45 — NVDA moved stop to 138.50 (breakeven).
+1R achieved. Target still 145.25.

Tuesday — trade exits

NVDA opens strong, hits $143 by 10:00 AM, consolidates, then breaks higher midday. At 1:20 PM, your limit at $145.25 fills. Trade closed.

Update the journal

• Exit: 145.25
• Status: closed
• P&L auto-calculates: +$2,497
• Append to Notes: "Hit target cleanly. Didn't trail, didn't exit early. Plan held."

The progression — what to learn next

Week 0: Get set up (non-negotiable)

• Supplemental — Your First Brokerage AccountS

Week 1–2: Fundamentals

• Academy Module 1 — Small Account: How to BeginA
• Academy Module 2 — ChartsA, VolumeA
• Supplemental — CandlesS, TimeframesS

Week 3–4: Strategies

• Academy Module 3 — Moving AveragesA, Breakout TradeA, KISS-50 TradeA
• Supplemental — Retest MechanicsS, Measured MoveS

Week 5–6: Risk & Management

• Academy Module 4 — Stop PriceA, Target PriceA, Risk ManagementA, JournalingA
• Supplemental — R-MultiplesS, R:R RatioS, Breakeven StopS, Trailing StopsS

Week 7–8: Context

• Supplemental — Market RegimeS, Daily BiasS, Relative StrengthS, Opening RangeS
• Supplemental — Economic CalendarS, Index ShorthandS, GapsS

Week 9+: Options (optional)

Only tackle options after stock trading is profitable for you. Trying to learn both at once is how most traders lose their first account.

• Supplemental — Options BasicsS, ThetaS, GammaS
• Academy — Delta and BetaA

Glossary A–D

Glossary E–M

Glossary N–R

Glossary S–Z

A = Academy   S = Supplemental

→ Start the Wanderer Academy (30 lessons, ~90 min)

→ Do the Supplemental course (19 lessons, ~60 min)

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