What is the best stocks to day trade today

Screening Filters

1. Price: 2–150 USD

   • Purpose: Focus on reasonably priced, actively tradable stocks for day trading.
   • Rationale:
     • Below about $2, you often get illiquid “penny stocks” with wide spreads, higher manipulation risk, and unreliable fills—bad for consistent day trading.
     • Extremely high-priced stocks (e.g., $500–$1000+) can be harder to size positions flexibly for small accounts and can result in large dollar swings per share.
     • The $2–$150 band targets names that are generally accessible, tradeable in round lots, and still volatile enough for intraday moves.

2. Monthly Average Dollar Volume ≥ 200,000 USD

   • Purpose: Ensure sufficient liquidity to enter and exit positions quickly without moving the market.
   • Rationale:
     • Dollar volume = price × volume. It captures both how many shares trade and at what price.
     • A minimum threshold helps filter out thinly traded stocks where spreads can be wide and orders may not fill reliably—key risks for day traders who need fast in-and-out execution.
     • While $200k is a modest bar (some day traders might prefer much higher), it’s a minimum designed to avoid the worst illiquidity.

3. Relative Volume (Rel Vol) ≥ 1.1

   • Purpose: Highlight stocks that are trading more actively today than their usual pace.
   • Rationale:
     • Relative volume compares today’s volume to the stock’s average volume over a recent period (e.g., 30 days).
     • A value ≥ 1.1 means the stock is trading at least 10% above its normal volume, a sign of unusual interest or news.
     • Elevated relative volume often correlates with larger intraday price swings—exactly what many day traders look for.

4. Price Change Percentage: -100% to -1.5% (on the day)

   • Purpose: Focus on stocks that are down on the day, but not completely collapsed.
   • Rationale:
     • Limiting to ≤ -1.5% filters for names moving meaningfully lower—often because of news, sentiment shifts, or technical breaks—creating intraday trading opportunities (momentum or mean-reversion).
     • The lower bound of -100% is just a technical catch-all; practically, it captures any significant loser that hasn’t gone to zero.
     • Many day traders specifically scan for “losers” or “gap-downs” because they tend to have strong, tradeable intraday moves with high volume.

5. Region: United States

   • Purpose: Match the user’s focus on the US market.
   • Rationale:
     • Ensures that only US-listed securities are returned, aligning with US trading hours, US regulatory environment, and typical US broker access.
     • Eliminates ADRs or foreign markets that might have different liquidity and volatility profiles.

6. List Exchange: XNYS, XNAS, XASE (NYSE, NASDAQ, NYSE American)

   • Purpose: Restrict results to major, reputable US exchanges.
   • Rationale:
     • NYSE and NASDAQ are the primary venues for most liquid US stocks; NYSE American (AMEX) also hosts many actively traded small/mid caps.
     • Excluding OTC and pink-sheet stocks reduces exposure to highly illiquid, less regulated names where day trading risk is significantly higher.
     • Major exchanges generally ensure better transparency, tighter spreads, and more consistent trading rules.

Why the Results Match “Best Stocks to Day Trade Today in the US Market”

• Intraday Action: The relative volume ≥ 1.1 and price change ≤ -1.5% tilt the scan toward stocks actually moving today, not just generally volatile names.
• Tradability: The price range (2–150 USD) and minimum dollar volume work together to find stocks that most day traders can afford, with tighter spreads and enough liquidity to get in and out.
• US Focus & Quality of Listing: The US region and major-exchange filters align exactly with “US market” and avoid lower-quality, off-exchange names.

Together, these filters don’t claim to find “the best” in an absolute sense, but they systematically narrow the universe down to stocks that are:

• In the US market,
• Liquid enough for active trading, and
• Showing unusual intraday activity and downside movement today—prime conditions many day traders specifically seek.