A little advice for all new traders...take it very slow, TRADE SMALL! The biggest regret a lot of long-term traders have is not going slower with very small amounts of money to learn how to trade in the beginning years. Trading is not easy, and it's a very psychological game, so when you have a big position and it's not working out, it can mess with your decision-making. It's good to trade on a simulation account before using real money. I like to trade slightly out-of-the-money options. The reason it is good to trade indexes like QQQ and SPY is that traders are always looking for the hot stock of the moment with lots of liquidity (Volume). You have that almost every day with QQQ and SPY because they have the highest volumes and represent whole segments of the market. Try to watch them both to get a feel for the charts. For charting, I use ThinkOrSwim and TradingView. I like both of them for different reasons and different tools. If you are new to charting, then you might find TradingView a bit easier to learn. Here is a link to it: Sign up to explore TradingView now: https://www.tradingview.com/pricing/?share_your_love=bigronnielove&mobileapp=true All the best, Ron