How This 19-Year-Old Student Balances Momentum Trading With College

Ben Banks was 12 years old when he bought his first two stocks. He didn’t know much about trading, but he was familiar with Nike Inc (NYSE: NKE) and Target Corporation (NYSE: TGT), so he purchased shares of the companies.

Seven years later, he’s studying finance at North Carolina State University and sharing his momentum trading performance on BenCBanks.com. He recently joined Benzinga’s #PreMarket Prep to talk about how he balances trading with college.

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“Surprisingly, there are a lot of people that are interested in the markets here in college,” he said of his peers. “About everyday I get asked, ‘Ben, tell me about what you do. I want to know more about trading. I’ve always been interested in that.’ So I’m happy to tell them. There’s a lot of interest.”

He’s taking 18 credit hours this semester (most universities consider 12 credit hours full time) and gets to the gym around 6 in the morning, he said. Banks uses his iPhone to track his trades throughout the day every half hour or so.

Although he might tweet out some thoughts throughout market hours, Banks said he doesn’t do much trading intraday.

So we're blaming this intraday reversal on #Ebola now? Because it certainly be a result of hitting resistance @ the 50 SMA.

— Ben C. Banks (@BenCBanks) October 23, 2014

“My prime time for set up … is from 3 to 4,” Banks explained. “And if anything looks good, if something’s setting up, I’ll then go and buy it in the last hour of the day.”

Banks also talked about his set-ups, the purpose for his blog and his hopes to someday be a money manager.

Check out his full interview here:

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