Types of Traders - Overview

The scalper is an individual who makes dozens or hundreds of trades per day, trying to "scalp" a small profit from each trade by exploiting the bid-ask spread.

Momentum traders look for stocks moving significantly in one direction on high volume and try to jump on board to ride the momentum train to a desired profit. For example, Netflix (Nasdaq:NFLX) surged over 260% to $330 from January to October in 2013, which was way above its valuation. Its P/E ratio was above 400, while its competitors' were below 20. The price went up so high primarily because many momentum traders were trying to profit from the uptrend, which drove the price even higher. Even Reed Hasting, CEO of Netflix, admitted that Netflix is a momentum stock during a conference call in October 2013.

Technical traders are obsessed with charts and graphs, watching lines on stock or index graphs for signs of convergence or divergence that might indicate buy or sell signals.

Fundamentalists trade companies based on fundamental analysis, which examines corporate events such as actual or anticipated earnings reports, stock splits, reorganizations or acquisitions.

Swing traders are really fundamental traders who hold their positions longer than a single day. Most fundamentalists are actually swing traders, since changes in corporate fundamentals generally require several days or even weeks to produce a price movement sufficient enough for the trader to claim a reasonable profit.

Novice traders might experiment with each of these techniques, but they should ultimately settle on a single niche, matching their investing knowledge and experience with a style to which they feel they can devote further research, education and practice.

Source: http://www.investopedia.com/articles/trading/02/090302.asp