1) stick with companies / indexes you are familiar with. I made several trades in YONG, one of the China smallcaps I watch every day. It's not a great one to trade because there's not much volume, but I had a good sense of where it might bounce. I had bought it at 7.70, sold at 7.90, bought it back again at 7.92, sold at 8.40, then I left it alone until Thurs., when I bought it back once again as it dipped all the way back to 7.90 and it closed at 8.00. Most people buying it probably ended up breakeven or at a slight loss, but I made money every time on that one.
2) What the majority of daytraders do however, at least many I follow, is play anything with strong volume. I still haven't been able to jump these high-flying 'stocks in play' names. It requires a great deal of courage. I may try next week with very small size. What many traders do before the market opens is see what's 'in play' based on news. You can check what might move by checking Yahoo page here:
There's also a nice I-hub forum, like the one we have here, devoted exclusively to monitoring stocks that will gap up or gap down at the open. These guys always list what's hot or not each day and you can bookmark them here:
Some of the stocks from last week include: SERV, ABIO, SOMX -- you'll note some of these stocks went up over 100% in just one day and they almost always drop 50% or more within 3 days afterward. The key is to always buy them on the way up. (Once they start falling, they can be deadly.) What attracts daytraders? VOLUME. Volume is what makes these things move.
Also realize that many of these guys are very good at risk control. They always set stops. They are always ready to get out if the push runs out of juice. A few I follow are often selling after just .20 or .30 gain (which can often mean a quick 900 - $1200 profit in a few minutes).
The other key is to check the overall markets and see what sectors are hot. I noticed last week the oil sector was strong and bought RDC which I sold too quickly for about .30 gain -- it went on to run about 1.80 past my entry point in just 3 days. So buying a hot stock in the strongest sector is another good plan, even if the stock itself doesn't have any news. RIG, ESV, NE were all strong but I wasn't in them.
Unfortunately, the small cap China names I did very well on last year have all been selling off hard recently. The market has changed dramatically but I didn't change fast enough. Going forward, I'd like to be more in sync with the markets and less with what 'should' work. I'm sure at some point stocks like YONG, CPBY and RINO will work... but not now. So I'll get back in and hold them when they are showing strong volume and price movement.
I day-trade I use my scanner through E-trade (broker) to see what is active in the morning. I also go to various sites for news and info http://vsinvestor.com/
Market Data 
Markets 
AI
