The default scanner focuses on two ETFs — keeping signal quality high beats covering everything badly. For anything else you want to track, your personal watchlist on the dashboard handles it, with the cadence that matches how you trade.
What Sigmatic watchesSigmatic watches two large-cap ETFs every morning — QQQ (Nasdaq-100) and SPY (S&P 500) — during the active 9:30–10:30 ET window. Want to watch something else? Add it to your personal watchlist on the dashboard. Pick fast watch if you might trade it today, or long-term watch if a daily check is enough.Why YouTube day-trader numbers look differentWhen you see traders post $5,000 or $50,000 days from small accounts, three things are usually going on under the hood. First, they're trading low-float small-caps on news catalysts — stocks under $20 with very few shares available, where one news headline can move price 50% to 500% in one day. The upside is real; so are halts, gaps, spreads, and full wipeouts. Sigmatic does not cover these and does not recommend them for beginners. Second, they're using leverage — options contracts, futures, or leveraged ETFs that multiply the percentage move of the underlying. Third, they're using larger buying power — a pattern-day-trader margin account (see PDT margin below) lets bigger position sizes ride on a smaller cash balance.The Sigmatic trade-offSigmatic gives you clear BUY / SELL / WAIT calls on liquid symbols, with risk management baked in. The dollar-per-trade ceiling on a small account is small. The dollar-per-trade floor — the worst loss — is also small. That trade-off is intentional. Sigmatic is not a low-float small-cap or news-rocket tool. If you want occasionally explosive, you want a different tool. We optimize for the boring middle — clear setups, defined risk, no heroics.Being right isn't the same as making moneyA correct read on direction doesn't guarantee a winning trade. Price often touches a level and then turns back — more often than it pushes cleanly through and holds — so a BUY can be right about where things are headed and still stop out (get closed at its preset loss) on the wiggle before the real move arrives. That isn't the signal failing; it's ordinary market noise. It's also why Sigmatic surfaces WAIT so often, keeps the risk on each trade small, and never asks you to bet the account on being right every time.If you want bigger swings on a small accountLeveraged ETFs aren't part of the default QQQ + SPY universe — but you can add them to your watchlist. TQQQ (3× QQQ long) and SQQQ (3× QQQ short) are the most common. Set either to fast watch for intraday refreshes, or long-term watch for a daily check.
Heads up: leveraged ETFs amplify gains and losses, and they lose value over time when held more than a day — they're built for short holds, not long-term positions. If you add one, treat your position like it's 2–3× larger than it looks.
Terms in plain English
Low float
A stock where very few shares are actually available to trade. Big news plus low float means demand can vastly outweigh supply, which is why these stocks can move 50–500% in a day.
Spread
The gap between the price someone is willing to buy at (bid) and willing to sell at (ask). Liquid stocks have tight spreads (often 1¢); illiquid stocks can have wide spreads that quietly eat into profits.
Leveraged ETF
A fund engineered to deliver 2× or 3× the daily move of an underlying index or stock, designed for one-day holds; held longer, the daily reset mechanic can cause decay.
Fast watch
A watchlist symbol that refreshes every few minutes during market hours. Use this for tickers you might trade today.
Long-term watch
A watchlist symbol that gets a single daily check at 9:00 AM ET. Use this for swing positions you don't need to react to in real time.
Pattern day trader (PDT) margin
Accounts above $25,000 can borrow up to 4× their cash for day trades. Bigger position size, but losses are also 4× — you can lose more than you put in. Below $25,000, you're capped at 3 day trades per 5 business days.
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