Last Updated on 10 February, 2024 by Trading System
Maybe, you are a swing trader and trade the market whenever you see a good setup in the market. You are not really bothered about many things. Ever wondered how many trading weeks are in a year?
There are 52 trading weeks in a year, just as there are 52 weeks in a year because the markets rarely, if ever, close for a full week without opening for business. However, in some trading weeks, the market may not be open for the entire five weekdays.
In this post, you will learn the following:
- What a trading week is
- How many trading weeks there are in a year
- Why you may not trade every week
- How to plan each trading week
What is a trading week?
A trading week is any week the stock market is open for business. Basically, every week of the year is a trading week because the market never fails to open each week. For the U.S. and European markets, which we focus on, the trading week normally starts on Monday and ends on Friday. However, in Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Middle East, the trading week is from Sunday to Thursday because of Friday prayers.
There is one thing you should know though: the market may not open on all five days in a trading week. The reason is often due to scheduled public holidays in the country, but on a few occasions, it could be from a major, unexpected event of national importance, such as the funeral of a president or something in that category.
Now that you know what a trading week is, let’s find out how many there are in a year.
How many trading weeks are in a year?
Just as there are 52 weeks in a year, there are 52 trading weeks in a year because every week is a trading week — the markets rarely, if ever, stay closed for a full week without opening for business. However, in some trading weeks, the market may not be open for the entire five weekdays due to public holidays observed by the market.
In the US, for example, the stock market normally observes nine holidays in a year, and they include the following:
- New Year’s Day (January 1st)
- Martin Luther King, Jr Day (The third Monday of January)
- Presidents’ Day (The third Monday in February)
- Good Friday (The Friday before Easter Sunday)
- Memorial Day (The last Monday of May)
- Independence Day (July 4th)
- Labor Day (The first Monday in September)
- Thanksgiving Day (The fourth Thursday of November)
- Christmas Day (December 25th)
Apart from the scheduled market holidays, unexpected events of national importance can make the market close for some days of the trading week. For example, the U. S. stock market closed on Wednesday, December 5th, 2018, to mark the death of former president George H.W. Bush.
Can you trade every week?
Now, you know that there are 52 trading weeks in a year, but can you trade every week? Sure, you can trade week in, week out if that is what you want. However, certain factors can limit the number of weeks you trade in a year. Some of those factors include:
- Poor liquidity and volatility: There are some weeks and months with a cluster of holidays and festivities. During such periods, there are usually low liquidity and low or high volatility, so you may want to stay away from the market and come back when things get back to normal. In essence, that the market is open doesn’t mean that it’s worth trading.
- Vacations: There are times when you will like to go on vacation with your family to quality time together. Most people do that during the summer, while some take their time off during the December holidays when the market is usually less liquid.
How to plan each trading week
Whether you are a day trader or swing trader, you need to plan your week ahead so you can be in a better position to take advantage of the opportunities that may arise during the week. Here are some tips that can help:
- If you are a swing trader, do your technical analysis during the weekend and create your watchlist of stocks to trade during the week. Also, check your open positions to know how they are doing.
- If you are a day trader, use the weekends to study the trends in higher timeframes and mark them out with trend lines. Also, mark the important support and resistance levels on those timeframes with horizontal lines. This will make your analysis on the intraday timeframes during the trading week a lot easier.
How many trading days in a month or a year?
We have these articles prepared for these questions and topics.