Category Archives: Trading

Too Many Indicators Used In Trading Forex

Traders utilizing technical analysis make it their business to devise structured trading methods known colloquially as -systems.- Traditionally, a system is composed of a signal and a filter. The signal can derive from a single indicator or from several working together, while the filter is generally a lone indicator. New traders can, however, run into trouble when they build their first systems. The problem, which is two-fold, stems from overcomplication.

New traders often begin their journey lurking on Forex forums and utilizing free charting programs such as MetaTrader. While MetaTrader is a solid platform, the sheer number of free indicators available for it can overwhelm. Newcomers may find themselves fiddling with different indicators for months, switching from one to another whenever they make a series of bad trades.

Worse, this bounty of indicators makes it easy to cram the MetaTrader window full of them on the erroneous assumption that -more is better.- As a result of this constant experimentation and over-stuffing, novice traders never learn the value of getting a proposed system down in writing and testing it exclusively for at least six months, which is the only way the trader can actually tell if they can utilize the system profitably.

Worse still, these Forex hopefuls often don’t take the time to learn the difference between indicator types and will use them together indiscriminately. Consequently, many new traders use several indicators that essentially do the same thing. For instance, the Relative Strength Index and the Fast Stochastic are both oscillators with little lag. Having them on the same chart, if they’re both set to their standard periodicity, is a waste of space.

Having too many indicators in a system causes two problems: information overload and false confidence. In the case of the first, the trader may panic if their indicators all indicate a trade and then several indicators later reverse the signal, as often happens. In such a case, the neophyte won’t know which indicator to defer to and will be exposed to the market all the while.

False confidence manifests when a sophisticated-looking system is actually a hodge-podge of disparate indicators that were never meant to work together. A good example would be a system that includes both Bollinger Bands and the Market Facilitation Index. Bollinger Bands is a channel indicator that represents changes in volatility, while the Market Facilitation Index uses bars of various colors in a separate window to illustrate the real-time flow of volume. Trading with both indicators can be confusing because they are analyzing the currency pair in very different ways.

Forex newcomers that build complex systems are loath to discard or simplify them because such systems provide a sense of sophistication. However, the effectiveness of their systems are always directly proportionate to their Forex knowledge, and therein lies the problem.

Fortunately, new traders can overcome the debilitating tendency to overcomplicate by learning about the different types of indicators and as a rule using only one type each in their system. In general, there are five types of indicators: trend spotting such as the simple moving average, trend strength such as the MACD and PSAR, channels such as the Bollinger Bands, volume such as the Market Facilitation Index and price action indicators such as the Renko, Kinji and candlestick formations.

Core Liquidity Markets is an Australian company which is registered with ASIC, ACN 164 994 049. www.clmforex.com

Common Mistakes Made by Online Forex Trading Beginners

One of the biggest mistakes a beginner can make is to rush in. You need to understand the basics of currency trading before you become a trader. For instance you could lose all your trading capital if you do not understand leverage.

Develop your plan first and get a forex trading strategy and write it down. Follow your plan and strategy diligently. Failing to invest time into forex trading is another novice mistake. The exchange markets need dedication; you need to constantly monitor it. This is not the kind of investment you make then sit back and wait for the returns.

Lack of discipline can be a fatal mistake in currency trading. You need to be much disciplined. Do not make emotional decisions that can cost you. For instance, if you incur losses, do not try to trade more to get back at the market. Be rational in your decision making.

Limit your number of currency pair. In order to succeed in currency trading, try trading in only one currency pair; this will ease your monitoring and decision making process.

Do not attempt to make predictions in currency trading. Many forex trading beginners try to adopt a “get rich quick” mentality. They therefore make hasty costly mistakes like trying to predict the buying or selling prices. You can’t make predictions in currency trading.

Most forex trading beginners fail to establish a trading style. You need to understand the three trading styles, that is, day trading, long term method and swing method. Select a trading style that matches your goals.

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Forex Scalping Techniques – How It Can Increase Your Forex Trading Earning By 300%

Foreign exchange trading is all about making money out of the variations in the values of the currencies you hold. While most moneymaking forex trading decisions are done by sticking in the market long enough to see trends and to take advantage of breakouts, there are those that are done short-term. One forex trading method that is common for those who want to go for short-term small-yield forex trading is forex scalping. Scalping in the forex market is done by going into a trade and then getting out of it within moments. Traders scalping in the forex market often make several trades in a day desiring to grow more pips out of their trades.

Forex scalping is made feasible only because forex trading is a highly leverage trade. Due to the short term nature of this form of trade, traders constantly exit their trades for a small gain of approximately 15 to 25 pips. Because of the leverage offered by the forex brokers, it allows the small pips profit to be translated into a good income. What most forex scalpers do are getting in and out of several trades within a day to gain more earnings taking full advantages of the volatility in the forex market.

Being a forex scalpers can make you a good income but it can also cause you to huge losses within a short period of time. As forex scalping is a short term trading strategy, the trade is usually executed within several minutes and this definitely requires the quick decision making ability of the traders. Therefore it is very essential for anyone who plans to scalp the currency market to have a thorough knowledge in trading. If you find yourself having troubles in scalping the forex, you can also look into the alternative method of using a automatic forex robots that is able to make trades for you based on its program. There are some robots that are able to get consistent results raking in good profit for the traders.

Having a good automated forex robots can make your forex scalping much more better. If you have built a good forex scalping plan, you can then program it into your automated forex scalping system so that it can trade for you on its own. a combination of a good trading plan run by a trustworthy forex robots can be more lucrative than day trading.

If you are not patient enough to go for day trading or position trading which may takes you a minimum of 90 min to see your profit, you can look into scalping the forex as a means of forex trading. However if you have troubles in executing the fast trades, you can use the help of those forex scalping robots or systems to help you.

Forex Trading – Refining Macd Trading Strategies

No indicator can give all correct signals all the time and hence continuous refinement in the strategies to use an indicator is a must to avoid as many false signals as possible. Getting a few signals which are good is always better than getting a lot of signals of poor quality.

Moving average convergence divergence MACD is used very commonly in technical analysis for trading. MACD is a lagging indicator and that means that any signals by the crossover of MACD and its signal line are generated with some lag in time. The signals are generated after a confirmation of the move in a particular direction this comes with a time lag. When the trend is weaker, this lagging would tend to cause more false signals.

Why more false signals during weak trends or when the market is ranging or running sideways?:

1) Entry signal: By the time the entry signal is generated, the price may be reaching the reversal point because during the time lag the trend becomes further weaker and market is on the verge of reversal.
2) Exit Signals: By the time the reversal crossover takes place and signals that we should close our position to take profit, the price already reverses so much that the realized profits levels are much less than the realization levels if would have closed the trade sooner.

Though the most important factor in trading are the skills, knowledge and trading discipline but there are always possibilities of improving our indicators also. The improvement can be either by the change in the logic by adding new conditions or by experimenting with different period settings. What we wish to always achieve is to have lesser and lesser percentage of false signals. Albin, Gunter and Kain came up with some refinements in the original MACD for reducing the percentage of false signals which may otherwise be generated. The first refined version is known as MACD R1 and the second is MACD R2 as the subsequent one.

Let’s check what MACD-R1 and MACD-R2 are. Our trading platform most probably will not have these refined versions but considering the logics of these, we may think about improving our MACD trading strategies.

MACD-R1:

a) One more condition was added and that was to wait for three periods (days on daily chart) after the MACD line crosses the signal line upwards or downwards before we take a position. This wait was to ensure that the signal was not false and an immediate reversal does not take place as soon as we take a position. If during this 3 periods another crossover takes place then we forget the first crossover and wait for another 3 periods to ensure this reversal.

b) To avoid the exit problem as mentioned in point number 2 above, MACD R1 has the profit taking levels as pre-decided percentages. In a nut and shell it says that don’t be greedy and come out of a trade with certain pre-decided percent of profits. These suggested profit taking percentages were 3% or 5%. So MACD R1 says that close the trade after 3% or 5% gain after the entry. In case a reversal crossover takes place before this pre-decided target of 3% or 5% then also we should close the trade.

MACD-R1 – weaknesses:

1) Even with these additional conditions there still is higher number of false signals.

2) Loss in the profits: Lets assume that it is a strong uptrend and after taking a buy position the prices move up by 8%. And what we did was, we closed the position after 3% or 5% profit and hence the opportunity of making higher gains was lost. basically we may end up in making a big loss in the profit and that goes against the mantra that let your profits run and cut your losses short.

MACD-R2:

To overcome the above mentioned issue of still higher number of false signals by MACD R1 an additional condition was added in terms of further refinement. The new refined version is known as MACD-R2.

Lets think why MACD-R1 still offers possibilities of reducing the false signals:

Scenario: We wait for 3 periods to have the confirmation of the trend continuation by seeing that no reversal crossover takes place during this waiting period. And after this 3 periods we enter the market. As soon as we enter the market, a reversal takes place and we end up with losses.

Now let’s see why the above mentioned scenario is possible and what did we miss to avoid it:

This can happen because we waited for the confirmation but ignored another warning signal i.e. what did not happen may happen soon now.

This may happen because though by the end of the 3 periods after the original crossover, another reversal crossover does not take place but the MACD line comes dangerously close to the signal line to indicate a reversal. The difference between the MACD and signal line reduces drastically. We are not keeping track of this development and ignore this reducing difference between MACD line the signal line even though it indicates the possibilities of a reversal crossover.

What additional changes/conditions are there in MACD-R2:

Now when we know what we missed, we have to add that condition so that we do not lose the track of the reducing difference indicating a reversal.

An additional condition was added apart from the original concepts of MACD-R1 to design MACD R2. This condition is to ensure that we keep a track of the difference between the MACD line and the signal line and do not ignore a warning signal of a possible reversal. This condition ensures that a pre-decided difference maintains between MACD and MACD signal line even after waiting for 3 periods and then only we enter the market. If the difference between MACD line and the signal line goes lesser than the pre-decided level then we do not enter the market.

Suppose we decide that the minimum difference between MACD and signal line should be at least 1.2% at the end of 3 periods. What it means is if the difference between these two lines is less than 1.2% then should not take trade position. We decide this difference percentage based on the experience that a difference less than this may indicate a possible reversal.

Visual Chart Trading, TradeStation Add On, Chart Trading

Visual Chart Trading Directly from Your Trading Charts!

Can you see the value of being able to:

1.Buy
2.Sell Short
3.Scale into a trade with multiple manual entries while an automated strategy does your exits
4.Scale out of any automated strategy entry using multiple manual exits
5.Manually drag a Profit Target Line into position
6.Manually drag a Stop Loss Line into any position to initially limit risk, and during the trade to lock in your profits
7.Have the strategy calculate and display the Reward-Risk Ratio on your chart, based on where you just positioned your Profit Target trendline and Stop Loss trendline.

You can do all of this without ever leaving your trading chart!

http://www.customizedtrading.com/TradeStation_Add_Ons/Visual_Chart_Trading

The Trend Line Trader Strategy completely allows a Trader to manually interact and manage ANY existing automated trading strategies while eliminating the common TradeManager “Out of Sync” error problems.
Using the Trend Line Trader Strategy you can do any of the the following directly from your charts:

Trader can make Manual Entries & Exits – Computer does the Trade Monitoring & Alerts
Trader can make Manual Entries – Computer does Automated Strategy Exits
Computer does the Strategy Entries – Trader moves Profit Exit Line & Stop Loss Exit Line to manage exits
Computer does Automated Strategy Entries & Exits – Trader interacts and manages automated strategy trades using Profit Exit Line & Stop Loss Exit Line.

After entry into each new trade, this strategy draws a trendline at the “Real” entry price on your trading chart. It also draws an adjustable Profit Limit exit trendline, and a adjustable Stop Loss exit trendline. The trader manages the trade by moving the adjustable Profit Trendline and adjustable Stop Loss Trendline at any time during the trade.

This strategy uses the entry price, profit trendline, and stop loss trendline to calculate the live Reward-Risk Ratio and display it on the trading chart. Move one of the adjustable trendlines and the Reward-Risk Ratio is re-calculated and displayed. See examples in picture #3 and #4.

Professional Traders manage risk first and foremost, risk management is a Traders most important job. This makes good Reward-Risk Ratio trade management very simple.

Why Reward-Risk Ratio trade management is so vital is best said by Perry J. Kaufman, “A trading system alone will not assure success without proper risk control, beginning with individual trades… Every trading style has losing streaks that will ruin an investor who begins trading at the wrong time without adequate capital; therefore the size of the position, the markets to trade, and when to increase or decrease leverage become important for financial survival.”

This is a TradeStation Add-On Strategy and works on any intraday chart, time frame, and symbol, plus it works correctly alongside ANY existing automated strategy you already use. This strategy requires [IntraBarOrderGeneration=True] to work correctly, this means TradeStation will not allow multiple data streams to be placed on the same chart as this strategy.

http://www.customizedtrading.com/TradeStation_Add_Ons/Visual_Chart_Trading

Benefits Of A Multi Screen Set-up During Your Forex Trading Course

Ask any new or aspiring trader about their preconception of a professional Forex trader and most answers conjure up images of men in pinstripe suits, sat in front of uncountable screens filled with charts buying and selling every minute. It is understandable why so many feel inadequate and at a disadvantage when sat in front of their 15 inch laptop trying to trade every set-up on every market at the same time. First things first, it must said that it is the Forex trader behind the screen that matters, his/her psychology, discipline and money management that determines the traders success and not whether or not the trader has the latest version of Dell monitors, high speed access to broker prices or an instant newsfeed. These things can contribute to the traders success but they are not perquisites for successful trading.

During your Forex trading course you could realize that there are benefits to trading from a single screen monitor or laptop and this can be used to the beginning traders advantage. It allows the trader to choose one single market to follow or one set-up to master on whichever timeframe they choose. With time and experience the Forex trader will build the necessary skills required to trade multiple markets or monitor for multiple trade entries. Once more advanced a Forex trader can start to create their own trading station and utilising technology in their trading. When using a handful of strategies on different timeframes in various markets, monitoring their correlations and watching how different timeframes relate to one another it can be imperative to have more screen space.

Having a multi-screen set-up during your Forex trading course is great way to keep an eye on various charts all at the same time. It also allows the Forex trader to access emails and newsfeeds which may be relative to their trading. Going beyond a four screen set-up is not normally a necessity and is more of a luxury rather than requirement. Having said so; for traders who also teach or act as a mentor to new traders; having extra 2 screens can be very useful as it allows traders to not only watch his/her positions but also provide training to trainees. The extra screens may be used as more of a command and control system whereby the main trader watches how trainees are progressing in order to correct mistakes and set trainees on the right path.

Some Forex trading course providers have many traders from around the world who trade from a laptop, anywhere with an internet connection. However, as time progresses it would not be surprising that their Forex training continues using a multi-screen set-up simply because the beginners to Forex can become more efficient and more productive.

Making It Big In Commodity Futures Trading

For many average investors, commodity futures trading are quite hard to understand and deal with due to a largely complex trading process. However, it is only hard to novel investors. Once you have understood the running concept, you can start counting returns even before you invest your money. This article will give you a few pointers towards that direction.

To make it big in commodity futures trading you must have a broker who is well versed in futures trading or an FCM (Futures Commission Merchant). An FCM is an intermediary between the futures market and public traders. The broker deposits a certain margin online to the realm of futures trading market so that he or she can make the trader recognized. We have two brokerage types namely the discount brokers and the full service brokers.

In commodity futures, the trading performance is held in place by a contract that is known as a futures trading contract. The commodity futures contracts are created so that the underlying commodities a trader has invested in can be traded sometime in the long run at a more fixed rate, mostly in the current market prices of the time. Just like trading in stocks, the commodity futures are traded only at certain trading markets that are centralized for that sole purpose, such as Globex and S&P.

Many investors in the futures trading world of commodities are mired by the misconception that it is the commodity futures exchanges that establishes or determines the prices of commodity futures when selling or buying. The truth however is that the commodity’s demand and supply ratios are the determining factors of the market price rates. Like in all trades, you must remember that if the buyers exceed the sellers, the price automatically shoots up. The converse is also true.

Essentially, the sell and buy orders are the ones that determine the kind of prices to be set and they originate from multiple sources. All orders are channelled through the trading exchange for appropriate execution. Commodity futures trading has evolved over the years and currently it has been affected to an extent by online markets. Futures trading online offers the convenience of trading from home and a wider market reach.

A huge number of brokerage firms that have set up their websites. This allows you to trade in distinct commodities on these websites. The brokers on the other hand require you to begin trading only after registering an account with them and after you have downloaded a trading platform, which will give you the ability to trade. Some of the futures trading sites provide you with a number of commodities trading service execution, from broker execution, foreign exchange currencies, self directed execution online to automated system execution. All of these can easily be in use in commodities trading except the foreign exchange platform of execution.

The importance of a commodity futures trading broker is that he or she is responsible for the maintenance of records that include the customer deposit margins, completed transactions, money balances and open futures.

Forex Trading Tips – Find Success in the Forex Trading Game

Forex trading is gaining popularity in leaps and bounds and everybody wants to get in on the game. Forex trading can be very profitable, if you start out the right way and not just blindly jump in with both feet. The experts will tell you the first thing a person needs to do is develop the right personality for forex trading. When giving forex trading tips, experts say that your attitude will either make or break you.

Honesty is the first key in becoming a successful forex trader. Many people feel that in order to make their stories more interesting than they actually are, they need to embellish and exaggerate them. Most people don’t come right out and lie, but when they start talking they tend to add a more exciting details and twist to their stories. Also, many people tend to leave the bad stuff out or shy away from the downside of things, especially when she or he is trying to make a sale. Honesty is absolutely essential when you’re forex trading. You want the people your dealing with to trust you and you will need that trust in order to build good working relationships with the people you come in contact with. Either good news or bad, being honest will get you where you want to go.

If you don’t have good listening skills then you’re going to need to work on them and become a better listener. When someone is giving you essential information about what’s going on in the forex trading market, listen to their whole story. Many people start off listening pretty well but after a few minuets, many tend to drift off or zone out and start thinking of other things. Make sure you listen to the whole story, when you feel yourself drifting off, come back and stay in the NOW, not what happened yesterday. Many people have made some very bad financial choices because they didn’t hear everything that was being said to them.

Think things through before making a decision. After listening to some good forex trading tips, think them through and analyze the situation first. Don’t react to everything you hear right away. Many traders find that when they wait a couple hours or so after they’ve learned some information about the market, their outlook has changed and they understand what they heard even better than they did after first hearing about it, allowing them to make better decisions with their money. Thinking things through and analyzing what may and may not happen, is the key to successful trading.

Lose the ego, or the -I’m smarter than you attitude. There is no room for big egos within forex trading. Making your decisions based on pride could be disastrous to your financial situation. Decisions based of facts and figures are needed here.

Set your goals and stick with them. Decide what it is you want from forex trading and then be prepared to wait for it. Smart traders know they are not going to get rich quick. Success happens over time. When you set goals, you have something to work towards and this keeps you focused. If you’re an impatient person, then set smaller goals and build up to bigger one’s. Most important of all is to stick with your goals and try not to venture too far off the beaten path. Many people set goals but don’t follow them and then wonder why they’re not successful traders.

These are just a few forex trading tips that you may find helpful to you. As you set out to learn all you can about forex trading, you will find all kinds of good information. The best thing to do is to take the information that you need and leave the rest for someone else. As big as the forex trading market is today, there’s enough for everybody to gain a successful financial future.

About the Author:

Did you know that most successful forex traders made it big without any prior trading experience? Adam Feinberg has helped hundreds of average income earners learn the ways of forex trading with great results. To read about Adam’s forex trading secrets, visit his personal forex trading website here: www.forextradingspy.com

Six Forex Trading Tips for Newbies

You have decided to be a trader in the forex market, and you have no idea on how to begin. Let’s first start by defining what the forex market is and what it does.

The term “forex”, also known as the foreign exchange is a market for the sale and purchase of all kinds of currencies. It originated in the early 1970’s when floating currencies and free exchange rates were first introduced. At this time, the forex market traders were the ones who set the value of one type of currency against another. Nowadays, the market forces determine the value of a currency against another.

One unique aspect of the Forex market is that very little trading qualifications are required of anyone intending to trade therein. Independence from external control ensures that only the market forces influence the currency prices. As the largest financial market, with trades reaching up to 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars, or USD, the money moves so fast, its impossible for a single investor to substantially affect the price of any major foreign currency. In addition, unlike any stock that is rarely traded, forex traders are able to open and close any positions within seconds, because there are always a number of willing buyers and sellers.

1. The first thing you need to do is open a forex account. You will have to fill an application form which includes a margin agreement stating if the broker will be allowed to intervene with any trade when it appears too risky. Since most trades are done using the broker’s money, it is only logical that he protect his interests. However, once you have established an account, you can fund it and begin trading in the forex market.

2. Adopt a trading strategy, that has proven to be successful for you. Remember that strategies will work differently for different traders, so don’t try to adopt a strategy that works well for another trader. It might backfire on you. The two available approaches are either technical analysis or fundamental analysis. A combination of the two is a more preferred choice for experienced traders.

3.Understand that prices move by trends. Forex has a popular saying, The trend is your friend. There are certain movements that have been studied over many years in order to identify a pattern in the trend. These trends need to be understood in order to understand a good trading strategy.

For small accounts that are $25,000 and under, trading with a trend may help improving your odds when compared to bi-directional trading. Most newbies will look to trade in any direction, when they should be trading with a trend.

4. Ensure you know which are the top five currencies pairs in the foreign exchange. These are USD/Yen, Swiss franc/USD, Euro/Yen, Euro/USD and Pound/USD.

5. For newbies, it is advisable to maintain two accounts to ensure you learn to play the trading game. Keep one real account, one that you will actually use to trade real money; and the second account should be a demo, one that you can use to test alternative moves in the trading game. You can easily use your demo account to shadow the trades in your real account so you can widen your stops to see if you are being too conservative or not.

6. Always examine the one hour, four hour and daily charts that concern your trades. Although you can trade at 15 and 30 minute time intervals, doing so requires a handful of dexterity.

Forex Brokers – Forex Trading Account and How to Start Forex Trading

Fx brokers don’t earn money on each trade so that you get unlimited trades with almost any fx broker. There are lots of brokers available however they offer outrageous fees as well as other terms that you need to consent to and therefore are simply not worth mentioning. Fx brokers necessarily let you know exactly what the minimum to shell out. In some instances, you are able to invest capital, using the entire $ 5 for your opening of trading account and also to start Forex currency trading. Fx brokers could be compared based on the spread it will cost. Most brokers publish live or delayed prices on their own websites using their profits calculated within the price.

Fx brokers usually offer a variety of trading platforms for his or her clients. These platforms often include real-time charts, technical analysis tools, real-time news as well as other data. Fx brokers commonly lean the costs. Fx brokers offer lots of amazing services that investors can definitely make the most of. They sustain strong spreads around the major currencies competing up against the dollar.

Fx brokers are generally compensated with the bid-ask spread of the currency pair. For instance, a retail fx broker may buy euros for 1.5475 United states Fx brokers necessary if you are planning to trade currency. You will find those people who are qualified to get this done without outside help, but also for the average trader, trying to trade on the foreign exchange market without having a broker it really is like attempting to hunt a dinosaur having a water gun. Fx brokers would be the typical go-between in the foreign exchange market. Without it agent you will find a difficult time working with the modifications in the foreign exchange market.

Traders trying to protect their existing long USDCHF position or enter long in a favorable price may think about a hedge short USDCHF below 1.0490 having a target at 1.0290. When the profit target is hit, we expect the bullish trend to resume. Trade without emotion – Don’t keep “mental” stop-loss points in the event you don’t have the capacity to execute them promptly. Always set your stop-loss and take-profit points to complete automatically, and don’t change them unless absolutely necessary. Trade using the trend to be able to maximize the chances of you success. Trading up against the trend is not going to “kill” a trader, and can surely demand more attention, nerves and sharp skills to achieve the trading goals you might have set.

Comparing FX trading brokers is really a tough asks. Although you will find several comparisons on the internet, they may be mostly performed by fx brokers themselves highlighting their merits.

For more information about AlfaTrade Forex Broker,simply visit our website.