Forex Trading Journal - Learn From Yourself
by: Casey Stubbs
Making profits as a forex trader needs many things to fall into place. One of the key things is to have the right tools and processes that will give you the necessary structure so that you can trade with confidence. A forex trading journal should be one of the tools that you first look to setup. It will provide a framework of discipline that will allow you to trade like a professional trader.
What Is It?
A forex trading journal is a notebook, spreadsheet, or other record where you keep details about each trade that you make. These details should include the decision-making or strategy behind the trades. You will also want to note down every detail of the trade, including the date, what currency pair was involved, direction of proposed movement, entry price, planned exit price, the trade size, pips target, pips returned, profit or loss, and the relevant trading session. You can also put in a screen shot of the trade if you want to for future reference.
Why Keep This?
If you have a forex trading journal, you won't have to rely on your memory to remember every mistake you have made in the past as well as every profitable trade you've been able to accomplish. As a trader, you should know that trading currency is a non-stop education and experience is often the best teacher. You will give yourself the best chance to succeed by analyzing the various elements of your good and bad trade decisions. This will allow you to emulate profitable trades and, at the same time, avoid the trades that cost you money.
You will find that a forex trading journal provides benefits in many other ways including the way that it will make you think and analyze your activities. You might be the only one that ever reads it but it still will change the way that you approach future trade decisions. Seeing your trades in black and white can be a sobering experience and adds a dash of reality to what can just seem like paper transactions. You'll immediately find that it will make you think more professionally about what it really takes to make profits over a prolonged period. Having to record something will help to stop you from over-trading or gambling.
Learn From Your Mistakes
When you are trading in the world of foreign currencies, making mistakes is unavoidable. Sooner or later, you will slip up. Do not be afraid of this as it can teach you a valuable lesson. In fact, most of the successful traders found their edge through trial and error. Profits won't come without making some genuine effort to educate yourself as much as possible. Eventually, you will have to learn from your mistakes. And what better way to do that than with a forex trading journal. There is a reason that most successful and respected traders have one and use it constantly. Big financial institutions, banks and companies trading in the market also do the same thing. If you choose to have only one tool by your side, then this is what you will need.
About The Author
Casey Stubbs is an experienced forex trader who likes to share his expertise with those wanting to learn more about currency trading. To get free advice and to see Casey's own forex trading journal, please visit his established trader community at => http://www.winnersedgetrading.com
Article source: http://www.articlecity.com/
Showing posts with label forex markets trading. Show all posts
Showing posts with label forex markets trading. Show all posts
16 September 2010
17 February 2010
Forex Trading Tutorial - He Blinded Me with Forex
Here we have my man Nial Fuller talking about pin bars and reversals in a forex trading tutorial video...
The charts tell it all.
The charts tell it all.
22 September 2009
Forex Scalping Strategy--Check Yo' Self Before You Wreck Yo' Self
Forex Scalping - How To Make Real Fast Money
by Tyler Thomas
Forex scalping is often referred to as quick forex trading. This method is often used by traders who will only want to keep their positions for a matter of a few seconds or even for a minute but never longer than that. Before delving into what Forex scalping truly is, it pays to find out a little bit more about the purpose of scalping.
Purpose of Forex Scalping
The main aim of Forex scalping is to make a small but tidy profit and at the same time ensure that the risk to the trading account is kept to a minimal level. Lowering the risk is achieved through quick opening as well as closing of trades. Scalping would not serve any purpose if traders were not offered a chance to trade with accounts that they can leverage to the maximum extent possible. Unless the trader is able to operate with large sums of money (even if it is virtual money) they will not be able to profit from small moves such as a two to three points movement.
How to Perform a Scalp
A scalper needs to simply open their trading position of one hundred thousand units with a pair of currencies, typically the US dollar and the EURO. Each pip will then help him earn ten dollars and so a five pip movement will net him fifty dollars which is pretty good for doing practically nothing for a minute at most.
Forex Brokers and Scalping
A scalper who is able to consistently make profitable scalps is surely going to make a Forex broker suffer losses. This is why, the dealing desk broker at least will not agree with the style of trading adopted by a scalper and so will normally request the scalper to change his style of functioning or deal with another broker. However, brokers can also apply other methods that can help to slow down the scalper as he performs his scalps.
However, a broker that has good trades that they process with automated platforms will not generally feel threatened by the scalpers.
Forex Scalping Facts The theory behind making successful scalps is that it will only be possible to make huge amounts of money in very little time if the scalper is able to make best use of very high leverage. However, this should not make you want to immediately jump off the cliff. Rather, it makes more sense to actually start with a more reasonable leverage such as 20:1 or even 50:1 and as your skills improve, you can then increase your leverage.
At the same time it also pays to keep in mind the fact that you have to learn to trade with higher leverage but without doing anything that will result in a total loss of your investment. For this, be sure to limit your trades to not more than 10 or 15 with a very tight stop loss.
You need to also be careful about deciding on the size of your trading lot and you must do some math to calculate your worst case scenario. So, if you suffer ten consecutive losses, you will need to stop at once.
How Effective Is It? Although the Forex market functions 24 x 7, not every hour of trading is suitable for Forex scalping. You need to pick those hours when trading is most volatile and you must also be aware of the behavior of your currency pair and the most active trading sessions.
Once you enter into a trade, be sure to move stops to break even as soon as is possible. Take profits at reasonable levels and get out of the trade if the prices freeze for longer than expected.
For only the very Best in Forex Marketing strategies, I HIGHLY recommend checking out http://www.unclesamsforex.com
About the Author
Tyler is an 8 year marketer based in Washington DC.
Article source: http://www.goarticles.com/
by Tyler Thomas
Forex scalping is often referred to as quick forex trading. This method is often used by traders who will only want to keep their positions for a matter of a few seconds or even for a minute but never longer than that. Before delving into what Forex scalping truly is, it pays to find out a little bit more about the purpose of scalping.
Purpose of Forex Scalping
The main aim of Forex scalping is to make a small but tidy profit and at the same time ensure that the risk to the trading account is kept to a minimal level. Lowering the risk is achieved through quick opening as well as closing of trades. Scalping would not serve any purpose if traders were not offered a chance to trade with accounts that they can leverage to the maximum extent possible. Unless the trader is able to operate with large sums of money (even if it is virtual money) they will not be able to profit from small moves such as a two to three points movement.
How to Perform a Scalp
A scalper needs to simply open their trading position of one hundred thousand units with a pair of currencies, typically the US dollar and the EURO. Each pip will then help him earn ten dollars and so a five pip movement will net him fifty dollars which is pretty good for doing practically nothing for a minute at most.
Forex Brokers and Scalping
A scalper who is able to consistently make profitable scalps is surely going to make a Forex broker suffer losses. This is why, the dealing desk broker at least will not agree with the style of trading adopted by a scalper and so will normally request the scalper to change his style of functioning or deal with another broker. However, brokers can also apply other methods that can help to slow down the scalper as he performs his scalps.
However, a broker that has good trades that they process with automated platforms will not generally feel threatened by the scalpers.
Forex Scalping Facts The theory behind making successful scalps is that it will only be possible to make huge amounts of money in very little time if the scalper is able to make best use of very high leverage. However, this should not make you want to immediately jump off the cliff. Rather, it makes more sense to actually start with a more reasonable leverage such as 20:1 or even 50:1 and as your skills improve, you can then increase your leverage.
At the same time it also pays to keep in mind the fact that you have to learn to trade with higher leverage but without doing anything that will result in a total loss of your investment. For this, be sure to limit your trades to not more than 10 or 15 with a very tight stop loss.
You need to also be careful about deciding on the size of your trading lot and you must do some math to calculate your worst case scenario. So, if you suffer ten consecutive losses, you will need to stop at once.
How Effective Is It? Although the Forex market functions 24 x 7, not every hour of trading is suitable for Forex scalping. You need to pick those hours when trading is most volatile and you must also be aware of the behavior of your currency pair and the most active trading sessions.
Once you enter into a trade, be sure to move stops to break even as soon as is possible. Take profits at reasonable levels and get out of the trade if the prices freeze for longer than expected.
For only the very Best in Forex Marketing strategies, I HIGHLY recommend checking out http://www.unclesamsforex.com
About the Author
Tyler is an 8 year marketer based in Washington DC.
Article source: http://www.goarticles.com/
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