Tuesday, 5 April 2011
Whipsaw and tail spin
After bringing the account back into profit - today has to go down as a bad day in the office - will need to do much better and more disciplined - will get an early night tonight and start the rebuild process.
Monday, 4 April 2011
Steady Progress
Hiya, After having a great weekend , with plenty food, drink and rest, I was truly glad to be back at work and in front of the charts for another trading week doing what I love to do, after finishing last week with such great momentum and back to my better form - I was truly looking to carry this into this week.
As we had a very busy end of week last week as it was NFP friday, the proceeding mondays tend to be slower and much more choppy in price action, today was surely about being patient and discipined and I did manage to pull a few pips out of the market, even in a choppy trecherous market place - I both bought and sold the same pair in the same session realising a profit. So all in a very good close for Monday and now am 1 or 2 tades away from being back into profit - Am considering waking up extra early and seeing what the Asian session has to offer - sometimes there are some lovely trending moves but normally the market is asleep during the Asian session and only has range bound prices. Feeling good and feeling great.
As we had a very busy end of week last week as it was NFP friday, the proceeding mondays tend to be slower and much more choppy in price action, today was surely about being patient and discipined and I did manage to pull a few pips out of the market, even in a choppy trecherous market place - I both bought and sold the same pair in the same session realising a profit. So all in a very good close for Monday and now am 1 or 2 tades away from being back into profit - Am considering waking up extra early and seeing what the Asian session has to offer - sometimes there are some lovely trending moves but normally the market is asleep during the Asian session and only has range bound prices. Feeling good and feeling great.
Friday, 1 April 2011
Patience + Discipline = Success
Today was a day to tread with caution and discipline, we had all the hall marks of conditions ripe for losing money,
1.It was April First (Some say its an omen)
2.A new month so alot of unwinding of posistions by large institutions causing violent fluctuations in prices.
3.It was NFP Day - the largest news event in the Forex Calander.
With all these factors to be mindful of I approached the session with caution and spent the morning just observing price action, I did manage to pull a trade early on as the market had came to a level where entry was right, I grabbed a few pips on the Euro as it recceded to a great level to enter - the risk was well measured and trade was a high probabilty outcome.
After London had come online around 8AM GMT prices constatntly were undecided and jittery, this is common for NFP - which takes place around 1:30PM GMT for the US open.
After the jitters are over prices tend to stagnate in readiness for the High energy that would surely follow at 1:30PM - it was now Aprox 11AM and I wasnt prepared to commit to any posistions in a stagnant market, so I went to bed to grab a power nap and set my Alarm for 1:15pm for a fresh clear mind for the NFP Fest.
After my nap - I returned to my PC - I already had an idea of how I was going to play the NFP - my bias was to buy the USDCHF buy The UJ and also buy EJ ( EuroYen) on the basis that the US jobs numbers were better than expected- As the annoucement came out - my initial assesment was correct - USDCHF was up UJ went up, while the GU and EU also AU ( aussie vs dollar) all were heading violently down.
Now because my mind was clear and I was in my zone I wasnt going to chase this market - as I did earlier in the week - when I tried to jump onto a moving bus only to be dragged down the road holding on for dear life, instead I took the approach that all successful traders do and wait for the market to come to them, Which I indeed did with great precision. I took a counter trend Sell trade on a violent moving USDCHF - I did get the confirmation to go short and that was a nice gain of just over 32 pips.
Because I have been trading with dicipline and following my rules, I decided to treat myself to a tub of Hagen Dazs Ice cream - As an incentive to carry on in this great flow of form - the account now is just a few trades away from being in profit again, and I am looking forward to another trading week. The disasterous midweek madness is well and truly put to bed and I have to give thanks and gratitude for the speedy recovery over the last couple of days.
1.It was April First (Some say its an omen)
2.A new month so alot of unwinding of posistions by large institutions causing violent fluctuations in prices.
3.It was NFP Day - the largest news event in the Forex Calander.
With all these factors to be mindful of I approached the session with caution and spent the morning just observing price action, I did manage to pull a trade early on as the market had came to a level where entry was right, I grabbed a few pips on the Euro as it recceded to a great level to enter - the risk was well measured and trade was a high probabilty outcome.
After London had come online around 8AM GMT prices constatntly were undecided and jittery, this is common for NFP - which takes place around 1:30PM GMT for the US open.
After the jitters are over prices tend to stagnate in readiness for the High energy that would surely follow at 1:30PM - it was now Aprox 11AM and I wasnt prepared to commit to any posistions in a stagnant market, so I went to bed to grab a power nap and set my Alarm for 1:15pm for a fresh clear mind for the NFP Fest.
After my nap - I returned to my PC - I already had an idea of how I was going to play the NFP - my bias was to buy the USDCHF buy The UJ and also buy EJ ( EuroYen) on the basis that the US jobs numbers were better than expected- As the annoucement came out - my initial assesment was correct - USDCHF was up UJ went up, while the GU and EU also AU ( aussie vs dollar) all were heading violently down.
Now because my mind was clear and I was in my zone I wasnt going to chase this market - as I did earlier in the week - when I tried to jump onto a moving bus only to be dragged down the road holding on for dear life, instead I took the approach that all successful traders do and wait for the market to come to them, Which I indeed did with great precision. I took a counter trend Sell trade on a violent moving USDCHF - I did get the confirmation to go short and that was a nice gain of just over 32 pips.
Thursday, 31 March 2011
What a differnce a day makes
Having stayed long on Sterling from the previous session, the market proved Leon right in that Sterling did indeed Rally through the NY close and during the Asian session, the position had indeed shifted from being in heavy drawdown to being in some moderate profit, the only question was now trade management, how would Leon manage the open positions, I decided to reduce the accounts exposure by reducing all posistion by half, and placing the stop loss to within the profit zone for GU, I felt much comfort in speaking with both JQ and Shaq who expressed words of comfort and encouragement during a very bad day in the office yesterday.
This gave me the inspiration and confidence to push on through and to find my flow once again.
To that end, every trade I managed to take during the London and European session turned into a profit and the account is a few trades away from being back into the black.
I dont like to blow my own trumpet, but I was truly on fire yesderday and if I continue in that vein of form then expect monumental results.
Today is NFP - non farms payroll for the USA - and the begining of a new quarter so will be very prudent and cautious today- I have reduced risk considerably and as a result have been trading much better - with high risk trading there is always a good day - but conversly there is a bad day, and all it takes is for 1 or 2 trades to not go well and the account can be severly damaged, this indeed goes for all financial instruments.
I have now truly learned the lessons of overleveraging and how stressfull it can be when abused :-)
I can smile now - that I managed to reduce risk on the 2 Large positions and also to have an above 90% strike rate on the session - God was truly with me yesderday and I give thanks for that.
This gave me the inspiration and confidence to push on through and to find my flow once again.
To that end, every trade I managed to take during the London and European session turned into a profit and the account is a few trades away from being back into the black.
I dont like to blow my own trumpet, but I was truly on fire yesderday and if I continue in that vein of form then expect monumental results.
Today is NFP - non farms payroll for the USA - and the begining of a new quarter so will be very prudent and cautious today- I have reduced risk considerably and as a result have been trading much better - with high risk trading there is always a good day - but conversly there is a bad day, and all it takes is for 1 or 2 trades to not go well and the account can be severly damaged, this indeed goes for all financial instruments.
I have now truly learned the lessons of overleveraging and how stressfull it can be when abused :-)
I can smile now - that I managed to reduce risk on the 2 Large positions and also to have an above 90% strike rate on the session - God was truly with me yesderday and I give thanks for that.
Wednesday, 30 March 2011
Pride comes before a fall
With a new found vigour and mental attitude, Leon started the Euro session with an aggresive attitude - contrary to his ususal - cautious prudent approach - drifting away from his plan caused a devastating early exchange - sustaining 2 losses attempting sub substandard trading ideas. Having seen the euro in free fall since the portugals downgrade, Leon decided he would attempt a Scalp trade on the EuroJen cross pair, even tough the EJ had been making high highs, Leon thought he could pick the top and scalp for a few pips, he indeed see roughly 8 pips in a short matter of time and was thinking this may come down much lower for a larger profit, I think the words Greed and stupdity come into mind and these traits will cost any trader his shirt, after 30 mins the EJ reversed back to the upside and any profit from this trade quickly turned into a posistion being upside down, with the tought of losing on a winning trade is such a hard pill to swallow, I then begun telling myself that this would come back into profit, knowing from the start that this was indeed a risky trade, it did not however and I eventually closed the posistion for a heavy loss.
Feeling aggitated that the loss was incured, my immeadiate response was on revenge and clawing the loss back asap, having sat through the the late part of the Asian session, I noticed that Sterling was at key support levels and making a turn back up for a potentually reversal Buy trade, although sterling had some better than expected news today it had already travelled over 100 pips, from the original time I spotted her moving up, with revenge still in mind and my emotional disposistion I struck out and Loaded up on a ridiculoulsy heavy Buy Posistion on Sterling 4 lots ( which is 40 pounds per pip) on a 5k account is kinda ludicrous actually its insane, my initial response for the first loss was to go out all guns blazing and double this account today.
However the market is a very good teacher and greed and poor trading decisions are never rewarded.
Ontop of that I never placed any stops in place, becuase of my arrogance, stubborness and sher stupidity.
Now working with the laws of nature and karma my stupidity was further punished when internet connection went down - I immeadiately called JQ to explain the situation and asked him for assistence and the current prices on GU GY - we also then placed stop losses and talked the posistion through.
He was a friendly voice in a moment of a distressed trader and I thank him for his calming nature and pragmatic reasoning. He was able to give me second by second prices and was telling me how the current posisition.
Now with all that said and done, my decision to Buy Sterling was not a poor choice, what was a Poor choice is that I never got in much sooner when I should have and overleveraging the account out of fear and greed.
So I am totally responsible for this as its very uncharacteristic for me to be trading in such a rash substandard manner- akin to going into a cricket field and slugging for 6's on every ball is not a sound idea for long term success.
I have also read that there is a thin line between genious and stupidness - The posistions we currently have open are Long GU and GJ ( sterling vs dollar) and ( sterling vs Yen), so I am anticipating over the next coming days and weeks sterling will move to the upside across those pairs and heres why I think that. I see the Sterling moving up for at least another 200 plus pips because as the charts so tell us we have entered into a strong demand zone - and we did have better than expected UK data yesderday- in any event a day in forex is a long time and much can happen between even the next couple of trading sessions, but I am confortable with us holding Longs at these levels - again this week is NFP week non farms payroll - (US jobs numbers) that is always a big market mover so trading may be slower on thursday with the focus on the US data release this coming friday.
If the numbers are worse than expected for the US this could send our posistion home and dry and put the 200 odd pips back into the account for a tidy little profit. lets see what the next couple of days brings us.
Feeling aggitated that the loss was incured, my immeadiate response was on revenge and clawing the loss back asap, having sat through the the late part of the Asian session, I noticed that Sterling was at key support levels and making a turn back up for a potentually reversal Buy trade, although sterling had some better than expected news today it had already travelled over 100 pips, from the original time I spotted her moving up, with revenge still in mind and my emotional disposistion I struck out and Loaded up on a ridiculoulsy heavy Buy Posistion on Sterling 4 lots ( which is 40 pounds per pip) on a 5k account is kinda ludicrous actually its insane, my initial response for the first loss was to go out all guns blazing and double this account today.
However the market is a very good teacher and greed and poor trading decisions are never rewarded.
Ontop of that I never placed any stops in place, becuase of my arrogance, stubborness and sher stupidity.
Now working with the laws of nature and karma my stupidity was further punished when internet connection went down - I immeadiately called JQ to explain the situation and asked him for assistence and the current prices on GU GY - we also then placed stop losses and talked the posistion through.
He was a friendly voice in a moment of a distressed trader and I thank him for his calming nature and pragmatic reasoning. He was able to give me second by second prices and was telling me how the current posisition.
Now with all that said and done, my decision to Buy Sterling was not a poor choice, what was a Poor choice is that I never got in much sooner when I should have and overleveraging the account out of fear and greed.
So I am totally responsible for this as its very uncharacteristic for me to be trading in such a rash substandard manner- akin to going into a cricket field and slugging for 6's on every ball is not a sound idea for long term success.
If the numbers are worse than expected for the US this could send our posistion home and dry and put the 200 odd pips back into the account for a tidy little profit. lets see what the next couple of days brings us.
Tuesday, 29 March 2011
New Chart Layout 15 Minute Scalp Mode Officially start tommorow
Welcome Note
Greetings everyone, I will be compiling this blog as the roadmap to my toughts, feelings, and market observations as part of this most incredible journey.
The last week has been absolutely momumental for me personally, with the birth of my fouth son Cairo, who was born in the early hours of sunday morning 27/03/2011 at 6:45am at East Surrey Hospital, weighing 8Lb and 11 ounces, the arrival of him was a true gift from heaven.
Apart from the anxiety of an imminenet new arrival to the family and the unexpected outcome of all births, the world has seen to be going through a turbulant phase: we have seen in the past 2 weeks a number of significant World wide events that have all sent the financial markets crazy and hightened the risk factors.
We have seen the Invasion of coallition forces in Libya - affecting the USD and Oil Prices
we have seen an earthquake devastate Japan - affecting the Yen
and now we have seen a downgrade of Portugals and Greeces credit rating affecting the Euro.
and also slightly less significant we had the UK budget - affecting Steling
All of these significant events have caused extreme volitilites in the markets - and causing extreme prices and causing the markets to be more challenging to read.
In any event I have started to trade the account and opened the first trade with a winner - ha ha start as you mean to go on. - I decided that I would trade cautiously and prudently and over the last couple of sessions managed to get the account up by 4-5%.
This was all done by trading very low leverage and with very little margin.
My initial game plan for this account was to trade 2 styles with 2 sub accounts - one account would be traded of the 4 hr charts and be for more conservative trading - this would require larger stops and more patience for the trades to mature.
The second account would be for more scalp trading - which was usually heavey loaded trades taken with very small stops - this would serve to compound the account more quickly.
However with only the one account available I have had to combine both stratergies into one - and ontop of all the global risk and imminent arrival of my son has caused lets just say some interesting trading.
also the clocks going forward in the UK and US has also been a factor to throw into the mixer :-)
After aprox four days of trading, I have noticed that the trades that I execute with presice entries and higher Lots I am generally winning and the payout on those trades are higher, and the longer term trades that I generally hit are causing the account trouble in the form of drawdown - this is due to the factors I have highlighted as the market dynamics are shifting and changing and are very unpredictable for long term trades.
As a conclusion I have revised the game plan and will focus more on whats actually winning % wise and what will give us the best results - so I have parked up the 4hr charts and will narrow my focus to the 15minute charts for precision Heavy in and out sniper trades - with stops of around 15 to 20 pips and targets from 30-50pips.
I have managed to bring the account into the black after suffering a drawdown - as I brought the Euro last friday US session - Standard and Poors ( Credit Agency) decided to downgrade Portugal - the Euro dropped almost 150 pips , but found support at a key Level 1.4050, where demand was high, I then used my experience to buy back more at a better price - some people would have never of done that, but I used my knowledge and experience to steady the ship.
So to round up, this has been an amazing week for me personally a bit of a roller coaster, with the new arrival, but things are settled more now and I have had time to reflect on the best way to move things forward.
I actually enjoy trading of the 15minute chart more - so expect great things :-) - I have had to reconfigure my charts to suit this new approach but all guns are blazing and we are ready for battle. :-)
Bring on the next session.
Over and out for now.
The last week has been absolutely momumental for me personally, with the birth of my fouth son Cairo, who was born in the early hours of sunday morning 27/03/2011 at 6:45am at East Surrey Hospital, weighing 8Lb and 11 ounces, the arrival of him was a true gift from heaven.
Apart from the anxiety of an imminenet new arrival to the family and the unexpected outcome of all births, the world has seen to be going through a turbulant phase: we have seen in the past 2 weeks a number of significant World wide events that have all sent the financial markets crazy and hightened the risk factors.
We have seen the Invasion of coallition forces in Libya - affecting the USD and Oil Prices
we have seen an earthquake devastate Japan - affecting the Yen
and now we have seen a downgrade of Portugals and Greeces credit rating affecting the Euro.
and also slightly less significant we had the UK budget - affecting Steling
All of these significant events have caused extreme volitilites in the markets - and causing extreme prices and causing the markets to be more challenging to read.
In any event I have started to trade the account and opened the first trade with a winner - ha ha start as you mean to go on. - I decided that I would trade cautiously and prudently and over the last couple of sessions managed to get the account up by 4-5%.
This was all done by trading very low leverage and with very little margin.
My initial game plan for this account was to trade 2 styles with 2 sub accounts - one account would be traded of the 4 hr charts and be for more conservative trading - this would require larger stops and more patience for the trades to mature.
The second account would be for more scalp trading - which was usually heavey loaded trades taken with very small stops - this would serve to compound the account more quickly.
However with only the one account available I have had to combine both stratergies into one - and ontop of all the global risk and imminent arrival of my son has caused lets just say some interesting trading.
also the clocks going forward in the UK and US has also been a factor to throw into the mixer :-)
After aprox four days of trading, I have noticed that the trades that I execute with presice entries and higher Lots I am generally winning and the payout on those trades are higher, and the longer term trades that I generally hit are causing the account trouble in the form of drawdown - this is due to the factors I have highlighted as the market dynamics are shifting and changing and are very unpredictable for long term trades.
As a conclusion I have revised the game plan and will focus more on whats actually winning % wise and what will give us the best results - so I have parked up the 4hr charts and will narrow my focus to the 15minute charts for precision Heavy in and out sniper trades - with stops of around 15 to 20 pips and targets from 30-50pips.
I have managed to bring the account into the black after suffering a drawdown - as I brought the Euro last friday US session - Standard and Poors ( Credit Agency) decided to downgrade Portugal - the Euro dropped almost 150 pips , but found support at a key Level 1.4050, where demand was high, I then used my experience to buy back more at a better price - some people would have never of done that, but I used my knowledge and experience to steady the ship.
So to round up, this has been an amazing week for me personally a bit of a roller coaster, with the new arrival, but things are settled more now and I have had time to reflect on the best way to move things forward.
I actually enjoy trading of the 15minute chart more - so expect great things :-) - I have had to reconfigure my charts to suit this new approach but all guns are blazing and we are ready for battle. :-)
Bring on the next session.
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