Hi rookie and others (Mike you also get now some chance to comment),
I see I have a bit to catch up so I start now.
First of all here is something to read about Russia/Ukraine:
Russia and Ukraine: Can we stomach more lies from the US media and more hubris from US foreign policy? | Forex Blog: Currency Currents
If it is too long, then just go to the forecast section on the very bottom how Jack the Pipper sees it in case the war stays.
Actually rookie, you already answered my strategy of trading in your own post. I will stay aside as well. Or as Mike would say: “I regroup myself.”
The thing is that I only like to trade one direction: the direction of my fundamental, sentimental bias and the trend. I do think these three increases my edges a lot. And now I see some movement in USD strengthening at this very moment but I do not really know why. I also think that what peterma wrote about USD Index, and all of you expect, I do the same: some retracement. USD was/is very strong lately but some retracement comes usually. I wait a bit, look how it works out and when it was done I jump in again. Until now I learn today and use the occasion of not trading that much. I do have strong USD bias but there has to be some stop for a while. As Philip mentioned, different traders have different strategy.
I personally do not like trading against the main trend. I tell you an example, maybe you can understand it: we take the EUR/USD with the current market price: 1.3277 (Jesus what a decrease again, what a pity that I wasn’t in ). I have a USD bias. So lets say I jump in now on market price. Trade goes against me and it is already trading at 1.3325 and then 1.3375. I am still not in a big hurry, because I look at the big picture and do not see any reason why it should not come back. I may even do everything against the rules and scale in to my losses with another short position. Of course this works ONLY WITH STRONG BIAS. So now we take the opposite direction. I anticipate that EUR/USD goes up but I still have my bearish overall view. I do feel now uncomfortable with the trade. Even if I expect retracement and some EUR strength. I jump into market again with EUR long this time. And lets say trade goes this time again against me, south now. The problem is: I do not have any idea if it comes back or not because I do have a bearish bias and a retracement comes but who knows when and how big it will be. So where should I stop my losses? Where is the trade invalig? As you see there are many questions which I did not have in the first case. Hopefully you understand what I mean. I tried to explain it clear. So even if I think there has to come movement across the board vs. USD I do not trade against it, I rather wait and see.
Another thing that works out quite well in the last 3-4 weeks: I do stick to my weekend discussions and plans! It is really cool and works good. I do try to be very disciplined and really follow my plans. Just to remind you what my main tasks were for this week:
- do not enter many new trades, rather monitor and manage the open trades from last week. Especially vs. JPY, where I do not want to open any new trades.
- manage the HUF trades.
Well, the first point works good. I did jump into some great setups, but not many and only short-term. I also closed all new positions. But managing the trades from last week goes good and I reduced my JPY trades from 4 to 1 which is also good. About the HUF I cannot do much as nothing happens. I just have to wait there.
There was nothing new in this point, but I wanted to emphasize how good discipline works the last time. Not only managing trades but not jumping into situations when I am not comfortable. I did it earlier and it worked out really bad sometimes. I do not want to be in stress when I don’t have to. I rather start reading the second book after finish answering all your posts