From the bottom up! Fx trading from scratch

Hi,

So I recently joined this site in the hopes of making a binary trading journal and to obvs learn as much as possible from the FX guys and apply it to my binary trading.
However after talking too some people and after about the first comment on my binary journal from lexys ( haha ) I decided im going to ditch binary and focus on fx and take it from there.

I’ve deposited my money in my broker today and decided I will go live in October. I haven’t had any fx experience so I know it isn’t wise jumping straight away but I come from a online poker back round and I understand risk management and variance etc. So im positive that mentally I will be strong enough to stick to small trades and focus on getting to know whole forex thing first before taking it up on my own.

I only today learned how to work out lot sizes according to your amount of money you want to risk etc so ye im a total noob…

I have a “signal provider/coach” who I got in touch with via the binary thing and he actually does forex as well, thats also a big part as to why im coming over. For first I will be only taking his signals ( Already paid for via a lump sum so dont worry haha ), he gives about 2-4 per week and I will be risking 0,5% per trade on my account with a minimum of 2:1 risk ratio so these i guess are considered longer term trades,

Here is a link to myfxbook which will have the results: SirSteve’s Profile | Myfxbook

Anyway so ill be using this journal as a blog I guess and I will be posting goals for learning, trading etc as I go on. Mostly it will consist of graphs where I apply my technical analysis and hopefully via comments etc I can learn from the users of this forum and that will speed it up.

Goals for this week: Finish the School of pipsology.

Hope to hear from you guys

Cheers.

Good luck BinarySteven I look forward to hearing about your strategy and seeing your charts.

Thanks Grant.

Ok so im going to post 2 setups I found. Im just going to be practicing on the EU,GU,UCHF and UJ.
Im going to be posting my charts for educational purposes only.

Firstly ignore the SL/TP for first its something i’m still figuring out. For now I just want to see where I would take the trade and if my point is valid as to why its a good idea.




So far not to bad. Good luck I will be following

Thanks bob, feel free to tell me what you feel i can improve on.
I think the pictures are a bit unclear, ill try sort that out at least with my next post.


Ok here is a setup we spoke about in our webinar. Im not going to be doing these pairs “myself” but will take the trades if recommended by our coach and I agree to what he is saying.

Going to wait and see how the candle closes ( daily chart ). Will then decide if im going to make a call or not as long as im getting a minimum of 2:1 before the resistance I drew im taking it.

Today I also learned the difference between swing trading and day trading, I basically knew the difference but didn’t look into it as much. We get coached more of a swing trade style which at this moment in time i prefer because of work etc. However the day trading does look exciting but I will leave that till im more experienced.

I decided on leaving the AUDJPY. Overall its a down trend that also looks like a triangle about to break soon. And imo it’s breaking to the downside so I’m much more comfortable taking it down after it breaks the line and comes back for retest.


So this is the “paper trade” i took yesterday. Looking at it today im thinking of maybe just letting it go. My reason for calling was valid it seams however it might be completing the left shoulder at this resistance level. Its just over 70pips itm and thats just over 100% return which is good, even though I aim for higher (200-250%). I guess this is the psychology part that kicks in by traders but im sure you have to find reason to do it and not just leave the trade either if you feel it will turn. Anyways i should have pre determined this actually instead of just figure it out now, but so we learn.


This is the 2nd “paper trade” I took, also itm atm but im just letting it be, no reason to sell atm. Will decide the closer it gets too the bottom trend line.


So this is my first real money trade, I took it from a signal. I’m only doing 0,5% risk and also I screwed up the lot size and it only comes too a 0,25% risk so its all good win or lose. I never analyzed it myself which was stupid, I analyzed the other signal and didn’t take it and atm thats OTM. So I’m going to make 100% sure I analyze the trades first before taking it, that way I can’t blame the provider if it goes South.

So far there wount be much setups for me, im in 2 trades ( 1paper , 1real ) so that will more then likely be all for today unless we find more setups in the webinar. Otherwise be sure to hear from me tomorrow :).

So yesterday we ended up taking another additional 2 trades, leaving me with 3 live trades and 1 demo. I sold the demo USDCHF because I missed a support line that could potentially push it back up, still made 150% return which is nice :).

Im short on EURAUD, EURNZD and USDCAD. All 3 are itm and EA and EN are looking very good both almost hitting my 250% mark. I must still learn "trailing stop losses etc. I guess if they are falling so well I should just set a stop loss at about 200% and see if they keep falling. But for first I’ll just settle for the 250% if it hits and leave it at that.

Cheers and enjoy the weekend.

Last week has been good, I took 3 live trades from my “coach”. Two of them have hit my TP and one is still live with about 50pips to go then I hit that TP as well.

Goals for the week:

  • Finish technical side of pipsology school.( I worked threw all the rest )
  • Only take trades if they are “swing trades” from coach and stick to 0,5% risk.
  • Do at least 2 of my own paper trades.

Two potential setups im waiting for.
EU im waiting for a candle to close by my trend then I will take it down.


UJ im waiting for it to break my trend, then retest and I will take it down.


Ive been thinking a bit.

Im going to leave my paper trades and going to do live trades rather for the next 2weeks.I will stick to 0,6% (Its nice and round £15trade). I just feel a bit more attached and run my analysis better when my money is on the line.

I will stick to it for the next 2weeks and then decided if im going to move up to 1% trades. Also I haven’t decided how many trades to keep open at a max, 5% seams reasonable IOW 5trades when doing 1%. But ill see how long my trades even out and then decided, I guess 10% should be max at a time, and being swing trading i doubt it will be that many anyways.

So many things racing threw my head today. Im rethinking my strategy when it comes amount of trades etc to reach a certain amount of % profit pm.

So lets do some basic math. If I do 10 trades/pm at 1% risk per trade , with a strategy that is right 50% of the time and a risk/reward of 2:1 that = 5% gain pm.

So lets get to 10% gain pm. ( which is what most people seam to be saying is reachable?)

I can or take 20x1% trades or 10x2% trades.I know, and fully understand that it is not set in stone, i might win all my trades this month and lose all the trades the next following 2months and so it goes on, its just an example. I like the swing trading more mostly because of my job not giving me the freedom to check the charts so im leaning towards the 10x2%. But before I even get there im going to stick to 0,6% per trade until I have got some trades under my belt.

My plan moving forward from now until end of September ( 2weeks).

*0,6% risk per trade.
*2:1 Minimum required to take the trade.
*take as many trades as possible from H4 and D1 charts on EURUSD,GBPUSD,USDCHF,USDJPY,USDCAD,AUDUSD.
*Only take trades from signal provider via webinar if you agree with analysis at 0,6% risk.
*Look at every H4 candle closing starting Monday 7am until Friday 3pm/7pm. UCT+2 My SA time.
*Finish school of pipsology .

I will cut the chat talk more and focus on posting charts more so that I can discuss and hopefully someone can spot leaks in my trading. It’s hard starting out, so many things to look at but i have decided to bite the bullet myself and jump in at low risk and see what comes from it.


My first real money trade and I won it :slight_smile: screwed up the lot size made a stupid error but still made like 150% return so thats allright.

For me, a total of 1%, maximum, at a time is good; 10% would be a nightmare and eventually a possible disaster.

All currency-pairs, and especially the “majors”, are effectively correlated (either positively or negatively) to some extent, and it’s comparatively easy to over-expose yourself to risk without quite appreciating it.

Well done with your first real-money trade, and good luck with position-sizing. :wink:

Thanks, ye ill still decide but 10% is prob a bit hectic as you say. I dont want to miss out on trades as they are so limited with this style you know and a trade can run for over a week sometimes. So ye im kinda lost with that, but I appreciate your reply and I will definitely keep it in mind. Thank you.

Also as a side note Lexy, thanks for posting in a lot of the newbie questions. Every time i search something on the forum your name comes up and is normally the most well thought out response.

Booked my 2nd win :), 230% ROI so im happy with this one.


The next pic is a trade I took this morning:

Reasons I took it, overall I think it should break the triangle to the top side. It gave me a nice candle stick reversal pattern ( tweezer bottoms).

However looking at it now I think I should have waited for it to give me a reversal sign closer to a trend or support line and then buy it, I do have some breathing space with the stop loss so lets see. The other thing I have in mind is maybe following this trade up, that if it works out and my analysis is correct of it breaking to the top I can make more then a 2:1 return ill aim for something like 3:1. Lets see.


Well done. Very nice “reverse head and shoulders” there, too, at the bottom, towards the left of your last chart, above. Always easily seen with the benefit of hindsight, of course … :33: :slight_smile: