Where should i invest? Can you guys give me some idea?
What do you mean āinvestā please?
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what is the better option in investing in forex? how do i know if it is legit or scam?
Donāt confuse trading forex with investing
Best idea would be to go to the free school here and learn what you are getting into before you decide if its for you
Namaste
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Eddie says it rightā¦
Some forex trends last for years, for example the uptrends in USD/IRR (Iranian Riyal), USD/ARS (Argentinian Peso), and USD/TRY (Turkish Lira)ā¦ I could go on with more examples.
These multi-year forex bull trends are the kind that you want to focus on if you intend to take a more āpassiveā execution style, more like buying stocks, where you spend time researching and monitoring your positions but you only enter a trade and pay one commission with a view to stay in that trend for as long as possible.
However, if you intend to day-trade forex then it is not investing, as Eddie said, and you should think carefully about what you hope to get out of it, realistically - and whether it is worth the time.
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Hi @PipMeHappy!
That is a very different approach compared with the usual time frames and methods found here on BP!
What level of leverage would you recommend for these kinds of positions?
I guess you also have a rather different approach to applying stop losses - if you use them at all?
Edited to add:
I know that USDTRY is available at least with the larger brokers firms but I admit I know absolutely nothing about these other exotics like USDIRR and USDARS - are these quoted as spot retail forex, and if so, via what kind of broker? The high interest rate differential is a measure of the inherent high risk with these currencies - is that a worry for you? or how do you handle that?
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Hello Manxx,
nice to see your reply!
UsdIrr and UsdArs are not tradeable with most brokers and, for.example, they may only get one price point a week due to lack of liquidity. This is why Mexican Peso has outrun many high-carry pairs (e.g. Indian Rupee) because it marries a high interest rate differential with good liquidity; this is what banks like Goldman Sachs are doingā¦ You only have to look at fx futures to see that this is true - price information below a weekly timeframe is very sparse indeed for some pairs (e.g. UsdTry).
In terms of risk, I never push it too far, e.g. so far it is between Ā£0.50/pip and Ā£3/pip, but with the proviso that I shave back some of the position size if a large move is taking a little longer. For example, EurTry took a whole month to start turning and offer a 3000-pip drop, but the drawdown was tolerable thanks to only having a Ā£2/pip exposure.
I leave plenty of margin for flash moves (e.g. last Turkish bank rate decision produced an 800-pip spread but I was nowhere near a margin call situation), also because unlike the debacle of October 2016 I am not doubling down on a position in the red AND I trade one or maximum two positioms at a time, whereas at that time I had severely overstretched myself - too many trades.
So the strategy is to bet on large corrections and.trade in the direction of positive overnight interest, so that the issue of timing (e.g. going in too early) is partly compensated by accruing interest - across my trades since Jan. 2018 the total ācarryā/rollover/swap was an added 25% to the trade profits. Again, this is not for everyone and my avatar really says it all - you need Buddha patience (or, like Eddie and I used to muse, āBuddha buttocksā)ā¦
You could say that some people prefer to trade and hold a position overnight in whatever direction and absorb any negative rollover/swap through leverage and trade profitsā¦ Some brokers do not show the overnight interest directly if at all (Fxcm show the interest on the live rates page, in real.time; Oanda have a page where you have to put in some info each time to see what the current rate offered is; IG have nothing at all; and so on), so you have to do some research first. Also, margin requirements and rollover rates may be better with one particular broker, so again this is not an approach that is viable with all brokers.
The more you leverage up, the largest your overnight rollover: for example, if trading in the direction of negative rollover AND leveraging up to, say, a 100k position, with some pairs you could get Ā£60 negative rollover per night, so Ā£360 a week. Obviously, if you make a killing then this fee is small change, and also if you only hold that trade for a handful of days then it will be a small price to pay; however, multiply that by, say twenty weeks, and it would have an impact on profits (Ā£360 x 20= Ā£7200). The rollover rate changes on a daily basis but you get whatever was shown at the time of entering your trade, so if you start with a largely negative rollover that daily rate will not increase but it will not decrease either. Again, practice makes perfectā¦
The advantage of this method is obviously that it is easier to manage if you do not have full-time hours to dedicate to retail trading; also, if you trade fewer trades with more probability of large returns, and in the time you wait you accrue additional interest, it is much more straightforward (for me, at least) than the opposite, that is, day tradingā¦Potentially, day trading can actually be less profitable, because if you do not have very strict rules and sharp focus, emotions can creep in and ruin your profits very quickly. This trading style fits my personality and risk tolerance much more. I am also a dad to a young child and am lucky to have working hours that allow me to spend lots of time at home, so I could not (nor would I want to) spend more time looking at charts.
The added bonus is, for example, that if you decided to cut a trade that really did not work out the interest would cushion some of your lossesā¦ E.g., on a Ā£2/pip position and with a weekly interest of about Ā£100, a twenty-week trade with a potential loss of Ā£3000 would actually turn out to be a (Ā£3000 - Ā£2000=) Ā£1000 loss. Obviously, like with any trade, managing that position and having some knowledge of fundamentals can protect you better than just letting it run with no knowedge of its progress: so far I have not seen such disasters as I used to see while day trading. My approach in 2015-2016 was on the right lines but I just took on too much riskā¦ Bad situations can happen whatever your style of trading, so I am not saying that all will be wonderful forever and that I will not face difficult decisions, but having the space to just nurture one trade (or two trades) at a time over a longer period really does allow better processing of what is happening.
So, tell me about your own trading at the moment! Has the Finnish spring spurred some animal spirits in your direction?
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[quote=āPipMeHappy, post:7, topic:147215ā]
Potentially, day trading can actually be less profitable, because if you do not have very strict rules and sharp focus, emotions can creep in and ruin your profits very quickly. This trading style fits my personality and risk tolerance much more. ā¦ having the space to just nurture one trade (or two trades) at a time over a longer period really does allow better processing of what is happening.[/quote]
Seems to me, PMH, that you have made some quantum leaps in your foreign exchange studies and development! Well done! It is really refreshing to read here something very different to the normal trading approaches!
I can imagine that, for you, this approach holds a lot of merit as it also offers, even demands, a study of the countries you are considering as well just the narrow economic fundamentals that we are used to looking at. I found the same associated broad interest in surrounding issues when I began trading Crude Oil. Similarly, that, for me, it is not really a trading environment. I just watch the price and buy whenever it seems cheap as soon as my technicals suggest it. I donāt short it at all.
These exotics are certainly not for the novice, but there are some very interesting concepts and issues here which are missing from the routine day trading type environment, and that is a good source of additional learning for people. You may even consider setting up a thread for this and post some items and points of interest from time to time. By nature, as you say, this is not an everyday type approach and would not require excessive posting from you?
My currency trading has changed little except that I have now successfully migrated from intraday to daily/4-hour positions and I tend to look at some additional pairs rather than solely EURUSD. It has so far proved to be remarkably consistent. But charting is still my passion and I could not imagine holding positions for more than a few days - (at my age, I might even forget they are there!! 
).
But you are right, spring has arrived here with a vengeance along with the swans, cranes and other migratory birds, the snows have melted and the new world is already hugely industrious as this pollen-covered little fella demonstrates:
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Hello Manxx, that is a wonderful picture: did you take it? Beautiful.
Regarding your trading, it sound like you found your niche and are happy to continue with something that works for youā¦Nothing wrong with thatā¦I remember Lexy and her Ross Hook trading, just scalping for a handful of pips a day: she made a steady income for herself that way, boring/repetitive as it may have seemedā¦Good trading does not have to have the wow factor every day, wouldnāt you agree?
To answer your suggestion, I do not have much time to start/lead a thread on carry trade, but someone here did start one on EurTry a few years ago: Trading Idea: Carry Trading profitable with Oanda
Sadly it did not garner much of a followingā¦
I also still curate my women forex traders thread, which has now been pinned, so I am happy with what I have achieved thereā¦that is enough for me.
I have also started as a partner on a new fx website which provides data and commentary/analysis: the developer/owner is a programmer and I am the one who provides articles with analysis of various fx pairs and upcoming news affecting certain pairs. Although there is no money in it as yet, this is a great opportunity for me and it came through a post on Babypips 
My entry ticket was all my YouTube videos and the fx articles that I had written/published: all that got me to where I am now. It is nice to be working on fx-related content with someone else, rather than always alone, so this cannot be anything except a good thing for me.
I hope that you enjoy all that spring has to offer!
Have a great week, in life as in trading!
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Thank you. Yes I did. I take a lot of nature photos. These were the first flowers to appear in our garden after the snows left. It is always a real pleasure to witness the start of a new growing season 
It is not really so much having found my niche, rather, how it is evolving over the years. As you know, I started trading many years back and in those days there was no such thing as microlots. The smallest size was one standard lot and my market was the CBOT T-bond futures - so with that size minimum risk, and no overnight stops, there was not really much room for anything else other than short-term day trading when starting out with a personal account. But it was a familiar world anyway then because my personal trading in the bank dealing room where I worked was T-bond futures alongside my normal trading room functions. It was there that my passion for charting was born!
I have drifted away from my previous traditional TFs of 15/5 mins a) because markets do not behave in the same way as they used to in these short terms, there are long periods of doing nothing, and b) as the years pass I do not have the same passion for the intensity, concentration and discipline that such short term trading requires. I have been trading more on Dailies/4H for about a year but I have only recently managed to wean myself off always taking a peak at the 15m chart and, of course, ending up taking profits prematurely at the first short term pullbacks that used to be my entry/exit points!
I donāt know if I am unique in this problem but I have found it very hard to demolish a short-term mindset! I actually only really achieved it my forcing myself only to look at charts either on the hour or at the end of a 4-hour bar - anything in between was forbidden!
I would never call such short term intraday trading boring or routine. It all depends on where oneās interests lay. Whereas you might be free during the day because your positions are long term, I would be free as soon as my 3/4 hour session is done for the day and, of course, I only trade, and/or have exposures to even think about, whenever I feel like it. And whenever I want to have days off or holidays or places to be or things to do, I just donāt bother trading then. In addition, I was not so concerned about whether I caught or missed a trend because it makes absolutely no difference where the price is at the time - it is only about where it is going to move to next for the next 10-100 pips. That is all a liitle bit different now though with slightly longer term focus.
I have always thought that this is one of the huge attractions and benefits of trading forex - that it can accommodate such a wide range of styles and leanings and personal characteristics. It is so important for traders to identify just what type of trader they are.
However, one restriction regarding this threadās issue of forex investment is that the type of investment that you describe is better linked to capital building than earning a monthly income. But I think the majority of new entrants to this industry have small capital sums and a dream of soon earning a sizeable monthly income so they can ditch their jobs and fulfil their dreams - that leads to risk-taking, over-trading, and a need to always find a trade even when there is not one to find. And, of course, the real cost of each loss is not just the realised 20 pips stop, it is also the unrealised 50 pip gain. So a bad trade leaves you 70 pips different to where you would have been with a good trade. That can soon break oneās confidence and a recovery from there requires some hard work and medicineā¦
[quote=āPipMeHappy, post:9, topic:147215ā]
To answer your suggestion, I do not have much time to start/lead a thread on carry trade, but someone here did start one on EurTry a few years ago: Trading Idea: Carry Trading profitable with Oanda
Sadly it did not garner much of a followingā¦[/quote]
Yes, this is the problem nowadays (and probably one of the reasons why many fail in trading). The kind of thread that I had in mind would only require an update maybe once every 2-3weeks - but that is so long that no one would be following it or maintaining an interest there. I have often thought of starting a personal thread on my trading but I know it would create pressure to input there at least once a day and even 2-3 times a day in order to keep it rolling - That is an unwelcome burden on anyone!
I do remember seeing something about that here on BP. That is really good news and exactly the right thing for you at this stage in your life. I remember your videos here well. It was about the time I joined here and I thought they were extremely well done, appropriate and useful.
I have always been a recluse with my own trading but in my banking days the team work within the bank and working with peers in other institutions around the globe was what made it such a great career to be in. I enjoyed every minute of it! So I can fully understand the pleasure and gratification that you are getting from this - as well as the promise of what it may be leading towards:)
You too! and I hope we see more of you around here from time to time, whenever it suits you!
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Thanks, Manxxā¦ great photos, and great model
Interesting about minilots and the evolution of access to the markets, though you can see how the apparent democratisation of access actually means that many will part with their money and just fill the coffers of brokers
who have no scruples. . .
Interesting how you changed to a longer time-frameā¦ They can say similar things if the day lacks movement, and it may be worth still looking at the 15-min. one, as you say, just to see how price reacts to certain events.
Yes, forex does accommodate a lot of styles; I suppose this is true of any market sector.
Interesting what you say about unrealised profitsā¦ True, also regarding the ārageā of a missed opportunity and
chasing trades aroundā¦
Yes, creating your own thread about your trading would require you to update it regularly in order to keep it
from sinking to the bottom of the pileā¦ More time in front of the screen!!
Thanks for your comments about my videosā¦ As you say about working on trading-related issues with others is so helpfulā¦ By the way, someone in my city came on Babypips and subsequently we met up: it was the first time I met
a fellow BabyPips poster, and it was so refreshing to discuss things face to face, charts on a computer screen in a cafeā,
very stimulating and devoid of all the delays or dramas of exchanging ideas on a forum
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