Nikitafx
What is meant by ‘bias’? Is it just the current down or up trend? Or is it the overall Market sentiment?
[ quote ] Nikitafx
What is meant by ‘bias’? Is it just the current down or up trend? Or is it the overall Market sentiment?
[/quote]
Home of Golf,
Each have their own definition of terms, so if I have got it different compared to what others might call it then I offer my apologies. Its just a name.
Bias is where price will go. Market bias is probably best termed as the current trend.
I trade with Day Time Frame ( DTF ) as my bias guide and H1 TF as my entry guide.
Others might look at Week TF or even higher and trade D TF. Swing traders do this I believe.
I take about 40 to 100 pips per trade so I look at Bias on D TF.
I look our for things such as candle patterns, rejections, pullback etc on D TF and that is my reading for bias.
Then I try to pick the highest possible entry on H TF for a sell and lowest possible entry on H TF for a buy. If you read your bias properly, you will rarely have a loosing trade.
1.05874 was my entry for AU today on H TF. I anticipated a fall from looking at Bias on D TF.
I only take a trade when I know for sure what the market is going to do today. Otherwise I just sit back and watch.
It takes out the tension of trading with real money especially when you have a trade that is going against you because of any number of reasons, including economic news.
It gives me the confidence to hold a trade, knowing that it will come back to profit.
I hope that sort of helps you.
Happy Pipping.
didnt read your thread properly.
I for one dont like to look at overall trend.
I find it very misleading and its not as profitable as it should be.
I mean what is USD pairs doing now? Are they on a retracement before its going to shoot higher up? Or has it hit its peak and its going to fall further?
If we are to take one of the above, what would be our SL like?
Can we hold for x number of days or week to find that out?
I personally dont think that sort of trading will allow me to make a living out of Forex. I could be wrong, but it does not suit my style and risk appetite.
One real disadvantage of looking at Bias as overall Market Sentiment is we really dont know what the market sentiment is until it has completed its move. Too much guessing when you have to risk it with your money I say.
My way of looking at bias is current up or down. That is which way is it going to go for today. At most, my up or down analysis holds for a week.
I tend to take profit on a daily basis most of the time. Or I collect on most and leave a much smaller lot to ride.
Hope that helps
happy pipping
Sorry I cant post any charts yet.
But look at GBP USD D TF. MT4 Chart please.
Look at Monday candle 13/ 06 / 2011. It was a strong up. My idea of bias is if yesterday was buy then today is most probably a buy. But dont take it so literally.
So next day, Tuesday 14/06/2011 I bought early. It went up 60 plus pips from my entry. I only managed to take 42. By the time I went to bed, price had fell much lower than that.
Next day I looked at the market at 8.00 am GMT +8 and I see a long wicked candle that was still bullish. Classic candle pattern to be a price rejection. So I sold on Wednesday 15/06/2011 1.63452 with a SL of about 40 pips including spread. I took 100 pips on that. Gave me more but I am still not that confident.
It always pays not to be greedy also. Always better to be safe than sorry.
Another example.
I sold AU today and not EU or GU because the price levels on that pair are closer to SMA 200. A classic rejection or resistant area. I took 70 plus pips.
Now as I am posting this, I am looking at a possible buy set up for GU. Rejected from SMA 200. This is based on the early price rejection from Thursday and Friday last week.
I hope that gives you some guides also.
Happy Pipping
USD CHF is another pair that shows an interesting set up on D TF.
Watch that. It looks like its going to fall again.
If todays candle ends up as a bear candle then it might be safe to sell tomorrow first thing in the morning.
I monitor a total of 7 pairs broken into two groups.
GU EU AU and UCHF on one group and GJ EJ and UJ on the other. This gives me more opportunities to find a trade.
I look at all the pairs before deciding on bias. I take the one that looks most promising. Usually that would be the biggest mover for the day.
I dont trade UJ because the pip counts are poor. But I use that to look at bias for EJ and GJ. If all of these three pairs show a bias for a fall and then I pick one from the pair.
If I find that the pair grouping seems to be out of sync where one shows a buy and the other seems to be about to fall then I avoid trading for the day.
The way to be profitable in Forex is to wait for your entries and only take an entry that you are sure of. Dont predict. Chances are we will loose. If you are forced to predict then dont take that trade.
Hitting maximum lots for profits because of very rare losses grows your account exponentially, compared to being unable to take more lots on a good trade because we reduced our account size on bad trades.
I hope this helps more in your trading.
Happy pipping to all.
Well, I guess that’s right for almost all traders. Maybe some can trade more frequently, if they have a couple of years of experience and other qualities. However, it is the nuts and bolts that overtrading leads to losses, particularly for newbees. Together with that revenge emotion. They get a loss, then boom “I must win that back!”. So they trade and trade until the account is blown.
Another very important point every newbie should write a thousand times at the board: [B]If you trade, you can’t learn! If you learn, you can’t trade![/B] So, while overtrading they miss the learning time. They are just focused to random entries, etc. etc. That’s not learning. I do not say you can’t learn while trading right, if there is already good experience. Just this overtrading, what gives you practically no time to learn to do it right until the account is blown.
Home of Golf…
This is a link to a thread where I have posted some charts to explain the concept of Bias and how I use that to trade.
http://forums.babypips.com/newbie-island/39366-new-forex-trading-6.html#post266070
Hope you are getting the hang of it.
Happy Pipping.
Hi,
Thanks very much for this comment. It help me to think about my ideals.
Tks again and pls keep posting.
Hi Everybody
Been missing in action for a couple of weeks so I thought I’d stick in an update to how I was getting on.
As you all now I had been in survival mode as my account had dropped into th $40 area. But with a little patience, and some good advice found through this thread, I had grown it back up to $74. ( Still not earth shattering stuff but certainly moving in the direction I prefer ).
Then I got extremely lazy. I placed 2 trades without doing my proper analysis and surprise surprise, found myself back down at $56 in a heartbeat. I was so angry with myself that I intentionally stayed away from my account for a week or so, ( this explains my ‘missing in action’).
Anyway back in the saddle now and back up to $64. Currently ( 19th July 23.50 GMT ) in a ‘buy’ ( I take it that is ‘long’ ) EUR/USD for what I think might be a short rally. Opened 1-4150, Stop 1-4120, Target 1-42.
Market moving very slowly but on the better side of 14 pips as I write. Talk to you all again soon and good to be back !!
HoG
Watch yourself HOG… 4h could well flip on the Asian. Very close to daily Pivot Point (1.4145). Yeah…buy is ‘Long’, sell is ‘Short’.
Not saying it will, but looking to the bigger picture, PA looks to be forming a lower high since the last high of 14/07. Anyways thats my take since I have a short off 1.42. 
my view 
i think your trade has a good chance… the trend in the 1H is up and the price is above several HSMA.
I have a long in play since yesterday… 1.4030 sl: 1.3950 tp: 1.4280
after ny close I moved my stoploss at 1.4100
Looks like your long worked out for you 1.4200 was reached. Great thread HoG, dont know if you realize this but your probably helping alot of newbs by being very honest about your trading and your thoughts. I found this thread today… and feel lucky that I did. Specially because I would like to start a micro account in a few months. Check out my thread if youd like, I am trading a bit more longer TF like daily and 4h and 1h charts.
One thing early on in your thread i noticed that I hope you dont get offended by me saying this but at one point you asked someone who told you to trade longer timeframe, and you asked him how long do his trades usually take to play out…
Same thing I was wondering at first when trying to get away from scalping and daytrading the 5m. And hate to say it but Its the greed playing up. Specially since you are down to below $100. Its that need to be back at breakeven. Revenge trading.
Anyways, I am grateful to you for sharing your trading and your thoughts with us. The honesty is refreshing.
Nice to read you are still alive, I mean your account, HoG.
Do what your system says, no matter what. And just pick the very best trades with very low risk. Better it will take a year or longer to go back to $200, than it will take just a week to go to $0.
Think of it, you will have to make now more than 100%, actually maybe rather like 200+% to get back to start, and more than 25% roi a year is already awesome! It is probably better to forget those $200 initial deposit for now. That prevents sort of revenge trading. Better look for a steady equity curve from your $50 up, and drawdown should be less than around 30% at all times. If dd is way bigger than 30%, your system has obviously some difficulties and you would have to work out what to do then.
Well, I guess your trade worked out properly, so you have a little more now as buffer.
congratulations with your trade, HoG!!
just be patience, identify the trend in your chart and trade with the trend…
Wow, this has turned into quite a thread. Can’t wait for you to make it big, I mean make millions. I am still in the Swing Low/Swing Hi mode. But I got many other things to worry about. But, you keep us little guys going. I’ll get there someday! Make us proud!
R Carter
Nice to hear from you again my friend. Not so sure about the 1-42 short on the basis that PA has formed a lower high from 14/07.
Looks to me since th 14th we’ve just pretty much made a big ‘V’ on the 1hr which would put a resistance around the 1-4280 area. as a matter of fact, as I write this reply, something has just spiked the E/U from 1-4210 to 1-4250 in less than a minute so I’m sure you’ll be keeping an eye on that.
Please excuse me if that sounds like I think I’m a know all, I am of course still a newbie, it’s just my thoughts and what would be my concerns with placing that trade.
Best of luck !!
HoG
Nice to hear from you again. I must admit I tend to agree with your price target. However I didn’t see the trade as early as you and being in the position I am in, I wasn’t as brave as you to let my trade run. I thought to be less ambitious and book my 50 pips was safer in case it turned on me.
I did get back in however and opened long at 1-4218, however I closed again at 1-4229. so account now sitting pennies over $71, which is good. Wouldn’t it be good to be able to see your account balance as a candlestick chart?
As I write this you are only 7 pips from your 1-4280 TP. God I hope you get it !! Will you take profit at that level or move your limit up slightly to see how far it goes?
Anyway, as I said, nice to hear from you again.
HoG
Always keep an eye out for the news. EUR/USD is currently a battle of the weak… USD is being plagued by the debt ceiling crisis and EUR meanwhile has the Greece situation. The spike you mentioned happened because Merkel and Sarcozy have announced to make a joined proposal for the Greek situation during the EU summit tomorrow. What that proposal might be is not revealed, but apparently it was enough for speculators to go wild on the EUR.
Hey ForSex ( now there’s a name !! )
Thanks for getting involved with this thread and thanks for the congrats on the 1-42. ( never a good idea to pat ourselves on the back too much though as the market can be quick to wipe the smile from our faces )
As for helping other newbs by being honest I’ll tell you this. I did not start this thread with the intention of helping others ( I know that sounds terrible but let me explain ). FX certainly ain’t a get rich quick scheme. If you jump without any real knowledge ( a bit like how I did it ) you’ll find that it CAN be a get BROKE quick scheme. And all I really wanted to do was write something that said, " Hey people, regardless of the crap that some folks out there are pedaling, this AIN’T easy. You WILL lose money at this if you’re not prepared. I know because I’ve done it !!"
As for offending me, don’t worry, because you are exactly right. It IS greed, it IS revenge trading. But also as I have wrote previously in this thread, Demo accounts, while useful to teach you the mechanics, are completely useless at teaching you about the emotions involved in trading with your real, hard earned money. NOTHING prepares you for the spectrum of emotions your mind will run while your cash is on the line except for ACTUALLY having your cash on the line.
That is why, as I have learned, it is important to start slow. Don’t go for the home run in this business on your first day because believe me, the pitcher has more experience than most of us put together.
As for which timeframes to use, well I’m afraid my personal jury is still out on that one. The way things are these days, situations are changing on an hourly basis. News is coming out from Europe one minute, then the US the next, that has the whole thing looking a bit like a rollercoaster. None of this helps us newbies.
As my rough guide just now I am watching equities. If the indexes are rising I’m bullish the Euro. If the indexes are falling I’m bullish the USD and I’m trying not to stand in front of freight trains (placing a trade just before the release of big economic news). I’m trying to find previous support/resistance and I’m trying to use a stop that is tight, but still lets a trade breathe a little.
But the most important thing that EVERY newbie should learn is the virtue that ALL of the more experienced traders have advised during this thread. PATIENCE ! If you miss a trade, or a move, don’t beat yourself up too much, there will be another one coming along soon.
Anyway, this reply is turning into a bit of a novel so I hope I haven’t bored you to death so soon after you got here !
Stay in touch my friend and be safe, it really is a jungle out there!
HoG
Hey Buckscoder
nice to hear from you again.
Yep, still here, still fighting. One of the mistakes I was making was setting myself targets ( make this much by this date ). But this draws you in to overtrading or trading when there is no clear trade.
I’ve realised that growing your account is the by product of proper research. Sure I’ll get it wrong sometimes, but by keeping disciplined targets and stops, and by doing the proper homework to begin with, I’m sure I’ll keep on surviving !!
HoG