"Getting Started In Currency" Calculator?

Beginner Questions
1

Hi everyone, I downloaded a book called, “Getting Started In Currency” by
Michael Duane Archer, and on the 60th page and up, he is slowly starts talking about how to calculate currencies, losses, etc.

Nonetheless, he uses this calculator as an example:

Does anyone know where I can download it?
So I can mess around with it a little bit.
He gives the formulas of how the calculator works, but if I want to run a few numbers really fast, it’ll take a bit longer if I can just put the numbers in:D

2

You can open a Oanda demo account. Their platform has those kinds of tools.

3

Hey, thank you so much! I found something really similar! Here is the link: Trading Calculator | Forex Profit / Loss Calculator | OANDA

I don’t want to make a second thread, but here is EXAMPLE #2:

Let’s say it did happen, and the person lost 20pips and $60

… My question is… Why did that person sell it when they knew that they will loose some pips? … Did they do it because they saw that the currency is going down, and instead of loosing more and more they decided to sell it quickly instead of taking the risk of taking even a greater loss?

4

You don’t enter a trade KNOWING you are going to lose money.
The plan is to gain profit. In your example, the trader entered short, hoping for the outcome of a drop in price. What happened was a retracement. Price moved away from the entry point.

You start in the hole because of the spread. Then, price never moves in a straight line. You can expect price to move backwards on you when you enter a trade. It’s part of the game. That’s where risk tolerance, and stop losses come into play.

Time frames also make a difference. The longer term trades will definitely work backwards on you for a little while.

The trader in question only loses money when he closes a position while in the negative. Otherwise the loss is unrealized, and only affects the available margin in the account.

5

  1. Just to rephrase what you’ve meant in my own words: He BOUGHT it, and hoped it’ll go up, and it actually went down?

  2. What would you do his situation? Keep it? Or sell it?

6

See where it says ‘POSITION’?
It says ‘SELL’. That means the trader was short.

Then, look at the ‘ENTRY’ price, next look at ‘EXIT’ price.

There is a 20 pip difference higher than the trader’s entry.

Price went up, seller was short, seller lost money.

Since the trader had 3 mini positions open, it was a buck a pip x 3.
A 20 pip up move resulted in a $60 dollar loss.

Again, it all depends on the trade.
Impossible to answer not seeing a chart of the time the trade was working.

In this case, the trader may have had a 20 pip stop loss, and that got triggered.

7

Okay, awesome! Thanks :slight_smile:

So the “general rule” is, “Buy when its low, sell when its high”?

8

Only if price is going to go along with your trade, if you buy low and it just goes lower then you lose. General rules seem to be broken when you least expect it like your example of the loss.

9

Hmm… Okay, what about the buying/selling?

ideal would be:

You buy at price X, it increases, you sell at price Y, you close it?

Or you buy at price X, it increases, and you close it? (without selling, if that is the case, what is the difference?)

10

When you open an order you lock in that price with the expectation that the price will get “better” for you. When you open a sell order at 1.25 then you are locking in the price that the market will buy from you. And when you close at a price you are closing at the actual current value of that currency. So if the price went to 1.26 then the market will give you 1.25 and you get to cover the difference. If the price went to 1.24 then the market will give you 1.25 for a currency that is valued at 1.24 and you get the difference.

Open price = Market’s price
Close price = Your price

So the sequence is buy/sell, price goes up/down, close trade for profit/loss

Buying and selling are two completely separate orders not reactions to each other.

I just woke up so hopefully this makes sense:)

12

Ohh! Okay, I think I get it…

Okay, I think this question was asked one million times before but… why not BUY [B]AND[/B] SELL the same currency. Sees which one is ‘doing better’ and sell the other one?

Lets say you start at [1.20]

You buy @ 1.20
You sell @1.20

You see that the market is going down like crazy and now its at 1.05, so now your “sell” is doing good, and your “buy” is doing horrible. So you close the buy, and now you are at 0.0 profit, but since the market is going down, and keeps going down, it goes down to like 1.01, and then you close it.

Is that how it goes?

… sorry for making it complicated… or did i get it all wrong?

13

Look up “hedging” as it relates to trading.

That way can work if the price moves enough but you can also end up chasing the price up and down losing money both ways. Open a demo account (free and easy) and try it some to see how it works. I use hedging to “stop the bleeding” sometimes when a trade goes against me. This can be very stressful and also a good way to turn one loss into two if done wrong.

You actually made it simple but in real life it is more complicated trying to predict when to enter/exit. It seems like every time I enter a trade (or close one side of the hedge in your example) in reaction to a big movement, the price stalls and turns around as soon as I get in. Reacting to price is a good way to lose money, we must be proactive and ready for a movement when it begins not trying to jump on after the move is exhausted.

14

Thanks a lot :slight_smile:

Yeah, so I opened a demo account, and now messing around with it.

Not sure what kind of style everyone has

but what I was thinking is just choosing 1 pair, and ONE hour out of the day, and just keep checking that hour day to day basis. trading within the … either 1hr slot, 2hr, or 4hr… not sure yet… any advice would be awesoem!