2 questions,
[B]
How far away do you usually put the stop loss?[/B]
-For me its usually 1000 pips approx, if selling id put it a little above a solid area of resistance.
[B]
How many pips do you aim to get when taking profit?[/B]
-I seem to be getting 50-300 pips when taking profit.
-Dont really have a sound strategy for taking profits, I might try adding trailing stop when the price goes my way.
What about you guys?
Your questions here will doubtless get a wide range of answers, according to the type of trading that people are doing. It will be interesting to see ⌠
Within reason, I donât measure that as âa number of pips/ticksâ: I position it at whatever level I wouldnât want to be in the trade any more, if hit, because my entry-reason would no longer be valid.
In practice, with the two main different types of trades I take, thatâs often initially going to be either 8-9 or 14-15 pips/ticks. I want my trades to move in âmy directionâ quickly, after entering them: if they donât, then I was [I]probably[/I] wrong to enter at that point and donât want to be in them any more.
I donât have a âspecific numberâ aim for that, either.
At the very least, Iâd want it to be related to the current volatility.
My absolute top priority is to avoid a loss if at all possible.
I try (which isnât always easy) to combine that with âtaking whatever the market will give meâ [I]without increasing the extent of my risk[/I]. (Of course, that becomes easier once a tradeâs moved into profit.)
The way I try to combine those two sometimes-conflicting objectives is by closing most of the trade quite early (after itâs moved about â1Râ in my favour, i.e. with a target about the same size as the stop-loss, or sometimes 1.25-1.5 times that distance, depending on the volatility) and then let the last portion run, if it will, adjusting its stop-loss manually as it goes, above/below its most recently-formed swing-low/high.
Thatâs the one thing I generally [B][U]donât[/U][/B] do, for all the reasons explained here.
I think there is no perfect take profit and stop loss ratio in trading. Each condition and each trader will make different view about good and bad take profit and stop loss ratio. Our style in trading will determine what Take Profit and Stop Loss level which we used.
My basic strategy is risking 2% to get 6%. In pips this typically is 30-40 risk for 100-120 reward. I always put my stop behind some structure( resistance or support ). Iâm also quick to move to BE as I am often wrong, yet profitable.
Might different trader having own choice to use stop loss and target profit, some trader might they put stop loss larger than target because they have reason giving room distance price movement and hope target hit first than stop loss, another trader use stop loss lower than target because they have reason if one time loss and one time profit hence still get profit on acumulating profit loss
When seagulls follow the trawler it is because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea.
thanks very much! very helpfull input.
lexys, I would be very interested in hearing your opinion on not putting stop loss atall - or setting it very very high.
since forex is very liquid in general, youd think if you waited long enough it will bounce back to your order atleast.
To eliminate the fear of blowing up account, pehaps trading with say 0.5% margin per trade and maximum trades at a time would add up to 10%.
even if it did eventually blew up your account, if you invested 10k, profited enough to withdraw 15k and then it blew up, thats still a win.
The less is divergence between SL and TP the longer your account will exist but harder to earn profit. I think its wise for newbies to set profit target such as 10-20 pips per day, divided by number of trades (for example 10 trades daily) so SL and TP margin should be 2-3 pips (on flat market not counting slippage)
there are many approaches to SL and TP depending on the type of trading you are doing, and on which pair? thats a rely flexible diverse question, on a personal note though i dont think i reach teh 1000 of pips when puting an SL with the way i do my tradings, on an average its somewhere between 50-100 it can actually vary between trades and what my traget profit is⌠but yeah i do move my SL when im in profit and leave it there. atleast a break even point if needed
I think setting it very high (if you have a system with a proven edge from doing that, and I donât doubt that there are such methods and that they can be profitable, though theyâre not my own style of trading) is far superior to not setting one at all.
Anyone, anywhere, can suddenly have an internet outage, computer catastrophe, or even a power-cut, and it really costs nothing to enter automatically at least a âdisaster stopâ with every trade. I know not everyone agrees with this, but I honestly donât understand why, and will stick my neck out (as is my wont) and say that it seems something of a no-brainer, to me. You can gain from it; you canât lose from it. My case rests.
Itâs the âin generalâ part, there, that gives me palpitations. There are exceptions! There have been times when youâd wait a decade or more for that to happen. There have even been times when itâs never happened. Granted, it very often happens, but long-term, successful trading isnât about what âvery often happensâ: itâs about risk-management. Itâs not my approach, anyway.
10% sounds huge, to me (though I also take the point that with some inversely-correlated pairs perhaps in the mix of open trades, the net liability, in practice, could be less than the 10% nominally at risk).
It depends what you compare it with.
Opportunity-cost is âcostâ, too.
Investing 10k, winning and withdrawing 15k and then blowing the account is better than not trading at all (âit is better to have loved and lost, than âŚâ?!) but it compares terribly badly with investing 10k, winning and withdrawing 15k and trading on so that you can eventually win and withdraw another 15k, and eventually yet another, [I]which is what you need to be able to do to make a long-term living[/I], in this game.
Itâs yet another of those "It must be true: I read it at Babypips, and posted by a âverified analystâ " moments. 
Where [B]do[/B] people get this purely fictional stuff from??? 
(It concerns me that large numbers of aspiring traders will read it, here, and some of the completely inexperienced ones may actually [I][U]believe[/U][/I] it, so Iâm certainly not letting it pass unchallenged.)
2-3 pips?!?! Let us know when you find a broker with whom you can trade like that. No: on second thoughts, please donât. 
Most of the people want to set stop loss and take profit 30 to 50 pips . I prefer to watch my positions with these tools too so that I can get profit if TP not hit . It is traderâs choice how he plan to set TP and SL in trading. with small lot we can select high pips easily.
Why would anyone think that is wise?
A 2-3 pip SL is going to be taken out almost every trade, and why settle for a 2-3 pip TP when you can let it run?
Ive got a trade on as we speak, no TP, but I keep manually moving the SL 30 or 40 pips behind the current price, As it stands, I am 380 pips up, with my SL at 340 pips. It might fall back now to my stop or it might continue upwards, either way its a free trade with no stress.
2-3 pips, Jeez!
They might [I][U]think[/U][/I] itâs wise because it says âverified analystâ right under his name. Unfortunately that can be taken by the uninitiated as lending an imprimatur of ostensible authority to the ridiculous nonsense he habitually posts here. 
trades without stress are the best trades 
in my eyes if its not at least 100 pips (quick trades) to be gained then the effort doesnt pay off. trades that go longer than 1 day at least 300 possible points, otherwise the effort exceeds the potential gain.
anyways; what eddieb said is 100% correct, you will never make any money having 1-2 pips SL as only the spread is usually around 1 pip, so its close to 100% probability that you get stopped out at every trade you do.
9 pip stops, 3 pip trail on 12 pip gain
Scalper,
Lets go again bro, thatâs not scalping. Itâs a low frequency intraday trading technic. Scalping is crossing the spread taking the profit.
Call me billy again and I am going to have to kill you!
âScalperâ? ⌠
I regularly trade with about a 9-pip stop. This has nothing to do with scalping (not even in shampoo advertisements). 
Really? Humm,
5M Chart, Tight stops, trail at 12 pips, with a 3 pip trail, with a 9 pip lock in at trail, several times a day, isnt considered scalping, ? Of course Ill take 3-4 pips if the plan calls for it, but comon, you guys are just tryin to troll my posts at this point, no?
And good stuff on the threat, you can actually go to prison for that sht, you know. I even screen shot it for ya,
Odd, because the definition is actually small time frames, take profit of [B]2-15[/B] pips, tight stops, several times a day, or high frequency trading, lol⌠Not sure how much closer to the definition you get then that. Oh, forgot the âUsing more marginâ per trade then traditionally speaking.
Oh, and,
If I wrote,
Yeah, I have 9 pip stoploss and 2 pip TP, Id be called a fool, and that I dont kno how to trade, because Im almost sure of it, you have said that to me in the past.
So, I take all the criticism, learn to trade better, broaden my TP, to not hold IDIOT status, and STILL, get rocks thrown,
Its almost funny at this point with some of you people here, âŚ
I can put, " I made 5% today" im called a moron, i risk to much, Just wait, youll blow it up, youâll always fail, blah blah blah.
All most of you people do here, is piss on people, and thats the truth.
But you know what, thats pretty much the way the world is now anyways, I guess.
Weâre all in the same business, smh, makes no sense. Ive never said, or interacted with EITHER of you people in a manner in which you would think I was an asshole, except you BOB, your always tryin to whack me, lol⌠This is like the 15th post that you come off aggressive at me for some reason.
*shruggs,