Its going to vary, not just between pairs but even with the same pair depending on daily volatility. Then factor in the spread changing, your own mm rules, and how strong you feel the market can/will move.
Its not easy, I’m glad I trade longer term were this is less of an issue
hi guyssss, what if i do not put limits( stop loss for exemple) , should i follow my transaction around the clock, sorry but i am new at this
There are times when I don’t use stops, usually with a pair like GbpNzd which can go 100 pips one way then 300 the other. Just be sure your account can take it if it swings against you and don’t blow your account. Reducing your lot size helps your mm if you plan trying this
I am not sure how many others have noticed this, but I look at it from a strictly numbers (pun not intended, despite how I usually am) standpoint. Let me give you an example of how I mean.
Now, for this example, total dollar value isn’t important, just percentages and ratios.
Let’s say your RRR is 1:1, which means for every $1 you risk, you stand to gain $1. This is a good point to use as a start, obviously more reward per risk would be better. But, for this to become a profitable venture, your particular strategy has to win, on average, 51% or better of your trades. Now for this example, your “risk” includes any potential losses as well as any commission costs, slippage, and everything else that adversely affects your account balance.
If you increase your RRR to higher value, you obviously need to win fewer quantity of trades to maintain profitability, as long as your quality of trades, or financial ($s won to $s lost) ratio remains at or above 51%.
If you have a system, no matter what it is, that works within these values, then you can make money at it, as long as you let the system work, and don’t get greedy. Obviously, if you want to use trading as your primary, or only, source of income, then you need to make a lot more than the 51% financial ratio minimum.
That is where the demo account trading comes into play. That will let you tweak and adjust your SL and TP settings until you can get your system to where it needs to be. One bit of advice I have seen on another thread, once you start a trade, real world especially, but demo as well, DO NOT ADJUST YOUR STOP LOSS FURTHER AWAY FROM THE TRADE. In demo is where you want your stop losses to get hit all the time if they are going to, but ONLY in demo. If that happens, that will allow you to look at your trading system and see what needs to be adjusted.
There is no one “correct” answer because that depends on the trading strategy. Under those styles that you don’t want to sit there around the clock and watch your trades (which will ultimately be bad due to lack of sleep and judgement) use of a stop loss is a good idea, so you don’t have to sit there and watch all the time, as is a TP (take profit) point and or trailing stop, so that you do not ultimately give back to the market all the profit you could have made on the trade.
That is Completely true. Demo trading is essential for tweaking entry and exit points of a trading strategy. After all if your Stop Loss is Almost Perfect then it’s a Perfect Disaster.
Oh and by staying true to your system you actually block your emotions because when trading we are in pressure and might not be able to think right. But our trading strategy was planned while being relaxed and focused!
I have a similar type issue that I am experimenting on my demo.
So far, I think it depends on the momentum of the trade when you first take it and how you manage it. Risking 1% for 1% is straightforward but now when your aiming for 2%+ I have found that you should actually not move your stop loss. Based on the law of averages. When you win big you will cover that 1% loss.
Does that make sense?
I’m kinda also interested in it
I set my trade stop loss as to the amount of risk I am prepared to make on that trade so that the stop loss will vary depending whether my account goes up or down.
Pivot points are fine but also take into consideration not only daily and weekly but also monthly.
Are trading around news time as this can take out a sensible SL and then reverse ?
For this topic I think it really depend on several factors:
-
what currency pair you are trading with.
Each currency pair is different. They behave differently and more importantly they offer different daily range. GBP/JPY is known as the beast with hundreds of pips daily range while EUR/USD offer less daily range. Learn the characteristics of the currency pair that you are trading and set you SL accordingly. -
whether your trading strategy uses fix stop loss or dynamic stop loss or a combination.
Each trading strategy comes with a stop loss setting that works best/optimized for it. If your trading strategy comes with a fix stop loss then an adjustment is needed when the market behave differently. This is because each trading strategy is designed according to a set of market condition in mind so when the market act differently than what the strategy is intended to cope with then the only solution is to adjust some things. -
your risk appetite.
Of course, aggressive traders tend to optimize their SL a lot. Find out what you are capable of dealing with in terms of risked capital and then work from there. Generally speaking, the bigger the SL the harder it is to get hit and vice versa. However, there are times when everything is out of whack and you need to weather it and not thinking “Ahhh…this thing just doesn’t work”. There is no thing such as perfect trading strategy.
These are solely my opinion. Anyone is free to disagree 
I had this kind of problem when I was trying to develop my own strategy. I think you are making the same mistake I use to make selling right at a support and buying at a resistance area. my suggestion is, draw support and resistance lines in D1, 4H, 1H, and 15M time frames and watch out for them whenever you want to place a trade. that’s what I did. I never sell near any of those support or buy at a resistance. I place my stop loss below the last significant high or low (depending on whether am selling or buying) as long as it is not more than 25 pips away. the theory behind my placing the stop there is that if price penetrates the high or the low , it is most probably going to continue in that direction.
My lower limit is 10 pips. I won’t go lower than that.
Normally it’s 10-15pips, Maybe up to 20-25. I trade on the 5 minute chart. (although I analyze everything from weekly down).
This is easy. Put your entry where you normally put your stop.
i like to put my take profit and my stop equal distance apart, then as the trend realizes start moving the stop closer to the price and the take profit farther away
the stop loss/ take profit are only there to make sure you dont loose excessively on a bad price spike against you, and ive seen some bad sharps (like the "will reduce a 1:100 leverage account to negative equity in minutes bad)
those kinds of things will be caught by a properly placed stop loss, conversely if it happens to go the other way you won’t be left sitting there going “but i just had +200 pips 5 seconds ago” and walking away with a measly 10 pip profit…
basically:
take profit goes where your “most optimistic estimate” tells you to place it plus a bit
stop loss goes where your account really cant take the hit (mine is usually set at a loss of more then 5-10% of the account)
then once you are in the green you move your stop loss to where you will still be making a profit (if things go south before you blink)
and your take profit keeps moving with your “most optimistic estimate”
in actual fact (or optimistic estimate) you should manually exit all your profitable trades at their zenith and cut your losses well before you actually ever even get close to your stop loss
50 pips minimum stop for myself!
Stop loss is determined by the strategy, the price action the time frame etc.
I am not sure how you guys come across these ideas for a 50 pip minimum SL or etc…it just does not make any sense to me.
If I am doing a setup on the 1H, then my SL might be 23 pips…it’s determined by the factors above, not just a random number
I don’t think it is such a big problem since a 100 pips movement in a single day is not something that uncommon. You should use stop loss as per your trading style, don’t worry. All the best to you.
Yes, you are right, in this case, you can do demo trading.
Live trading is not what we practice on our demo accounts. Demo accounts just make you acquainted with the typical market situations. But when you go live, you will realize, it is not what you used to think. Your first few trades will also be practice trades that will make you understand live trading.
Yes, you are right. It is very important to have a positive mindset. And in every trade, I have to work with a plan.