Welcome to my trading journal. I hope to be able to keep a nice record of my live trading on this journal. I have started with a very small account ($750) to trade with. I have been practicing trading and doing a little live trading for more than a year now. Being that I am just a recent college graduate, I do not have tons of extra money to play around with, but $750 is manageable to me.
Though it is pretty obvious that I should be trading in very small amounts, I simply cannot get excited about trading for pennies. I just go for it. With this current bank roll, I trade 2 micro lots (20,000 worth of currency) for each trade. If I am profitable and increase my bankroll, I will increase the trade size.
My favorite pairs to trade are NZD/USD and AUD/USD.
I started with this live account on 9/19. I started with a few quick trades but didn’t get much of anywhere because I didn’t end up letting them run like I should have. [B]Therefore, I started out down $25 when I entered a trade on Sunday night at 7:30pm EST. This was a trade to short NZD/USD at 0.83646. I just closed that trade at 10:44am EST at 0.82703 for a pickup of 94.6 pips! Sweet! Since that was for two mini lots, the profit was $188.60. Not bad at all.[/B]
I call my journal tulip bulb because I am only interested in shorting currency pairs. I find that this is psychologically easier for me to handle and therefore I think it will help me to be more profitable. The tulip bulb name comes from the tulip bulb craze that overtook Holland and Denmark in the Middle Ages and is widely regarding as the first recorded asset bubble in history. When that bubble popped, poverty consumed the region for ages, but when bubbles pop in Forex, profits can be had.
I hope that you will enjoy following this journal and my hunt for good shorts to get into.
At the moment, I have no positions open. My account has $912.60 in it, and I am waiting for NZD/USD to find another good place for me to get back in on the short and ride it down some more. It is already up 13 pips from where I sold it at, but I expect that it will ride up a good bit more. I don’t want to get in on the long side of it because this goes against my tulip bulb strategy and because the daily chart shows a move towards a correction towards the 0.81000 area in my view. I am hoping to hop back in for a short again with this pair a little north of 0.83000, and I will update the journal when I place the trade.
[B]UPDATE (9/24/2013 2:21pm):[/B]
I just jumped back in on a short opportunity that I see for a short term play on the 15 min. chart. I usually don’t advocate for these types of plays, but I wanted to see if I would be able to pick up some pips while I wait for the pair to get to a price target that I would really like to see. On the 15 min. chart, I am liking what I am seeing at this time for a short. I went ahead and did short just moments ago at 0.82829. This is up about 13 pips from where I covered earlier, but now the pair looks like it is ready to move down a little perhaps before climbing again.
I am just going to try to pick up 13 pips here (what is with that number today??) with a stop loss of 15 pips. I went for 3 mini lots since the limits and stops are so tight. I am going to see if I can capitalize on a short term shift. Currently at 2:26pm EST the trade is has just broken positive.
[B]UPDATE (9/24/2013 3:57pm):[/B]
Cool! Looks like things worked out to the downside again. I always love to see that! I closed out the trade just a few pips short of my original target, but that was just because I figured I should take what was already given to me instead of waiting for those last few pips to come in. [B]I closed it out at 0.82733 for a profit of $28.80[/B]. I am going to keep an eye on NZD/USD but also take a peek around the rest of the market and see if there are any good opportunities. As always, I will keep posting if I make a trade.
[B]UPDATE (9/24/2013 4:13pm):[/B]
That didn’t take long. It looks like CAD/JPY is setting up nicely to fall on the 30 min chart. Again, I prefer to trade the daily chart, but if there is an opportunity to capitalize on something that I see on a smaller time frame, then I may take the opportunity to do just that. Once more, I shorted for 3 mini lots as I am capping my limit and stop order to 25 pips. Max loss or gain on this one is $75. I feel that CAD/JPY has set up for a nice fall perhaps as early as later tonight. I don’t want to close this one out early if I can avoid it. I want to play it out and see where it goes. [B]Short 30,000 CAD/JPY at 0.95851 and it looks like it is already trading positive! [/B]
[B]UPDATE (9/24/2013 8:11pm):[/B]
Well it didn’t pan out exactly as I had planned, at least it didn’t transform into anything yet. Perhaps it would have ended up heading my way in the long run, but something about the chart got me nervous. I don’t like those shorter term trades so much, particular on a pair like that, so perhaps I should not have gotten into it in the first place. It certainly looked better 4 hours ago though. [B]However, I was happy to be able to cover my short at 8:09pm EST for a very small gain of just $3.95 at 95.838[/B]. At least we are talking about a gain and not a loss here.
It looks like the NZD/USD trade would have been the better trade to stay in, but you never know. I am once again going to take a step back and take a look at all of the charts. I have no open trades and my account sits at $926.95. I am primarily going to be looking for a longer term short now and will reduce the amount that I play on it to the standard 2 mini lots. Lets see what I can find.
[B]UPDATE (9/24/2013 8:39pm):[/B]
The last update of the day. I just got short the GBP/JPY pair at 157.909 for 2 mini lots. It looks like a good short on the daily charts which is my preferred time frame. I am looking to try to grab 100+ pips on this trade. My limit is set at 156.500 which would be a 140 pip pickup, but of course I could always close the trade early or adjust things as the charts change. I have also put in a 100 pip stop loss order in so that the maximum loss on this trade would be $200. Obviously, I am very much hoping that won’t happen.
This will be a longer term trade than some of the day trades that I have put in place today. Lets see how I do! Will update in a new post tomorrow.
Nice work here…keep it up and good luck!