I finally started watch the Chris Lori vids, Most of the way through disk 2 so far… That’s some good stuff!
I couldn’t agree more…well actually I could, it’s golden.
Just today on the cable I got 45 pips using just the basics, a large range up to last weeks high, in the sell zone on the pivots, looking for a counter trade at London open, R1 just 17 pips from 15700. Now it is turned into a 100pip bounce atm and I only got 45 but that just proves what a lousy trader I am (and I needed a shower after work) lol but the tools are GOLDEN.
Talking about “Ranges”, I wonder if weekly ranges are the same, I’ll be interested in watching how this week turns out as last week was a big range and as of today Wednesday we’ve already used up half of last weeks range, hhmmm could be sideways for the rest of the week or not, lets see.
Yes, it’s the real deal, plus it totally complements the information presented in the ATT threads, ICT blog, plus other resources focused on support/resistance levels.
Well that’s my problem too! Spotting profit targets is not my best skill, you got some nice pips, I ended with two beautiful trades at break even (Short cable during London session and long cable early Ny) That’s a problem I have very often, I should probably reduce my profit targets a little bit.
Interesting what you say about weekly ranges, makes sense to me, and for what I have observed, past weeks have behaved this way (narrow/wide ranges). I’d like to know more about this.
I was browsing another forum. Traderslaboratory. and found this quote that I thought was pretty good.
“You get two types of price areas to look to trade. Accepted price and rejected price. As you get close to these areas you watch the order action. Are orders picking up or slowing down and in what direction. That’s all there is. If you are near a previous rejected price area and order flow slows you have your trade. if order flow picks up and you go through the rejected area and there is a previous accepted area on the other side you trade in the direction of the previous accepted area.”
Yes Talon that pretty much sums it up I think.
Here’s something I’m going to practise doing at the beginning of each week. Due to my brokers new margin requirements, USDJPY has the lowest margin and spread so although it doesn’t move as well as GBPUSD or some of the others, it’s what I’ve got to work with.
With quite a compressed 15min chart I’ve marked last weeks high/low range with the fib tool. You can clearly see the support & restance areas on the way down. I shifted the fib tool “high” area from 81.98 to 81.84 so that the fib levels matched those areas better. Those then become this weeks S&R levels.
Next using pivots or trend lines, I’ll be looking for intersecting price levels and wait for price to reach them.
Last night, UJ was forming an up channel. Price was at the lower channel line (support area), and the 23.8% fib line…an intersection. So I entered a long order at 80.64 with a stop of about 15 pips and a profit target of 130 at 81.95 which was last weeks high. Price must have moved in a tight 7 pip range for almost 12 hrs…arrrgh! I had a 15 pip trailing stop set and went to bed. This morning woke up to a 73 pip profit! Price had made it to the 78.6% retrace at 81.50 and then my trailing stop took me out at just below that at 81.37.
I did have a few other pending short orders at each fib level but due to the no hedging rules, they just got cancelled as price moved up past them. However, I still have a pending short order at 81.51 which just missed getting cancelled or triggered by 1 pip…lol.
After breaking through that upper channel line, it is now in a position where it’s returning to the upper channel line…resistance become support, which is intersecting around the 61.8% retrace at 81.23…will it hold or will it break?..lol. With the upcoming news release, it may skew it right up!
Unfortunately I’m at work so can’t do anything but it will be interesting to watch…I have access to online charts.
Looks like you may have got pulled into the ring! $600 billion! holy do do batman! that’s some serious bond buying… 
That sounds like fundy talk…I’m still looking in from the outside in that regard I’m afraid, but as long as it was a good thing 
Good thing… ummmm I doubt it
Sorry I’ll wash my mouth out immediately, that fundy creeps up on you sometimes…bit of a fundy day… lol
Well if I’m going to trade this pair, then I should get to know it better too…perhaps another weak area that I need to strengthen. So googling usdjpy characteristics, I found this summary article. I will look for others but I’ll start with this and keep this post updated with whatever else I find.
[B]Personality Characteristics of USD/JPY[/B]
October 10, 2005 by Trader RichI was reading an interesting article about currency pair
“personality traits” and will summarize those traits that are exhibited
in the USD/JPY.[U]The Yen is frequently used as a proxy for other Asian currencies that are not freely traded or are too illiquid[/U]
e.g. Speculation over the revaluation of the Chinese yuan has caused
frenzied yen buying because the yuan is not freely traded in the sport
market and the belief is that revaluation will result in other Asian
currencies strengthening in tandem.[U]The Yen is most politically sensitive currency[/U]
Why? Because of perpetual trade surplus Japan runs against the U.S. and
other major economics. In addition comments by the Ministry of Finance
(MOF) weight heavily.[U]The Yen exhibits large concentrations of market interest at common levels, resulting in clusters of stop-loss and limit order at key technical points[/U]
Why? Because Japanese cultural tendencies favor intra-Japanese
coorperation and communication. This results in herd-like
behavior that can cause large, volatile moves followed by extended
period of range-bound consolidation and the pack responds to breaks of
key levels and then settles down[U]The Yen tends to respect technical levels far more than other currency pairs[/U]
The produces lower likelihood of false breaks. The suggests
traders need to respond more quickly to the breakout of key levels
rather than waiting for pullbacks or a bounce to enter. This also
favors placing stop-loss orders just beyond key technical levels.Traders should pack attention to candlestick and “Ichimoku”
technical analysis as they are widely followed in Asia and signal
reversal or major breakouts.Traders should also be aware of the major yen currency pairs, as
technical breaks in these can frequently spill into USD/JPY[U]Liquidity in USD/JPY is said to be thinnest on last trading
day of each month and at the end of financial semesters (March and
September) [/U]Why? Japanese institutions scale back their presence which can
result in highly erratic and unpredictable market movements.
Does it matter that it’s 5 years old…
This link should have gone here but you will also find it a few posts ahead too…A link to an article on Tailoring Your Technical Approach to Currency “Personalities”
Worst case you will see what changed.
Well it still seems to respect technical levels pretty well…lol…that pending short order I mentioned I had at 81.50 (78.6% fib, weekly R1 pivot level, and the monthly pivot level)…well that news release triggered it and it hit my t/p…another 50 pips thank you very much
Congrats, Sweet Pip!
One of my bots just made 5 pips on eurusd a few minutes before that interest decision/fomc meeting, but even this is much after 2 days doing nothing.
By the way, I guess trendlines are a very good tool. I used that on eurusd and had some profits with it. I attached a xau chart. The green channel is very old. Then it jumped above that channel and after dropping back to that channel it respects the lower channel line like my chart would be at every xau traders screen, lol. I looked and used channel lines since a year and those channel lines of this width on a daily are respected very often by the xau price. I just don’t trade it right now because my risk would be too high with xau.
Yes they can be and some pairs moreso than others. Here’s a link to an article on Tailoring Your Technical Approach to Currency “Personalities”
Thanks, I will read that. The good thing with xau is that it just stands against the usd. So, there is not so much influence from other currencies. In my chart you can also see my bearish red channel at the left side. Just look how nice the pa went out of the red channel into my green channel. Whoever traded that breakout made a fortune! Those trades are easy to handle. This is just my last chart. As I said, it was often like the same in the past. I watch the price since 5 years and did draw trendlines since a year. After one or two bounces off a trendline those channels with xau seem to be very reliable. I did draw the green channel even before price came down to 1236. I had in mind that time to open a buy/sell a bit away from that channel, but I didn’t. I have my bots and that’s the main reason. If my account grows bigger, I might trade xau, too.
Just fyi: the oranges are bigger trend lines for the weekly and monthly and are irrelevant in this chart. Plus another info, sorry, if you don’t know that already: A long in xau is probably easier than a short trade. We have a 20 year bull rallye in gold and we are in the middle of stage 2. So, I expect more volatility over time.
XAU…not really familiar with that, but after googling it, it looks more like a mutual fund of mining companies. Yes in that case I’d hope that longs are easier to trade…lol
The xau in the chart is pure spot price of au (gold). Index of mining companies would be hui and xau. Oops. Sorry, that xau what you see in my chart is just the spot price, not the mining index. The mining index xau is right now at 204.50 points and I would not trade that. Hui may give some indications how the spot price could develop, though.
Here’s my USDJPY 15m chart for today.
There seems to be a steep downward channel and I’ve circled where it bounced off the upper & lower sides of it so far. Resistance & support was found at 80.75 a couple of times prior, and was support just recently which is now being retested as resistance as of this chart. Since it still seems the USD is going down and there’s no more news coming for another 16hrs, I placed a pending short order at 80.75, which also I recently read is one of those “key” price ending numbers that the major traders of this pair like.
I wouldn’t be surprise if price consolidates for awhile throughout the Asian session and this entry could put me at the top of that consolidation range. I also read that this pair is not prone to false breakouts, so if it does break out to the upside, then my stop is tight for that reason. If it does respect the resistance then the drawdown while it consolidates will be minimal and easier to take psychologically. 
My stop is 15 pips above at 80.90 which puts it above todays open at 04:00 GMT (Midnight EST), which also serves as a possible resistance area before reaching my stop. Target is 80.50…another key price ending level, but ultimately the next 2 support levels below that are at 80.31ish & 80.23 …but I don’t want to seem too greedy…lol…and my R:R is still proportionate.
UPDATE -
Nope, stop hit for -15 …on to the next setup…
Edit: What I failed to notice was that there was a BOJ news event at 5pm PST. :eek: For some reason, Forex Factory didn’t have that on their calendar, but Babypips did. If I had realized that, I would have waited before placing the pending order. From now on, I will be comparing both calendars. If anyone wonders why I’m using the calendar at FF and not BPs, it’s because there’s an indicator that displays it right on my chart. 
Running such a tight stop on a pair with major ongoing issues such as this, a day ahead of one of most potentially volatile data releases of the month, when anyone with common sense is cashed out & on the sidelines doesn’t really reflect the title of the thread now does it.
I don’t know about smart trading, that exercise resembled scared trading to me.
3 years, 2,000 posts, you conduct all that analysis & then blow it by making the same glaring mistakes you undoubtedly made when you first started out.
Maybe you ought to refer back to your decoder book honey & give it another shot. The information in there will definitely keep you from making silly mistakes like that time & again.
While you’re at it try searching out [I]Captain Currency[/I] & [I]ChuckNorris[/I] on here & put the principles of those 2 threads into action.
They’re not quite as noisy & glitzy as the ones you’re usually so enamoured with, but by the looks of it all that glitz isn’t doing you too many favors is it.
I read that text Sweet Pip and its nice that they bring up some numbers. I experienced the same thing. There is not one single system what works in all pairs.
Plus please let me add: The jpy is probably also a very good trendline candidate, because it is the single currency what connects the western to the asian world. So, the other currencies like swissy or cable don’t mean to much influence to it. It is a little bit like with xau.
Nasty chap aren’t you. Well if you can’t find’em handy, they can find my ignore list. Good luck in your other relationships 