I’m not a big fan of leaving orders myself bobmaninc. The order I left for the sell on GU was more a test of the supply/demand thing than it was anything else. Which I suppose in itself isn’t too clever. I also like to be “in the trade” when I have one going. But the flip side of that is that sometimes when I’m physically sitting watching one of my trades live is that I cut it off too early, snatch at profits when if I’d stuck to my original target I could have made more.
I tend to snatch at profits on a trade even more if the previous trade had been a loser, just desperate to try and regain what I have lost. However, i am confident this is a thing that will come to us all in time.
RCarter once made a comment that there is no substitute for thousands of hours screen time. To be fair I think that is probably the truest thing ever said on this entire forum. Whatever it is we all do for a living, we didn’t learn it in a day, yet somehow, we all expect to learn trading currencies in a couple of months. Maybe our downfall is that we are all in too much of a hurry to “get there”.
So we work on what we have to work on, and try not to beat ourselves up too much about the things we don’t know or don’t understand yet along the way. But I’m sure the more prepared we are to take the time to learn, gives us a better chance of being here for the long run.
Anyway, sorry to go all deep on you. I wish I had something insightful to say about the charts tonight, but truth be told I spent the whole night watching Harry Potter 3 & 4 with my little one. Didn’t even give the charts a second thought !!
May have a quick peek at them now and see if anything jumps out at me.
Certainly for now, EU looks to be within the rising channel, albeit at the low end of it just now.
EU Daily
With today’s open being around the 1-3325, I’ve marked my Average pip range ( still running at 155 ) as 1-3480 High Range, 1-3168 low range.
Price as you can see for the last couple of days has been pretty much confined to the range between the orange lines at 1-3387 top end and 1-3255 at the bottom. Seems to be just a range play just now, if you fancy trying that, in the abscence of something to really drive it in one direction.
Dont get your hopes up to high. My charts are saying alot but not trade me. I have learned to walk away when in a trade. I wanted to open the door for me to trade while at work. Pending orders will do that but I must also realize it opens the door for loses. I am not hurting so I guess dont fix what isnt broke. Thats a hard one there as I always strive to improve more over just maintain and in maintaining you are bound to improve. Like rcarter said there is no substitute for thousands of hours of screentime. I just remember everytime I was looking to get in at X price and well I had to go to work before it got there just to come home and see price hit my entry exactly and off to the races it went. However I got to keep in mind I may remember those time but what I do not remember is every time price didnt do that and just keep going in the wrong direction. Those times meant nothing to me. Why? well they were irrelevant to me and so are the ones that shot in my direction. Just I remember the ones that would have worked.
As for the GU, it was interesting to watch PA unfold as yunny and I discussed last night. I can honestly say that it was the first time I have saw a level, reckoned it would do a certain thing at that level, and then actually watch it happen. It was quite an emotional moment for me LOL !!
Just a pity I forgot to get in at the right level then eh ? :34:
Certainly is great when you start to figure out the market, of course you can not be always 100% accurate but it gives you the edge needed to be profitable, just do not forget your SLs
I have a sell order at 1.6086, aiming for 300 pips. The risk is that i am going against the recent up trend.
It was certainly nice to see a live example of the trading method, but I’m a long long way from figuring it all out. Maybe that is a trader’s Valhalla, to finally figure it all out. We live in hope eh?
As for the 1-6086 short, I’ll be keeping an eye on that level myself going forward. Interested to know how you decided on the 300 profit figure. I haven’t got a chart in front of me just now so maybe the answer would be obvious if I did.
1.5650 is a range bottom that was tested a few times throughout Feb & Mar so would make a good final TP if we do enter into a risk-off phase for a bit. Who knows what’ll happen with these schizophrenic markets though.
Took a short GU on the break below 1-60 targeting yesterday’s low of 1-5979, with 10 pips risked at 1-6010.
Probably could’ve been a bit braver as price hit yesterday’s low and let th trade run, but I’ve already broke one rule by using my iPhone to trade in the first place, so didn’t want to push my luck. Ended up +23 pips.
Nothing wrong with using the phone to trade either in my opinion. I do it fairly regularly using the Oanda android app. So long as you know the levels beforehand where you’re going to be interested in getting involved and you can view PA as it arrives and reacts (or not) to those levels then you’re good to go I think.
Using the phone to trade is no bad thing, it’s just the charting app for FXCM on the iPhone is utter pants, which is a shame because I tried several different demo web based platforms and I prefer FXCM hands down.
So I use the TradeInterceptor app for charts. This is actually the thing that stops me buying an iPad for using during the day at work, because I know i’ll just end up with the app instead of the web version. Don’t know if it is possible to download the web platform on to an Android tablet.
OK, may well be classed as a gamble, but I took the GU long at 1-59637. I’ve only risked 8 pips to see if price breaks today’s low, looking for 1-5990.
GU 1 Hour
If nothing else it has to be worth 8 pips risk no??
Had to go out and pick up my nephew and came home to find EU and GU had jumped off a cliff. Obviously lost my 8 pips but did something happen to make them both fall so quickly does anyone know?
It’s ok. it was the Fed minutes that caused it all. Actually was a dozen pips up until that happened. Nevermind, might be well advised to get the Harry Potter DVD’s out again tonight and let the dust settle, start again in the morning.
Just thought I would torture myself a little further with this 1 min chart of what happened to my little GU long ‘gamble’.
Actually there is a point to putting this chart up rather than just some perverse self punishment. I placed this long purely because it was only an 8 pip risk, as opposed to a potential 27 pip reward. As you can see, it was going not too bad until the FED minutes were released.
But the point of adding this is just to illustrate what can happen if you don’t put a stop loss on your trade when you open it. I know you can point the finger at me and say that I have been guilty of not doing this in the past. And I would have to say “guilty as charged” to that accusation.
However, I did put my stop loss in place, hopefully I am at last beginning to learn the value of that. But just for any newbies out there who still need convinced of the need to place a stop loss, consider this.
I was +12 pips on this trade and then had to go 100 yards around the corner to the local community centre to pick up my nephew. By the time I got back, this pair was trading almost 80 pips lower. Eur/Usd fell over 100 pips in the same time.
I also hate trading from my phone, but i’ve got into the habit now of only monitering open trades by phone - i.e. moving my SL, closing some of my position etc… Otherwise unless i have proper charts infront of me i try not to take trades from my phone as i feel my analysis will never be as sound…
If i could throw in my 2 cents, and not to butt in and throw out garbage as i realise my experience in trading is currently even less than yours LOL…
But from the way i’ve been looking at my charts, GU and EU have been stuck in i think a bit of a distribution phase for a while…
I’m gonna throw in some current charts of the swing trade i’ve had set on the USD/CHF - which yes are unrelated but at the same time are negatively correlated with the EU, so what i thought in my analysis here will should hopefully be a reversal in the EU…
In the daily TF, you can see ive thrown a fib over the swing low to the recent swing high and the last few days have been ranging in between the 62-79% retracement levels - ICT’s Optimal Trade Entry zone…
After the lingering in this range, and failing to break the lower barrier, and zooming in on the 1h TF…
To me, those long wicks i have marked in the chart are signs of an ongoing accumulation process of buy orders being built up by smart money. Ive been waiting for today’s jump since the end of last week and today we finally had a positive movement upwards… In no way am i saying im always right - because believe me i’m far from it lol… But i think these last four weeks where i have given myself a solid set of rules before entering a trade have definately changing my way and outlook on trading - everything is starting to feel a lot more controlled…
The reason i throw this in, as i have seen quite a few traders on here that do not pay attention to news, i quite like this approach. I try to keep the news in mind (so i know when to expect large spreads) but i believe you can see most of what you need to see from the charts… The drop you saw today in the EU, was shown in my graphs on the USD/CHF, but to me, it wasnt unexpected due to the minutes that came out, the inability to break the range barrier and trend coupled with what i saw as accumulation to me meant this jump (or fall in the case of GU, and EU today) was expected. What you saw as a jump due to a news release, i saw it as an excuse for smart money to make it’s move using the news as a cover up…
Anyway, i hope this at all doesnt sound patronizing, im in no position to be patronizing lol, but simply just giving my take on the situation. I think one of the big things that can change the profitability of trading is to trade with the direction of the bias of the pairs. This alone can mean the entry doesnt even have to be spot on, but just by trading in line correctly with the days bias it will leave you profitable by the end…
Good observation SanJ… news good or bad in my opinion has little impact on what smart money is ‘actually’ doing (longer term moves aside). Often news is just as you describe… an excuse to push a pair in a predetermined direction. Agreed the drop on both EU and GU was coming… I posted Sunday night I was looking for 3300 - 3250 so my trade worked out ok.
Agreed good write up. I managed to get a little scalp on my aussie. Good for 40 pips. Stopped me out after 40 then went down some more. I do agree I see the low for the week just put in on my Aussie. To bad my bias is short so I will only short (that and nothing is saying long right now). I good correction and I will be in. Looks like a slow week for me even though there has been good moves so far. It happens. We will see though the week is still young
Although we have dropped 90 pips from the EU open as I write this, according to my own Av. Daily pip range (155 pips) we may still have a drop heading toward NY open.
However, the thing that bothers me about it is the fact that we are sitting just above up trend line on the daily.
Think it would need a strong break of that line to tempt me in.
Agreed price would need a strong push to break that. Just like beloved Aussie I was able to catch some nice pips last night. But we are now hitting 1.02 which is a major level. I remember this level kicking my butt so many times last year and judging by the smirk on the pairs face so does it. I think I might have to find another pair for a while. I do not want to be going long on the Aussie but I just dont see it going down much more before a strong correction to the upside. With the trade deficit coming out of Australia showing signs of weakness they are most likely to have to cut rates. So up we go for now I guess but on the bright side it will let me get back in at a far better price later
