Almost all Forex traders start working with the short-term trade. There are some reasons of that. First of all short-term trade doesn’t demand large assets, secondly it is much easier to test your trade systems on short-term periods.
The thing is that the structure of movement of the market prices is almost the same. You can see the undulatory structure of the market on any chart. That’s why it is better to test your trade strategies on short-term time periods. In this case you will understand very quickly if the system works or it won’t work. But there are some special features of short-term trade.
1. Macroeconomic news and speeches of different politicians and officials. A trader who works on a short-term time period must take this factor into account. At these moments, sharp day fluctuations of the prices start on the market. It is almost impossible to predict the movement of the price at this time. As they say, the market becomes “nervous” and many broker offices do not work up the traders’ orders at this time. That’s why a trader must know the time of this news and to be ready to that. The most optimal tactic at this time is to wait till the news is over, if you do not have open positions. If you have positions with profit, you have to fix profit. If your transactions are unprofitable, put stop losses.
2. The schedule of Forex sessions. If you trade within a day, then you must pay attention to the trade sessions. As you know there are four types of trade sessions – Pacific, Asian, European and American. As the Forex market works 24 hours a day, you can arrange transactions at any time of a day. But banks, stocks, large firms etc. do not work 24 hours a day. That’s why there are moments of sharp fluctuations of prices and slackening on the market. A trader decides by his/her own when to trade. But the trader must understand that fluctuations of GBP/USD or EUR/USD will be the sharpest from 5 a.m. to 6 a.m. on Greenwich. The same will be with the Asian, Pacific and American currency pairs. Knowing that, the trader needs to choose the currency pair and the trade practice that will be reasonable at a certain period of time.
3. A day of a week is a very important factor too. Here two days should be mentioned Monday and Friday. Monday is often opened with large gaps, especially if some important macroeconomic events happened on a weekend. You also need to understand that on Monday many traders only watch the situation and take the waiting position, that’s why as a rule there are no sharp fluctuations on the market on Monday. But on Friday sharp fluctuations often happen.
As in every other niche of our life Forex needs some knowledge.
Of course, one can start forex investment and get quite successful about it. But sooner or later the losses will come. This is when one might think “Why didn’t I start with a good forex trading education?”
That does not mean that after reading even the top materials you will start closing trading positions with huge income, but this info will save you from many traps. And even if you decide to get the assistance of a managed forex account service, still you will make a much wiser decision.
And a final piece of advice – today the Internet technologies give you a really unique chance to choose what you need at the best terms which are available on the market. Funny, but most of the people don’t use this chance. In real life it means that you should use all the tools of today to get the information that you need.
Search Google or other search engines. Visit social networks and have a look on the accounts that are relevant to your topic. Go to the niche forums and participate in the online discussion. All this will help you to create a true vision of this market. Thus, giving you a real opportunity to make a smart and nicely balanced decision.
And also sign up to the RSS feed on this blog, because we will everything possible to keep updating this blog with new publications about Forex currency trading.
The first thing that every beginning trader must understand is what the essence of the profitable trade on the Forex market is. If you ask this question to a hundred of beginning traders, they will say you almost the same. The essence of the trade is to divine (determine) correctly where the currency rate is moving. But this understanding is wrong. A trader will never be able to trade profitably till he/she thinks so.
The major task of a forex trader is not to determine where the rate is moving; the major task is to see where the rate is moving and to follow its movement. There is really a great difference between “to determine where the rate will move” and “to see where it has moved”.
Let’s imagine the following situation. You are on a railway station and you are waiting for a train that moves to the south. But there are several trains on the station and you do not know where they are going. You have two ways in this case:
The first one: you can get into the first train and to rely on your luck. May be you will be lucky and the train will move to the direction you need/
The second one; you can wait till a train starts moving to the south and to jump into it.
Now let’s apply the given situation to the market. When the trains are on the station, this is flat. You do not know where the price is going to move. And you have two variants again:
You may input the market relying on your luck. But this is not trade, this is a game like in a casino. Or you can wait till the price starts moving and to follow it. You must understand the difference between the first and the second variants. The Forex market is not a place where you can “guess”, you always must input the market purposefully.
If you look at the structure of movement of any currency pair you will see that the price on the market moves from level to level. I.e. there are some “areas” of the market that the price just passes, and there are places where the price can fluctuate for rather a long period of time being in flat. These flat parts of the market are those stations between which the price is moving. Our task is to determine where the price is moving and to follow it to the next level.
I.e. all the trade on the market comes to the determination of the beginning of the movement, calculation of possible goals and output from the market in the end of this movement. Technical analysis helps us in this work. You only have to use it right. Do not try to guess where the price is going to move with the help of technical analysis. For you it doesn’t have any matter where the price is going to move because wherever it moves you follow it and earn your money.
There are 2 ways you can make money on currency exchange market.
You can study the basics of Forex market trading with the help of a good forex book and do the forex trading personally.
Alternatively, you can hire experienced traders to manage your account and they will trade for you. Read more about forex investment.
Many beginning traders trying to find the “Grail” of the Forex market find the following announcements:
“At last you have found what you really need! The super profitable trade system that allow you to get at least 800 pips a week. The maximal profit has no limits and sometimes it reaches 5 000 pips a week. You do not have to do anything; the system does all the work for you. Buy the system as soon as you have read this announcement; the number of pieces is in limited supply….. and so on, so on.” I am sure you have noticed similar announcements from time to time. Many people believe in that and buy such trade systems. But the most important that they start working with such systems and believe that they really will help them to earn large money. But in the result they lose their money. As you can understand you can not trust to such trade systems.
You may wonder if it is impossible to create a profitable trade system. No, it is possible to create a good trade system, but this is not as simple and profitable trade systems are not churned out, this work is not proceeding on the conveyor. And even a profitable trade system can malfunction. The Forex market is not constant, it is changing all the time and the system that works today, might not work tomorrow. So, I recommend not to buy someone’s trade system, but to create your own and to work with it. Why?
The Forex market is not a plant or a firm, where something is manufactured and sold for money, and then this money is allot to the participants. The market has no outside receipts, all the money of the market is the money of its participants. And if you earn someone loses, this is the “law” of the market. And now let’s imagine a super profitable trade system that allows getting a large profit. You can download this system. If the system is really worthy, then thousands of traders will download it. So the number of earning traders will grow with each and every day. But……….the amount of money of the market has stayed the same, so the profit of every trader will be less and less. I.e. the profitability of the system is falling and from the profitable system it will become unprofitable.
That’s why you should not look for “easy ways”. If you really want to become a professional trader, you have to create your own profitable trade strategy, to understand its essence and to adapt to the terms of the market always. You will definitely lose if you do not want or can not do that. In this case you should think of another way to earn money.
There are two options you can make money on Forex market.
You can study the basics of currency exchange trading with the help of a nice forex book and do the forex trading personally.
OR you can hire professional traders to manage the money on your trading account and they will trade for you. Find out more about forex investment.
Many beginning traders often ask the following question: “If there is a difference between the work with a demo and a real account?” Yes, there is a difference and it is rather essential. There are many reefs that every beginning tarder meets when he/she opens a real account. Unfortunately many brokers do not tell about possible worry that expect for a trader in the real work.
The nuances of the trade that differ demo from real can be divided into three basic groups:
- technical
- psychological
- special (the theme that is not preferable on different forums)
Now let’s see each of this groups more detailed. We will start with technical moments. The main difference is that on a demo account all the transactions are arranged automatically by a computer. On a real account a real person (a dealer) stays behind every transaction. I.e. on a demo account you just click on the button “buy” and the transaction is arranged, and there is no matter of what is going on the market at the moment. On a real account you give an order for arranging transaction to a human, so everything is going on not so fast. It takes the dealer some time to work up the information and to make a decision. Sometimes it takes about one minute. If a trader is used to work with a demo account (for example when there are sharp fluctuations of prices) then this trader just will not have time to open transactions on the price that he/she needs. While the dealer is working up the information, the price will be changing constantly.
Psychological factor is important too. Almost all traders meet this factor. I.e. trading on a demo account you can easily increase your account during a month. But you start working with a real account and you can not do that. The balance is either zero or is in minus. Why? There is an example which will help you to understand why. “A teacher reading a lecture on psychology puts rather wide board on the floor and offers the students to walk along the board. Every student gets 100 dollars for that, and everyone agrees of course. After that the teachers offer to throw the same board from the roof of one building to the roof of another building. The teacher offers 1 000 dollars to that one who walks along this board.” How do you think if a lot of students would like to do that? As I know, no one agreed. But the board is the same, so why it is so easy to walk along it when it lays on the floor and so difficult when it hangs on the height of 3 000 meters? The answer is simple – when the board is on the floor you do not runs any risks. The same can be said about trade. Working with a demo account you do not run any risks. But when you open a real account and invest your hard earned money to it you are afraid to run risks.
As in any other sphere of our life foreign exchange market needs some education.
Of course, one can start forex investment and be quite successful in it. However sooner or later the losses will come. This is when one might think “Why didn’t I start with a nice forex trading education?”
This does not imply that after reading even the top materials you will start making money, but this info will save you from many dangers. And even if you make up your mind to get the assistance of a forex managed accounts service, still you will be able to make a much wiser decision.
And some general tips – today the online technologies give you a really unique chance to choose exactly what you need for the best price on the market. Funny, but most of the people don’t use this chance. In real life it means that you should use all the tools of today to get the information that you need.
Search Google and other search engines. Visit social networks and check the accounts that are relevant to your topic. Go to the niche forums and participate in the online discussion. All this will help you to build up a true vision of this market. Thus, giving you a real opportunity to make a wise and nicely balanced decision.
P.S. And also sign up to the RSS feed on this blog, because we will everything possible to keep updating this blog with new publications about Forex currency trading.