Tuesday, March 18, 2008

I got myself a new trading style. Bollinger + DMI + MAC/D. Works excellant. But decided maybe I'll start keeping physical records instead of online ones.

Only thing which is holding me back is, should I stay fully technical or fully fundamental?

Monday, March 3, 2008

Exams are over, finally. Trade will resume on 3/3/08, after such a long time of self evaluation. Updates on trades coming up soon, but would be concentrating on Asian sessions.

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

I apologise for the lack of entries, and I admit it's due to the lack of discipline. Anyway lots of ups and downs, but will not update now, maybe tomorrow.

Be back soon.

Wednesday, January 9, 2008

Trade Review 7/1/08

In the afternoon, I entered into a long EUR/USD @ 1.4700, with a t/p objective @ 1.4720 and s/l @ 1.4675. I fully understand that it is pretty outrageous for me to have such a poor r/r but for me at this point of time, it would always be better to have profit, than to not have any at all. And so, managed to get my t/p @ 1.4720 with a $16 profit. Not a bad start.

Afterwhich, I entered a short @ 1.4707 as it was right below the 5ema line, my favourite way to enter a position. That position felt good initially, reaping me profits. However as time passed, it seemed like it was getting more and more wrong. Until at night, it was nearing my s/l @ 1.4740 and I decided to move my s/l a bit higher to 1.4745.

At the same time, I decided to go short at somewhere near the peak of the previous day high @ 1.4734, with the same s/l @ 1.4745. This position was basically entered with the intention to set off losses in the 1.4707 trade. However, all I did was go to the washroom, and come back with a realized loss of $39.20, and the peak at bid price 1.4742. You must be wondering, how it hit my s/l @ 1.4745 when the spread for EUR/USD was only 2 pips. Because of a news release, and the broker widen the spread to 3 pips, so it hit my s/l @ 1.4745. And of course, that was the last of 1.4745 seen for the day as it was the high and all could have been avoided if I was more careful with my s/l and more attention paid to news releases.

So at this very moment while I'm blogging all these down, I'm also in a short EUR/USD @ 1.4734. Peak of today at this moment was 1.4743, which was indirectly pretty similar to yesterday's. I'm looking to take profit @ 1.4704, which I had just missed by one pip approximately 10 minutes ago. However, I'm still being positive about the decline in the Euros right now.

Tuesday, January 8, 2008

How does it feel to be correct and yet lose money?

Updates soon after emotions are balanced out.

Saturday, January 5, 2008

Trade Review for week starting 2/1/08 - 4/1/08

This week of trading has been pretty smooth, except for some minor mistakes which I never fail to make.

Been really attached EUR/USD, and enjoying the movements in the pair. I guess the most attractive thing about this pair would be the low spread. 2 pip spread is great as I do not have to worry about paying too much even if I was on the losing side.

On 2/1/08, made some mistakes by not trusting myself and switching around too much. I'm glad the spread was only 2 pips, so switching around did not really cause me to lose too much in the spread. Went long in the first trade @ 1.4665 but took a quick profit @ 1.4667. Earned $1.60 there as I stuck to 0.8 lots. Reason for exiting so quick was because on my hourly chart it showed a reversal, so I shorted again @ 1.4670, and seriously I was right initially and was up approximately 20 pips. However, the mistake in this trade was that I did not pay attention to news release, and I ended up taking a 10 pip loss of $8.00, and hence I quickly reversed my position and entered long @ 1.4688 to ride on the wave. This brought me a 42 pip profit by closing @ 1.4730, which was $33.60.

Overall profit/loss for the day was +$27.20, a pretty decent trading day.

On 3/1/08, main mistake was trading in a rush. I was out literally for the whole day, from 8am in school, all the way to afternoon where I went for my medical checkup, and then going to look for May in the evening, and reaching home only at 11.30pm. Went home, and saw EUR/USD chart, hourly chart signalled a short, but not at an exactly good price. As I wanted to earn at least $10.00 that day, hence I just hastily entered a short at 1.4721. Before I knew it, I was down a good 10 pips. Then I saw a friend on MSN and asked him for opinions, he was confident of how much it would go up, and as usual, I was taken in by his confidence. Closed off the first position at a 20 pip loss, losing $16.00 and entering long @ 1.4743. The moment I entered long, prices immediately started to decline and not before long my losses were fluctuating around 10 - 15 pips. This definitely signalled a bad sign. I didn't want to think so much and hence I just held the position overnight.

On 4/1/08, I woke up and saw a profit of approximately 10 pips, but that definitely wasn't what I was asking for. So I just held on further. At approximately 2pm I couldn't stand the losses anymore as it had hit 20 pips and it was the limit of my rsk appetite, so I closed it off at a 20 pip loss. Both these trades took away $16.00 and caused my balance to fall below the initial.

These two trades caused me to think through what I had done wrong, and the obvious mistake was that I entered trades hastily and the next would be I was wavered easily when people told me of their opinions.

So I just waited, and kept waiting for a chance to enter into EUR/USD again. About 5 hours later, this chance came as there was employment data release from the US. Prices started to escalate and I was prepared to go long at any price which came. Managed to long @ 1.4724 and I decided to not be greedy and just t/p @ 1.4775, earning a sweet 51 pips, giving me $40.80.

Before I entered this trade, I was looking at some other charts as well, and saw a good chance at GBP/JPY, but I guess I really have this phobia with this pair and have no wish to touch it again even though I saw a very strong resistance @ 216.55. I seriously have to blog this down otherwise I'll feel very bottled. It really sucks to see yourself missing on a chance which you had spotted. A good 300 pip that would be.

Ok, no point fretting over something which I was bent on not touching. Then I went over to May's house at night and brought my laptop along, was prepared to go short on EUR/USD again, and yes eventually I did after much hesitation and missing out on good movements. Shorted @ 1.4770, not an excellant price as well, saw a 13 pip profit but did not want to close it, ended up taking it @ 1.4767 making $2.40 out of it. Though if I had held on, I could have closed it off at a 10 pip profit, but I didn't want to hold on as I was so tired by that time at around 4am. So overall, up $38.12 from initial capital, not a bad start though I did not hit my profit objective of 30usd/day on average.

Lessons learnt: Do NOT trade when you are all tired and worn out. Do NOT trade based on a friend's opinion.

A friend is a fiend in trading.

New Year, New Objectives

Start of the year, enrolled myself in IBFX competition again. Now I only concentrate on one pair, EUR/USD. Lowest spread, lowest fluctuation. I don't exactly earn a lot on this pair, but it's considerably decent.

"30USD a day keeps poverty away."
Trading this doesn't exactly make me rich, but at least it does not bankrupt me.

"A friend is a fiend in trading."
Never listen to a friend, unless you are thinking the same way then maybe you could have some additional topics to talk about. However if you ain't, then jolly well just ignore whatever a friend says because you chose that trade initially with a reason.

Monday, December 24, 2007

Back to Basics

After these 2 whole weeks of bad trades, I've decided to go back into trading "safer" pairs; this means totally not touching pairs like GBP/JPy, GBP/CHF and EUR/AUD. These are killers man. Make you rich overight, and then take away double of whatever you earned the next day.

Been trying out EUR/USD after not touching it for sometime, and things seem to be working out. Being a lot more prudent, trading and earning a smaller cut out of the movements, and consistantly reminding myself not to bother about making a killing. 30USD for an account like mine would do well everyday, that makes me 1000SGD richer every month. Good enough for a student trader. But of course, this would only be carried out for the next 2 to 3 months or so.

I need more capital, so that I could trade bigger sizes. This is the key to it, and I must never forget. Of course, this blog has been set up to ensure discipline, but look at what happened, I haven't been blogging for approximately a fortnight or so, which also means I have been losing money for a fortnight already.

Currently I'm watching out for good movements in mainly EUR/USD, USD/JPY and GBP/USD, kind of ignoring other pairs already. If I can make it in these 3 pairs, I don't see why I would have much of a problem with the rest.

For now, I'll just be trading on a demo account until next year. Total balance/equity is standing at 250usd now, lost half of my capital already. But 250usd gives me eligibility to hit on next month's IBFX's competition. Things should be pretty intense by then and I wouldn't be surprised if my t/p objectives are being limited at 20 pips with a pretty lousy R/R. But 20 pips is always better than nothing, right?

Monday, December 10, 2007

Mistakes

A lot of mistakes made last week. Wouldn't be touching on the small little trades, more on the bigger trades.

I had shorted a total of 1.55 lots on GBP/JPY with an average price of 225.20. Don't ask me how I ended up risking so much, simply because of greed.

The t/p at 222.00 didn't work out, lowest was at around 223.77, and prices didn't look back since then.

Charts had indicated rebounds coming up, I was in a way, prepared for a rebound. But, not so much of a rebound until it seems like a countertrend already.

Lesson learnt for the week: Traders are short-term, don't bother holding on to a trade for more than 2 days.

Because of this "big" trade which I was looking out for, I had definitely missed out a lot of other so-called "smaller opportunities" which I had confident of.

This week would be a pretty busy week, so I guess not so much trading would be taking place yea?

Events to look out for would be interest rates statement from Fed. I'm thinking of how to position myself for this tomorrow, or should I just position myself today.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Holding Your Guns

Yesterday wasn't that well afterall. Lesson of the day: Holding your guns.

When you've decided on your trade, always bear in mind, never to change positions unless it really is beyond hope. There's always a reason for you to enter a trade, and its always a dumb reason to stop your trades.


GBP/JPY Hourly Chart

Take my trades yesterday for example:

First trade was a long GBP/JPY.

Rationale for entering was MA(5) had just crossed the MA(8) line, coupled with stochs at less than 10. This definitely meant a correction no matter what. So the long position was entered at 227.50 at GMT 4.45. However, in fear, I closed off the position with a close to breakeven profit at 227.52, and afterwhich, prices shot all the way up to 228.22. A clean 50 pip profit would have been made.

However, I closed off the position to go short, at 227.50, which also caused me a loss of 59 pips as my stop loss was at 228.09. This was utterly depressing, So I decided to hang on to see what would actually happen.

After a few hours, I decided, since MA(5) had crossed above MA(8) on my chart, I decided to go long. And then, there was a downturn and there it was, it hit my stop loss again at 227.50.

So I rested for awhile, before deciding to go short at 227.75. This position kind of worked out, and not before long I was up as much as 115 pips, and also in the process I pyramided again at 226.92. These positions showed high profitability; however in less than an hour, it rebounded and then hit my stop losses for both positions at 227.75. So in a way, I broke even and also lost another 83 pips in this movement.

Then, I decided to take another break and then entered into another long position, at 228.00, when the pair looked more bullish. Within an hour, I lost another 50 pips.

All the trades I made yesterday were horrible, and simply stupid. If I stopped switching my positions so often, I probably would already have hit my profit objective of the day and then stopped trading altogether.

The experience yesterday taught me to hold my guns and stick to my beliefs, regardless of how much the rest of the world was telling me I was simply on the wrong side of the game.

That's all for the review!

Monday, December 3, 2007

GBP/USD

Good morning!!! Brand new day, brand new week, brand new month. Feeling kind of queasy so decided to skip school. But the trading bug in me hasn't exactly been able to die off so I decided to open up my platform and watch the charts.

While doing so I spotted the GBP/USD trade and am now waiting for a breakout. Below is a picture of the graph:


GBP/USD Hourly Chart

There seems to be a sideways movement as of the past 8 hours of trading and I'm currently waiting for a breakout. If it doesn't break out of this sideways movement, then I suppose the best would be to just stay out of it.

That's all for now!

Saturday, December 1, 2007

Equity Update: Week 1

Equity is currently standing at $550.67, up 10.13%.

I'm glad the previous trade managed to hit my breakeven price, or should I say, hit it by 1 pip above my entry price at 229.01. I promise I wouldn't hastily enter any trades next week.

A review of this week's trades would be pretty simple as only 2 main trades took place. One was a wrong short in EUR/AUD, which brought about a loss of approximately $25, and the other was the GBP/JPY. Details of the trades were in earlier entries.

Lessons to be learnt in these two trades would be mainly staying calm before entering any trades. Indicators never fail you as often as you fail the indicators.

Anyway IBFX's December Contest would also be starting next week as well, so it gives me even greater pressure to actually abide by the trading rules and not violate them at any given moment. Prizes would are awarded to the top 5 placings and monies are as follows:

1st $3,000
2nd $1,500
3rd $ 750
4th $ 500
5th $ 250

I've checked out the previous rounds' results. Winners did not exactly have spectacular results. But I believe if I abide by my trading rules, there shouldn't be any problems with winning the free prize monies.

All the best for next week!

Friday, November 30, 2007

The GBP/JPY Jerk Off

Right before my eyes, the GBP/JPY jerked off, and hit all my t/p. Been a very very exciting afternoon here, and I have earned a total of $74.76. The only crazy thing which I have done would be entering into another GBP/JPY trade at the price of 229.00. I know it sounds mad, but take a look at the hourly charts of GBP/USD and USD/JPY.


GBP/USD Hourly Chart


USD/JPY Hourly Chart

Both shows an upward movement, though with very little potential. And while typing this post, I think I should stop my self deception and close the bloody position at breakeven.

That's all for today, a 10% return in initial capital invested.

The Pyramid; GBP/JPY


H4 GBP/JPY Chart

I have just closed in half of my previous 0.42 lots of GBP/JPY, locking in a $7.80 profit. Also, I have moved up my s/l for this trade to my breakeven point at 227.10.

I'm looking to pyramid 0.53 lots more on GBP/JPY at 227.60 with a s/l at 227.10 and a t/p objective at 228.60. For now, I shall just wait for prices to hit my buy limit.

GBP/JPY, the counter trend


Hourly GBP/JPY chart

You know, I have been waiting for this trade for at least the past 8 hours. And the most sickening thing which could ever happen would be I dozed off in the morning at 7.30am after waking up and woke up at 10 to realise that I had missed some big moves.

Casting that aside and to not affect me emotionally, I have now placed a buy order of 0.42 lots at 227.10, with a s/l at 226.50 and a t/p objective at 228.10, a 100 pip profit.The maximum loss for this trade would be $22.93, exceeding my maximum trade risk by 0.8%, bringing the total risk for this trade to 4.8%. However this risk is worth taking due to high potential in this trade due to past GBP/JPY movements of at least 200 pips in each movement. A trailing stop of 10 pips would be set after a 50 pip profit.

Maximum R/R of this trade would be 1:1.67.

*While typing this post, the price hit my buy limit.

Bad Warm-Up

Just felt like clicking something, and there I was, ended up shorting EUR/AUD. Right when I shorted it at 1.6708, it hit my stop loss at 1.6758 within 10 mins. Painful warm-up. This shall remind me of sticking to the guidelines which I have set for myself and not break them.

So next the trade shall be a 4% risk on capital.

USD/CHF; Chance Spotted


Hourly USD/CHF Chart

By accident, I kind of spotted this trade. Looking to short 0.55 lots with a s/l of 50 pips and t/p of 50 pips as well. R/R of 1:1. Not exactly the best in the world but worth the trade due to high probabilities. A cross under MA(8) for MA(5) would siginify a time to enter, stochs are all pointing downwards, coupled with RSI sitting at 50. This is something to look out for.

Simply, waiting for a cross now.

Thursday, November 29, 2007

Issue Solved

And yes, I am back. My "New Orders" button issue is finally solved. And thanks to Jody, I now have the arrows which will notify me when my EMA crosses each other.

My call on EUR/AUD this afternoon on the hourly chart, was kind of partially correct, and would definitely have proved profitable if a trailing stop had came into place. A profit of approximately 80 pips could have been achieved instead of the targeted 100 pips, not too bad for a few hours of monitoring.

The next call for me would be a long on GBP/USD.


Hourly Chart for GBP/USD

As we can see from the chart, there seems to be a countertrend coming up. Hence, I'm waiting for my indicators to affirm this before going long. Stochs and RSI are both at very low points and possible reversals may occur soon. A cross of MA(5) over MA(8) would surely be helpful and then I suppose it would then be a time to go long.

I'll probably be risking 5% of my capital which is 25usd in return for 40usd. Lot size would be 0.5 mini lot with a s/l of 50 pips and t/p of 80 pips. Price to enter is yet to be confirmed as I'm still waiting to catch a proper price at this moment.

Updates would come up later. Time for Bloomberg TV!

A New Trading Life

It has been pretty long since I traded with my own money since the last time I broke my account. During this period of emptiness, I decided to improve myself by going back to demo trading and not losing touch with the markets, and also to read up more and see where I could be improving myself on.

So the day before, I went down to DBS and made a USD500 deposit into my InterbankFX account, which totaled up to approximately SGD770. However up til now, there are still some issues with my InterbankFX account, which are pretty crucial, i.e. I can't click on the "new order" button.

The trade which I am looking out for this week and next week would probably be going short on the EUR/AUD.


Hourly Chart of EUR/AUD

As we can see,the hourly chart of EUR/AUD indicates a downtrend to short for the short-term. A good price to go short could be at 1.6750 with a t/p objective at 1.6650. S/l would be good at 1.6810 as 1.6800 would be a physchological number to break. With stochs pointing downwards and the MA(5) crossing below MA(8), this shows a good short. Coupled with RSI(8) falling below 50, there shouldn't be any doubt going into a short position for the short-term. This trade provides a good R/R of 1:1.7 approximately.


Daily Chart of EUR/AUD

The daily chart is indicating signs of a downtrend as well for the pair. However to be double confirmed of the short position, it would be good to wait for the MA(5) to cross under MA(8) before entering into a medium-term short position. With the stochs pointing downwards as well, this shows a good indication for a short position. However, RSI(8) seems to be hanging slightly above 50 at this moment. We could probably see it cross below 50 by next week and then we would then enter short on that position. For this trade, I would look to short the pair at probably 1.6700 with a t/p objective at 1.6200 coupled with a s/l at 1.6960, the high price 2 days ago. R/r for this trade would be 1:1.9 approximately, a pretty good trade.

For all of the trades, an optimal risk level would be at 5% of capital for the total stop losses to ensure that you would be protected against overleverage.

That's all for today! Back tomorrow.