Become A Better Trader

It is a well documented fact that within the “business” of trading the financial markets, as much as 90 % of the participants lose and continue to lose money. So if 90 % are losing, that therefore means that 10% are gaining each and every time.

In order to improve my own trading record, I deliberately set out to try and discover what it was I had to do to become one of the 10% (The Winners) who are consistently making money from the unfortunate remaining 90% (The Losers) who don’t.

My research and investigations was to speak to as many successful traders as I could, to read as many articles, publications and books which have been written by successful traders. It wasn’t until I started my research, that I quickly realised just how much has been and no doubt will continue to be written about trading and the psychology of trading. What is even more astounding is the amount that has been written by so called “gurus” who actually haven’t made any significant amounts of money from a business that they are supposed to be experts in. I will tell you about some of my findings relating to these authors in future articles.

It is my intention to publish my findings in a series of articles over the next 3 months and I hope you can learn and improve your own trading from implementing the information which I release.

I personally trade the FOREX market now but I have tried trading stocks, futures, commodities and options. I will be covering the reasons for concentrating on FOREX in a later article but in the meantime let me tell you about one of my many discoveries.

Every one of the successful traders I interviewed, stressed the importance of keeping a journal of their trades. They would record the date, time, what they traded, buy or sell, price, indicators used including levels and/or figures, trends (long, medium and short) and an overall description of why they took the trade. It was also imperative that the journal entry included notes about the trade after the event. If it made money what was the criteria, and if it was a losing trade, why had it turned out to be like this and any contributing factors.

Now comes the interesting part. Everyone of them stated that they regularly reviewed their journal (some weekly and some monthly) but everyone quite categorically looked back over past trades. No doubt learning from their mistakes and to improve and repeat on their successful trades.

Trading is very disciplined with definite rules for entering and exiting trades. These rules must be adhered to at all times and one of the rules is entering all details about the trade in the journal, making no exceptions.

I hope you will all learn something from this and if you aren’t already maintaining a record of your trades, then please start doing so from now on. Also regularly go back over your records on a regular basis. You will see a marked improvement in your performance.

To know more  visit http://www.articledashboard.com

Posted in Forex Trading

A Trillion $ A Day Market At Your Finger Tips

the most liquid market in the world!
We’re talking about the currency market, money market, or ‘forex market’ meaning foreign exchange, of ‘FX’ for short. The highest day volume recorded on equity markets such as the FTSE, Dow Jones or NASDAQ are only one tenth of that recorded on the FX market. That makes the money market very big and more importantly very liquid. A liquid market guarantees buyers and sellers for even the biggest transactions. Online forex market Forex trading was not available to retail investors originally when online spread betting first started in the 1960’s. Only banks and life insurance companies had the resources. As spread betting companies developed their operations they began to offer online forex trading. The growth of spread betting and online gambling has made is simple for retail investors to take part. Many spread betting companies now operate in the forex market. Such competition has led to companies offering user friendly trading platforms with simple order systems, charts, and technical support. It is worth shopping around. A spread betting company that allows you to stake small amounts is a good starting place. Forex markets are priced to four decimal places. This means a very small move can result in very big wins or loses. To start your journey into forex markets it’s advisable to start with small stakes.
Forex Opportunities
It’s simple really: you can spread bet a currency pair to either increase of decrease with one increasing in value against the other. Fixed odds bets on forex markets are also available. Website’s like betonmarkets.com offer you fixed odds bets on various markets. For example, you can bet a currency pair will not hit a level defined by you or that it will trade within a range set by you.
So why trade forex markets?
Traders in any markets tend to determine the trend of the market. Traders in the forex markets have very large trading accounts and are led more by price action. This tends to cause self forfilling trends, for example, the more a currency moves in one direction the more the traders will push it in that direction. This can also be known as momentum trading. The fundamental drivers of currency markets, for example interest rates, inflation, balance of trade and a countries current account deficit or surplus can be active for years. Forex markets do not move in connection with equity markets or bonds. Trading currencies is an excellent way of creating a diversified global trading portfolio. Diversification is important because if equity markets loose value you have a chance to gain from forex markets.
What you need to know about fx markets
The most frequently traded currency in the forex markets are the dollar and 6 others. The droller’s forex symbol is USD. You can also choose from the euro, EUR; the Japanese Yen, JPY; the British pound, GBP; the Swiss Frank, CHF; the Canadian dollar, CAD; and the Australian dollar, AUD. Each currency even has it’s own nick name, for example, the dollar is called the greenback, the British pound – aka cable, the Swiss franc is called the Swissie, and the Canadian dollar is called the loonie. The worlds central bank hold the largest proportion of their reserves in dollar denominated assets….making the US dollar the worlds reserve currency. This means he dollar has a pivotal roll in many markets. The oil market is priced in dollars as are most commodity markets. If you want to import goods form Asia you can bet they’ll be priced in dollars. This means countries must hold dollars in order to purchase goods, trade in goods, or trade in raw materials. You will find that most spread betting companies will quote in terms of dollars. Always bear in mind which way the currency is being quoted, as it’s direction will represent either an appreciation or depreciation against the dollar. For example, a rise in the value of JPY/USD – expect to see the line of a forex chart moving upwards – means the Yen has gained in value against the Dollar. A rise is value of USD/JPY means the Dollar has gained in value against the Yen – again the line on a forex chart would be moving up.
Our recommendation
We recommend you use an online spread betting company. The accounts on offer are sophisticated and easy to use. An online spread betting account will give you more control. You can use stop losses (very important). You can set limit orders. Nearly every aspect of a trade can be automated. Last but not least, bear in mind spread bet companies price forex markets to four decimal places. A small move in the market produces a large change to your trading account. Imagine what a large move would do. Not to worry because you can use a stop loss and there are good spread bet accounts for beginners. Some accounts will allow you to stake a very small amount of money.

To know more visit http://www.articledashboard.com

Posted in Forex Trading