Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Short Term Currency Trends

Most of the time, markets don't show any visible clear trend - they bounce back and forth between support and resistance levels. This sideways movement is called a trading range.

Below is a strategy that may help you in identifying entry points on short-term trends, whilst protecting your profits with trailing stops.

Trade Set-up

The strategy uses two charts with different time periods (10-minute and hourly), along with two technical indicators: a 200-bar moving average and a 14-bar slow stochastic study.

1st Step : Identify a Trend

Compare the moving averages on both charts. A trend may be developing when price is consistently above or below the moving averages on both charts.

2nd Step : Pinpoint entry

Once you've identified a trend, look for the following two conditions at the same time on the 10-minute chart:

1. Price is no more than 20 pips above (to buy) or 20 pips below (to sell) the MA.

2. The "fast" stochastic (%K) crosses above the "slow" stochastic (%D) below 20 (to buy), or crosses below the "slow" stochastic above 80 (to sell).

3rd Step : Ride the trend

Set a trailing stop after the trade entry.

On a LONG position, the stop order should be 10 pips BELOW the 200-period MA on the 10-minute chart. You'll RAISE the stop as the trade goes in your favor.

On a SHORT position, place the stop 10 pips ABOVE the MA. You'll LOWER the stop as the trade goes in your favor.

I hope this helps ! Test this out on a demo platform like eToro or ibfx practice accounts before you go live !

Monday, March 1, 2010

Choice of Forex Trading Currency Broker

There is a very wide choice of currency broker companies online and when you are starting out in forex trading it can be difficult to find the best. We tend to be attracted by advertising, assuming they are all working in the same way. In fact this is not true. Foreign exchange brokers have very different business models which affect the way that they operate. In some cases, you may be surprised to hear that they could be working against their clients instead of for them.

Of course traditionally a broker carries out his clients' instructions, placing orders for them in the market. Originally brokers worked with telephone orders and simply placed the order for the best price that they could get through their dealing desk. These days, everything is done online so that clients put in their orders for a certain price. However, you do still need a broker who will connect to the market through their software platform.

Many brokers still work in the old way, placing orders for clients as they are instructed. These are often the brokers who run standard forex accounts with minimum investment of $10,000 and upward. But the internet has opened up forex trading to people with much lower investment funds. More recently, companies have come on the scene to cater for these smaller investors and they do not necessarily follow the pattern of traditional brokers. To cut costs, they usually do not have their own dealing desks and they may operate in some very different ways. This can have important consequences for your funds and how they are managed.

So let's take a look at the types of business model that you may come across in your search for a currency broker.

No Dealing Desk (NDD) Currency Brokers

NDD brokers work in a similar way to brokers with dealing desks, but they use a range of liquidity providers to actually match their clients' orders in the market. Competition between liquidity providers keeps the spread low, even though the broker usually increases the spread to cover their own costs and make some money.

Market Makers

Market makers are not brokers in the true sense because instead of placing your order in the market they will match it themselves and then cover themselves against any loss by taking a position in the ECN or market that offsets their commitment to you either partially or fully. Market makers set their own prices, although of course these will be related to market prices. They often do not like clients to use scalping strategies because the very short term nature of these trades makes it hard for them to offset their risk. Some traders are happy to use market makers but others consider that they have a conflict of interest which may work against you as a trader.

Electronic Communications Network (ECN)

Forex brokers who use the ECN can access an online network where trades are filled. Many market makers work this way, as well as some brokers, banks and other large currency traders. Spread is usually low but you may be charged a fee per trade.

Bucket Shops

Forex bucket shops are like bet takers in that they simply match your trade without necessarily taking any position in the market. They may not even have any connection into the real currency market. They win if you lose, so if you are successful they will probably close your account and return your funds. There is really no point in getting involved with a bucket shop unless you just want experience at very low levels of investment, and plan to lose money. They are illegal in some jurisdictions, and do not deserve to be described as a currency broker.

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Metatrader EA Passive Income Strategy

Metatrader EA passive income strategy

By: Douglas Smith

Meta Trader EA works under indicators which inform about the overbought and oversold zones.

It is simple, quick and works like a robot. Meta Trader EA is able to inform the possible movement changes from blue to red lines. MQL4 coding is used as it works for users as Indicators, Libraries, Scripts and Expert Advisors for the platform of Meta Trader.

The benefits of using Meta Trader EA software are only for the online currency trading. It is easy and simple to install. You can start your trading with in one hour’s time after purchase. It provides MTS 4 free of charge. After purchase you can get support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. For updates and on new versions, you can get bonuses and discounts. Copy tool software, DDET tool software, MBTrading Bridge and Forex Volumes tools are used in Meta Trader.

You can download the Meta Trader EA by just filling the form instantly. The trading through this program includes commodities, indices and shares. Low spreads and zero commission are offered with trading signals. Meta Trader Expert Advisors known as MT4 and MT5. Meta Trader 4 offers the trader a stretchy trading situation as well as Forex trading automation.

You can download these expert advisors and use them on Meta Trader platform. Currency pairs of GBP/USD, USD/JPY, EUR/JPY, GBP/JPY and USD/CHF can be used for this program. Meta Trader EA help to trade automatically when you are away form the system. You can have the commissions or spreads automatically. On joining you will have a demo account and one original / live account. First you have to use the demo account for better trading then use the original / live account.

Meta Trader indicators are as under:
- Statistical Metatrader indicators
- Divergence Metatrader Indicators
- Multi-Timeframe Metatrader indicators
- General purpose Indicator


STATISTICAL & DIVERGENCE METATRADER INDICATORS

New Meta Trader Statistical Indicators and Divergence Indicators can be purchased as - StateX can be purchased for $ 96.79, Momentum-DIV, OBV-DIV, Bollinger Bands-DIV, Stochastic-DIV, DACD-DIV, RSI-DIV and PowerRVI-DIV can be purchased for $ 115.96 each.

MULTI-TIMEFRAME METATRADER INDICATORS

Multi-Time frame Meta Trader Indicators can be purchased with different costs like; Trend MultiTF for $95.96, HeikenAshi MultiTF for $75.96, PowerRVI for $ 83.16, PowerSTLM for $99.96, Alt-Pitchfork for $87.96 and StateX for $96.79

GENERAL PURPOSE INDICATOR & EXPER ADVISORS

General purpose indicators can be purchased as PowerRVI for $83.16, PowerSTKM for $99.96 and Alt-Pitchfork for $87.96 only.

The opening positions are different on the four times frames. You can set the time frames of your choice as for 4 Hours – H4, for Daily – D1, for Weekly – W1 and Monthly – NM codes are used.

There are hundreds of trading robots out there, many of which claim to make very large profits on a consistent basis. It can be very difficult to weed through the noise and actually find an expert advisor that will provide you with stability and hopefully positive returns. Throughout this article I will show you a multitude of statistical ways to search for the best performing Metatrader EA.

Article Source: Metatrader EA passive income strategy

Friday, February 12, 2010

What are Ticks and Pips ?

Ticks are the smallest amounts of time that exist between any two currency trades. This time frame can be a short time period of a fraction of a second for major currencies, and can also be a time frame of a few hours for less popular currencies. Ticks do not happen in constant intervals, even though the charts used for technical analysis do use specific time rates such as 4 hours of 15 minutes.

Whereas a pip is the smallest change of price for any Foreign Currency. The currency quotes appear as numbers with either two or four decimal places. This means that if the Foreign Currency moves up or down, the smallest move is called a "pip". When you trade in Forex, you monitor how the pips rise and drop and this is what determines your investment.

Take the following example :

If you buy EUR/USD. This pair is quoted four decimal numbers after the point. A pip here is ten thousandth of a Dollar, or 0.0001 of a dollar. The pip is an abbreviation of "Price Interest Point", and this is why another name used for pips is points.

Even though a pip is only a small amount of money, because your foreign currency trading is usually a leveraged investment, a few pips can mean serious cash fluctuations. Each serious trader needs to know how to calculate the change from pips the actual sums invested, and some online Foreign currency trading agents offer such calculators in their account. You should consider these and other advanced functions when selecting the broker you want to use. Pip value can vary, and is usually $1 in mini accounts or $10 in regular accounts.

An important concept that concerns pips is called The Spread. This is the pip difference between the bid price and the ask price done for the currency trading sum. When you buy Foreign Currency it costs you more than to sell it and this is the spread.

Come on back as I provide more forex trading basics.

Full article source, with thanks : www.forexondemand.com