28 Jan, Usd/Jpy - Smooth Trade

Well, its me again.. Its Thursday, and my first trade this week. As usual, watching the euros, aussies, yen and pounds. there was news releases tonight, therefore i was simply watching the movements until after the announcement. here are my trade datas today.

Session: New York, London Crossver
Duration: 26 minutes.
Timeframe: 15M.
Technical: Moving Average, Fibonacci.
Fundamental: US Unemployment claims, Core Durable Goods Order m/m.
Strategy: Core Durable Goods better than forecast, lower than previous. Unemployment claims worst than forecasted, better than previous. Dollar rally a little upon release against Euro & Aussie. Bearish against JPY right after announcement. Long when candle closes above 100SMA & 38.2% fibo on Usd/Jpy & Doji star, take profit on 10SMA & 23.6% fibo which is the next line.

i thought i was gonna be in the eur/usd pair for tonight, which had a smooth downtrend. but my sell limit didnt hit, which in another words no nice price was set for me to enter for this pair.

i was shrugging upon the news data. no way i was gonna speculate a direction from such a conflicting data. anyway, no major knee-jerk reaction, except for the yen. therefore, i switch my attention to the yen and saw it landing on the brown 100 sma.



i entered after doji star formed. i have exactly 4 confirmation signals here. 100sma, 38.2% (drawn from 1H chart) fibo, bullish momentum from the stochastic oscillator and a doji star. the bear candle prior to the doji was the result of the news releases.



working its way up. take-profit on 10sma becuz i wasnt exactly comfortable putting it on the exact 23.6% fibo, partly due to previous noob trading mistake.



resistance served well at the next fibo level. price retraced after going beyond my t-p for 1 pip. this is juz the next candle. in a larger timeframe, price may still continue to go up. i take larger time frame as a reference, and try to trade within my own time frame.
+15

Black

Short Updates on Black Bottle's

it's pretty busy past few days, doing up some house chores over the weekend. because Lunar New Year is coming, and its time for spring cleaning. my lessons are starting this week, therefore i would have lesser time to trade, and lesser time to blog.. running from full time job and night classes.

im thankful that more and more readers who have came by, dropped comments, and share opinions. our daily trade journal might reduce from this point, but not completely M.I.A, i might post some other forex reviews or thoughts in words, maybe review on Millionaire Traders by Kathy Lien & Boris Schlossberg, which i juz finish reading.

Bottle has been focusing a lot on his trades these period of time, and working around clock before the Chinese new year. Forex is always in our mind. after this week, we will do up our month's review to keep it updated by end of the week.

Happy trading all the best to you and to us!

Black

22 Jan, Eur/Usd - Short & Sweet plus Noob Trading Mistake

Browsing my usual currency pairs and there are slight bear for the dollar today. No news release tonight. Here are my trade datas for tonight.

Session: New York, London Crossover.
Duration: 1 hour, 30 mins. (2 positions)
Timeframe: 15M.
Technical: Moving Average, Head & Shoulder, Fibonacci.
Fundamental: Nil.
Strategy: Candle closes below 20 SMA, second shoulder formed confirming bearish signal, price was well resisted at 23.6% (entry) and supported at 50.0%, exited in between at 38.2% fibo.



I took a second position after two more 15M candlestick closes confirm the resistance at 23.6% (average win position). 20 sma line has been working well for me this week. Head & Shoulder, second shoulder formed and price made a spike down after i came out of the bathroom. I was quite confident of the trade tonight due to the signals given, if price still went against me, i do understand that i have tried my best. Chart above is the nice chart. Describing my noob mistake in the second screen shot below.



My first position closed neatly at 38.2% fibonacci take-profit, with second average-in position still charging towards the next level. Check out the double zeros line at 1.4100 above. My second position t-p was exactly 1.4100. Price neatly hit 1.4100 and made a rebound back to 23.6% fibo. But, my t-p didnt hit. why? 2-pips spread difference in the price was not taken in consideration. in another words, my short position was actually at 1.4102 - when the price was showing 1.4100. that was due to the 2-pips spread for Eur/Usd (FXDD fixed spread on the pair). it wasnt the first time it happen to me, Bottle had experience on this incident. i wrote it down now becuz i dont want it to happen again to me or to you, and buy / sell price mistake actually costs me 13 pips :( maybe none of you had come across this noob mistake but it is something i think i have to take seriously.

+33 tonight.

Overall, i'm satisfied with the trades this week. Weekly profit hit. I hope next week don't end like the last. Happy trading, and enjoy the weekend everybody! :)

20 Jan, Aud/Usd - Swift Night

Its been a day of Dollar Rally, from 1H and 15M chart are all downtrend, forming a neat Perfect Order. Short after a few confirmation of the following:

Session: New York, London Crossover.
Duration: 1 hour.
Timeframe: 15M.
Technical: Hidden Bearish Divergence, Moving Averages.
Fundamental: Bullish USD news release on Building Permits & PPI m/m. USD rallying against major on Daily, except Yen.
Strategy: Candle closes below 20 SMA, hidden bearish divergence formed, bad forecasted PPI m/m, unchanged forecast on Building Permits, no violent reaction upon announcement. Downtrend.

Basically an extract from my personal trade journal. well, maybe only i myself can understand what im writing. Juz for reference sake anyway.



Some bull exhaustion on the above. Blue lines indicating divergence - Lower High, Higher High. Candles neatly closes below 20SMA line. Again, put my first position, in a bad position, entered the second position at a much nicer price, difference of about 8 pips.



my position were most of the time positive throughout the hour, so i thought to myself, why do i always let my losses run and for once, let my profit run please! i hang it there, for quite a bit. until i realise the bearish momentum has indeed dying off at previous support.



Indeed, the next two bull candle confirming my decision to close both my positions.. where stochastic is pointing up and candle closes after 20 sma.. as of now though. night ended with +22 pips.

Trading From Your Gut by Curtis Faith

Just ordered this hard-covered book online, after i saw it on local bookstore. it is way cheaper than the retail price even after member's discount. wonder wad was the membership for, if only i had found out the online site earlier.

There are always debates on whether trading is purely psychological or simply mechanical. the reason i picked up this book was becuz i felt myself leaning towards the psychologically side of trading more. and therefore, i wanna learn more. its not that i put aside technical trading completely, it is which one u rely on more when u hit the execute button. if im not wrong, this book was only published on December 2009.

Some of the much detailed reviews of the book i found are here. i will do my personal review after i got the book and finish reading it. another reason i have been picking up trading books was becuz, i still wan to keep myself occupied and learning when im not trading and learning in practical. i travel to work and back home two hours a day by MRT train. that makes about ten hours a week. and roughly forty hours a month. i could better use some of those times to read up instead of staring blank. forty hours a month.. almost two full days just to travel.. oh dear.

Black

Mid-Month Review

Approaching the mid-month of January. all started well last week where i focused and carefully executed each trade. mostly intra-day trading. i did not have any trade executed overnight or buy/sell-stop/limit that got executed while im in office.

i guess this week was pre-occupied and didnt had the focus like last week. i thought i could do anything. i knew from start of the week i didnt trade well even though i had profited on monday. i was also reading a blog by FXpropTrader, who was saying about trading with 'gut-feeling'. i trust that. but for me, i guess such gut feeling is not simply trading anytime of the day and any currency pair, i still need experiences from such 'gut-feeling'. i need to practice a lot from a particular currency pair, and say during New York session. i have to practice harder.

Basically i've given back almost all of my profit earned last week. my school lesson starts next week, which means i might be trading/blogging lesser for the time being. but my heart will still be here, im planning to buy another book on trading in the mean time after i finished with Kathy Lien's Day Trading & Swing Trading the Currency Market, its a good book. provides a lot of insights on trading, such as fundamental, technical, seasonality and etc. i will re-read when i have the time too.

till then,
Black

15 Jan Eur/Usd - Month's Profit Shattered

No good news this week. Scalping realli blew my day off. i dont exactly know what the hell i was doing. guess i shouldnt be trading after having such a long day, it leads to reckless on-going positions. gotta demo some of these styles before embarking LIVE.



Black

13 Jan - Tough Night! - Eur/Usd, Usd/Jpy

This is simply not my week. picked the wrong pair again. watching the eur/usd, but simply opening and closing at absolute wrong price. approaching second hour of new york session, price moves towards my target price to go long. price dips, and i went in. price dips further. throughout the day usd has been giving away, but approaching the third hour of new york session, it started to rally against euro and aussie. cable dips a little but not as hard, probably due to bullish NIESR GDP Estimate for pound announcement. a long bear candle kicked my ass. (-42)



i had in mind a price to short for Usd/Jpy off the trendline (blue) in a downtrend. hard time in the process. it seems like 70% of my open position life-time, im holding a floating loss. during the third hour where USD was rallying, surprisingly it was depreciating against the Yen.. technical comes into play? i was in two trades (second position was average loss). took small win from this pair. (+17)



i was at a point where i had two trades in each pair that were all floating loss and i was like pulling my hair most of the night. i focused.. yet this thing happen, perhaps at some point of time i wasn't really executing wad my mind told me to, but too much thoughts makes mi hesitate my decision.

-25 pips for the night.

Black

11 Jan - Fundamental vs Technical Analysis, Aud/Usd

Watching the Aud/Usd tonight. I have been sitting down for about 2 hours plus and waiting for the quiet market which was ranging between 0.9310 to 0.9320. Reason i picked this pair? With support of various fundamental news on Aussie's gain with China's export that boosts the commodity currency. On top of that, AUD Home Loans announcement tomorrow morning 8:30am singapore time, which was good forecasted. decide to put on a longer term trade. another part of me was wondering if i am silly to follow these such closely?

With longing the aud/usd in mind, i was waiting for a good price. but there was a conflict of idea between my technical & fundamental analysis. while targeting a good price to go long, i have also been watching and waiting if a candlestick could close below the red 50 SMA line, for me to seek a short. i have conflicting fundamental vs technical analysis in mind. usually if i encounter such case, i would simply sit by and watch, instead of picking a side.



Indeed, right after candle closes below 50sma there was such a long bearish candle stick. Unfortunately, you can see my miserable green dotted lines, my buy limit hit. I set by my rules of not averaging a loser smaller than 10 pips away. part of the reason i allow myself to average losers (maximum 3 open positions) is that i have stop entering a full position at one trade. usually i divide them into smaller size lot and enter at different position. my take-profit are usually scaled out at different target, but usually stop-loss at the same level. this flexible way of trading has ease me a lot of pain and big time losses.



Although 'momentum of price' is neither categorized in the Fundamental or Technical aspect, but i still find it very important. without considering the momentum of price going down, i set Buy Limit, entry hit on its way down. my ugly entry slightly above half of the bear candle is now hanging there by itself. u could see how many torturous 15M sticks beneath my entry before things started getting better, a little while.

There was a sudden dollar bear momentum in majors (i always watch Eur,Aud,Gbp/Usd & Usd/Jpy concurrently whilst trading a single pair, sometimes small movement are cor-related) and greenback in Gbp/Usd & Usd/Jpy pair were rallying smoothly for a little while. But the Eur & Aussie was just not moving its asses.

Closed the torturous position at +5 pips. As always, i still need to work on an exit strategy.

Black

8 Jan - Non-Farm Payroll

I wasn't planning to trade on the NFP on Friday night, becuz i had dinner with my family and expected myself to be home late, my weekly target of 50 pips has been achieved. but i came home an hour before the news release and went through some news data and several blogs. Seeni has posted NFP analysis on the news release, and i was happy to see his updates again.

According to the bearish news of NFP release, -85K and 10% unemployment rate, price indeed spiked up. between the 30 minutes, there was a 118 pips long candle. with this kind of news + reaction, was tempting to get in, and i did. i was long, but i never even took the meat of the candlestick. recalling my last month's NFP trading experience, this time i set my s/l & t-p ready before execution to prevent slippage when closing position. once again, a very wide candle, i only rode a minute with a +12 pips.



Black

7 Jan - Usd/Jpy, Yet Again

Long Usd/Jpy, as US Unemployment Claims bullish, and new Japan Finance Minister supports a 'weak yen'. Price probably will still maintain the uptrend. I entered way much after the data release, cuz price was reacting otherwise. waiting for them to settle. the problem with me as always, entering with the mindset of a longer-term trade, but exiting and adjustment in short-term mentality.

Take for example today's trade. i longed and expect to ride trend, but my first position exited pre-maturely, a few points away from my s/l, which basically didnt hit at all. -14 pips for that. i maintained my second position, which was an averaged in by ten points now hanging as in the picture above.

As for NFP tomorrow, i shd be taking a break but i will still be watching the price movement. NFP is like Mambo Night at Zouk to me, even if u dont drink u still want to be there lol. Adjusted my current second position s/l to +2 pips and letting it run for now.

Black

6 Jan - Phew Day Usd/Jpy

The two green dotted lines were basically my long entries and the top red dotted line was one of the take-profit and bottom one was both stop-loss. Once again i entered my first trade at a very bad price 92.41, it was juz moment before ADP Non-Farm Employment Change announcement and i longed the Usd/Jpy. Data was bearish than forecast. price went against USD as well as me. i did two average in more shots, before closing my first trade at -30pips.



i went in long 30 minutes later when 92.10 (50% fibo zone) served the support well. i also trusted the ISM Non-Manufacturing PMI announcement an hour later. not long, the US bulls gained momentum, i closed my 2nd and 3rd position (at +10 & +5 respectively) and trail with my last trade so that the stop-loss is at profit for a breakeven. Phew.

I let the last position on for the announcement but was once again backstabbed by the bearish data. i quickly closed the position at +26 pips before it went against the dollar. im not sure how is it going now, as i usually close the chart once im done for the day when its done, its done. trying not to overtrade, and go overtime. soccer players go exhausted playing into overtime. and when u reach the penalty shots, it is gambling. So i ended with +16 which could have been a night where my week's profit were ripped.

I was guilty to say that my 2nd and 3rd position i had actually pulled down my stop-loss, which saved the day. it felt like a gamble, it totally was, although i knew i would juz shift it down once. greens today is juz luck for me.

Black

5 Jan, Short & Quick - Aud/Usd & Eur/Usd

Long the Aud/Usd but price dips which shows the lack of discipline to wait for more momentum. The good thing about this trade was that i quickly cut the loss by closing at -11 pips, and did a short when price dips below the lime green 20SMA. Price continue to go down and escaped with +13 pips.



Concurrently, sold Eur/Usd below 23.6 fibo level prior to closing of 1H candle. Screenshot 15M juz for zooming in. Price dips after 1H candle closes below fibo, average in another trade. +18 pips on two trades.



US Home Sales data was terrible. The prices that dipped on the previous hours are now recovering quickly upon the announcement. My trades today are pretty simple and hasty. Just in, collect the profit and out, thankfully it went well.

Black

4 Jan - First Trade of the Year Aud/Usd

Very short trades today. i never really see a longer-term opportunity at that moment when i sat down after going thru some news and announcement that will be out that day, at least not to me. when i sat down was 9:30pm singapore time, which is about 8:30am into New York session. seems like most major im watching are forming a wide stretch of daily candlestick.

Based on momentum, i actually did a long on aud/usd, targeting small. it is forming a smooth uptrend. juz dat my target is pretty much close 0.9100 - double zeros, for the day. not much action when i enter, and slowly drag to US ISM Manufacturing announcement. Good forecasted, but based on my trading journal i kept, this announcement on December causes price to dip a little but does not bring much impact.

As i can't oppose my on-going trading pair, i shorted eur/usd prior to the announcement and bring in short scalps off the news. of course, aud/usd follows the dip, i average in my first trade. started scaling out the two trades and closed for the day. price is still spiking up in aud/usd. let's keep watching. sweet trades for first decade. (+21 pips)



Black

Transaction History December 2009 + First trade of 2010!

Hello everyone, the above show my November and December transaction history. The problem here is i couldnt get my December only history. I only see the last 3 months option. Lol so this is all i have. Before the green line is November's while after is December's.

Notice that the gradient of my December's trade is kinda straight yea... Most prob due to low confidence after the account shattering November. I went in and came out with little or no profit for alot of trades. Fearing that i might get bite again u know? That kinda feeling i guess all new guys have? Yup but fortunately the overall for the month is green. And thats gooooooood news.

Ok now for the first trade of the year 2010! Some information on the above scenario. Its USD/JPY pair in 4H timeframe. Its a short trade with the first circle as entry and second as my profit target.

Weapons used : Bollinger Band , Stochastic and candlestick patterns. ( + some Ema as well)

It all begins with the first green circle showing a Doji star lookalike candlestick. Its at the top of the Bollinger Band, looks like there is some indecisiveness here i suppose? The next bearish candlestick results in the Crossover of Stochastic in overbought zone. That looks very delicious...

Price was at around 92.93 when i am starting to make a decision. Should i go in now or should do it the more disciplined way? The more disciplined way will be at the near of Bollinger Band top where price will try to break up. Its at 93.16. Thats about 20pips away and the current market im watching that time is like u know... " Tug O War". No one is giving in, what if i go in late and miss the boat?? In the end, i manage to supress my inner devil (who has been asking to go in now lets not wait anymore!!) and set Sell Limit @ price 93.16. SL 40pips away and TP at 20EMA as support. Though i believe there is a chance that it might go all the way to Bollinger Band 30EMA. I chose 20EMA to play safe and not be greedy. Afterall its about 61pips if hit.

And there i thought it will be hard to hit my Sell Limit which is 20+ pips away, the next moment just after my lunch, im in a trade already. It went against me for a few pips and thereafter it proceeds towards my desire direction. The feeling is....... great

WHAT IF! I choose to go in earlier... i'll be having 20+ pips floating loss. It will affect me emotionally. I will tend to close at break even even though i analyse it correctly. I will have to go through the agony of floating loss unnecessary, no doubt it will affect my trading journey in the long run. Fortunately i chose the right path and end up having that extra 20pips that might just happen to be my floating loss if i went in earlier.

Still, there will be chances that i will miss the boat by doing the above... But i choose to take the trading system is set for myself seriously and follow it strictly. The system that i think can maximize my profit(more pips) and minimize my risk (further SL). I have much to learn.

First trade of the year = Profit = Good Sign!!! LOL!! Lets hope we can keep it this way.

Bottle

Dec 09 & 2010 Resolution

Happy new year to all readers. As u can see me and Bottle did not post much of our trades past two weeks. As for me, taking the two weeks break since christmas till now. will be coming back for the start of the year. anyway, im still red for my December 2009. My only improvement this time was the pips lost wasnt that much. Here is my graph for Dec 2009.



26 executed trades - 15 winning trades, 11 losing trades.
-8 pips. wads the problem here? my loser lot size are bigger, and more pips, money management.
best trade: 90pips usd/jpy on 15 Dec.
worst trade: big lot size loss -27 pips eur/usd on 12 Dec.

since my LIVE trading since August 2009, except for the first month, the rest are RED (losing) month.

Aug 09: +30 pips
Sep 09: -156 pips
Oct 09: -107 pips
Nov 09: -44 pips
Dec 09: -8 pips

in TOTAL: 100 profit trades, 69 loss trade for 2009.

The reason my august was green was becuz that last trade of that month, the revenge trading was a success. which is also a great reason why the months that follows after that are red. i had a trade that went below my initial capital, i took double lot size for revenge and took back my wins.

September was the worst month. 4 revenge trades that took a drawdown of -70% in total. balls bursting. October had a revenge trade that took -20% of equity that point of time. Although still red, there was not a single revenge trade on November and December anymore. heart-wrenching to dwell on those losses but trying my best not to do it again.

As I've told FX in his posts, my equity is kinda living on a thread. i may not be winning yet, but i do enjoy seeing lesser lost and learning from past mistakes. experiences is the best lesson, and is also the hardest. i luv to see myself doing more analysis before any trades, and there as each day past, i m finding out what kind of a trader i am. it is like a sculptor, as each day past his material and artpiece began unfolding as i see myself, although not yet a complete form at the point of writing.

I read a book by Malcolm Gladwell - Blink. As he has pointed out that, a person might not noe about wad he actually noe, it lives in our subsconscious. my explanation suck here, but let me give u an example. consciously, i think that due to full time work and other commitments at hand, i thought i might be better off a day trader and becuz i cant bring trades to slp. but subsconsciouly, i maybe a better swing trader, probably becuz thats wad ive been doing 90% of my demo trading and for that, it is also a cause that my analysis and trading plan are longer-term than intra-day.

basically, what he meant is that a lot of ppl who noes and does a particular thing, he does not noe the actual explanation to another party (previous paragraph might be a good example). he trade successfully and he does 80% of winning trades, he juz noe it in him but he doesnt noe how to bring out in words, how to express wad makes him so successful, or worst, he thinks that it is something else that made him so successful.

Anyway, coming back, realistically, i might not be able to bank in some profits (if there is) in upcoming months. but i hope to see myself having TIGHTER DISCIPLINE, showing u guys profits at month end in terms of pips and monetary, and a much sharpened trader.

I wish all of u success in 2010! new decade, new year, new start! Happy trading!

Black
Peace.. No revenge..