September 30, 2009

Forex Tips

Forex is nothing new, but a lot of traditional stock market traders are starting to move over to it daily. And there's a lot of new investors making it their first venture in the world of trading. Here are 6 tips to help you complete profitable trades.

One: Knowing is half the battle

To borrow a line, success with Forex is about knowledge. If you just jump in an trade without knowing anything, like following a system blindly, you'll be losing money soon enough.

Two: Tightness

When you're trading, don't try to thread the needle. What I mean by this is that if you try to make trades with very minimal profit, thinking your risk is being lowered, you're setting yourself up for potential disaster.

Three: Pairs are where it's at

One mistake a lot of newer traders make is trading currencies straight, which is wrong. You want to trade pairs. You need to know how both sides function.

Four: Strategy

This really teams up with my first point. You need some sort of trading strategy. The last thing you want to do is trade all over the place without any "order" to it.

Five: Keep Emotions in Check

This goes for all trading, Forex or otherwise. Do not, under any circumstances, make emotional trades. I don't care if you doubled your money today or lose half of it. Each trade must be mechanical in nature. Trade like a surgeon. Through mechanical trading, you'll have a much better chance at success.

There are other trading tips out there that will help you. Obviously, some Forex trading tips are poor. The key to remember is that this market is like any market. Before you trade $1 of your own money, you need to understand the basics of the market and trading in general.
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September 10, 2009

Central banks

National central banks play an important role in the foreign exchange markets. They try to control the money supply, inflation, and/or interest rates and often have official or unofficial target rates for their currencies. They can use their often substantial foreign exchange reserves to stabilize the market. Milton Friedman argued that the best stabilization strategy would be for central banks to buy when the exchange rate is too low, and to sell when the rate is too high—that is, to trade for a profit based on their more precise information. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of central bank "stabilizing speculation" is doubtful because central banks do not go bankrupt if they make large losses, like other traders would, and there is no convincing evidence that they do make a profit trading.

The mere expectation or rumor of central bank intervention might be enough to stabilize a currency, but aggressive intervention might be used several times each year in countries with a dirty float currency regime. Central banks do not always achieve their objectives. The combined resources of the market can easily overwhelm any central bank.Several scenarios of this nature were seen in the 1992–93 ERM collapse, and in more recent times in Southeast Asia.

August 28, 2009

Market Psychology

Market psychology and trader perceptions influence the foreign exchange market in a variety of ways:Flights to qualityUnsettling international events can lead to a "flight to quality," with investors seeking a "safe haven". There will be a greater demand, thus a higher price, for currencies perceived as stronger over their relatively weaker counterparts. The Swiss franc has been a traditional safe haven during times of political or economic uncertainty.[11]Long-term trendsCurrency markets often move in visible long-term trends. Although currencies do not have an annual growing season like physical commodities, business cycles do make themselves felt. Cycle analysis looks at longer-term price trends that may rise from economic or political trends. [12]"Buy the rumor, sell the fact"This market truism can apply to many currency situations. It is the tendency for the price of a currency to reflect the impact of a particular action before it occurs and, when the anticipated event comes to pass, react in exactly the opposite direction. This may also be referred to as a market being "oversold" or "overbought".[13] To buy the rumor or sell the fact can also be an example of the cognitive bias known as anchoring, when investors focus too much on the relevance of outside events to currency prices.Economic numbersWhile economic numbers can certainly reflect economic policy, some reports and numbers take on a talisman-like effect: the number itself becomes important to market psychology and may have an immediate impact on short-term market moves. "What to watch" can change over time. In recent years, for example, money supply, employment, trade balance figures and inflation numbers have all taken turns in the spotlight.Technical trading considerationsAs in other markets, the accumulated price movements in a currency pair such as EUR/USD can form apparent patterns that traders may attempt to use. Many traders study price charts in order to identify such patterns