Intraday Live short term trading calls from an Expert Retail Forex Trader

[Forexmospherian]

I use stops of an equivalent size and typically take a fraction of my risk as profit per trade. I have been doing so for some years making reasonable profits on my capital employed. The risk reward ratio myth need to be debunked once and for all. Nothing matters but profit however it is managed.

Hi Pieter

I would agree with you that profit is our main goal - ie we need to make a return on our capital that we find satisfactory and can also cover our labour costs of actually doing the work making the profit.

I think most retail traders would be very happy if they had say a $250K Capital account and made say 40 -50% per annum from it. The profit would easily cover their labour rate unless they were earning over say $100 per hour from alternative work

However the majority of retailers start off with under $5 or $10k and then look at making similar returns per annum on that capital. So on a $10k account making $5k would be looked upon as a good return - and they would be happy - however should they be ??

If they spend say 7 -10 hrs a week checking charts and studying etc - then the return works out at say over a 48 week year at say $11 - $13 per hr - so paying like a part time job - whilst risking your cash - is that good ??

Now if they spend say 15 -20 hrs a week - then really - they could be better off by sticking the money in the Building society - low returns but no risk and getting a part time job.

For me its all down to "efficiency" and therefore RR's are an important component.

For example a trade with a 50 pip stop and a 150 pip target - ie RR of approx 3 will take 1 - 2 days or even more on average. I can get a RR of 3 normally under 30 mins - so allowing me to be more efficient in growing my capital and therefore achieving 30 -50% returns a month on retail size accounts - rather than only achieving the same over 10 months or a year.

Surely that make sense - you would prefer to earn say $1000 per day then say $300 per day ?

Swing trading over a few days or weeks and similar proper investment trading is simply not efficient for a full time trader - unless he or she is lucky enough to have a large multi $100k or million plus capital account.

Taking a $10 k account up to say $1 million over 2 -5 years by compounding is simply not possible for 90% of experienced retail traders using their own money - even if they have a brilliant method or strategy - as some point between say 15 and 25 lots they will hit a "financial wall" and have problems with coping with large $5k plus losses.

This normally psyches traders out ( it did me and I have not revisited it - although if I had been 20 yrs younger - I would have done ;-) )

Hope this explains why RR's and efficiency are important for making money

Have a good week

Regards

F

 

[Forexmospherian]

Thanks for the update Pete. As you know, you can't start a thread/blog like this without experiencing two basic reactions .... 1/ negativity/envy 2/ interest/curiosity/desire to learn - you have seen off most of the envious although be sure that they are waiting on the sidelines looking for an opportunity to attack - although God knows why they can't just leave people in peace.
For my part I've always been open-minded and I'd rather believe until given reason not to do so than oppose from the beginning. When medieval mariners set sail to explore new lands can you imagine the naysayers lined up on the dock shouting insults at them as they set sail - and it wasn't even their lives at risk. I very much appreciate your reading of the market. This coming week I'd like to short term trade the 3 minute TF on the GU and the AU so looking forward to the continual updates. I would choose the EU over the GU but it seems to be (more) heavily manipulated - what do you think?

Hi Steve

Yes the EU is the currency pair traded the most - and so should be the most liquid but also can be the pair that is say "played" with the most.

I spent approx 3 years taking thousands of intraday trades 90% of the time just on the EU. I was at that time only after a daily target of 25 pips - but I realised I missed out so much by staying with it rather than covering other pairs more.

In normal trading hours the EU might give you a scalp trade worth say 14 -30 pips, meanwhile the GU might cover 20 -40 pips and the EJ 25 -50 pips - so worth the extra spread

I will make sure i cover the GU and AU this week more and try and give some regular updates

Have a good week

Regards

F

 

[Forexmospherian]

It is proven that our willpower and concentration are correlated to our blood-sugar levels - make sure to eat high quality carbohydrate every hour. Its not for nothing that tennis players scoff bananas down every 2 games or so.

Its normally bacon sarnies and cups of tea for me - much to my wife's disgust

 

[Forexmospherian]

What should he do to achieve this do you think, huff and puff or wish really hard? If it were as easy as simply telling someone to try, you may as well suggest he try to get his win rate to 100%. Putting aside that rather vacuous advice, without a firm grasp of how much he is winning on his winning trades and losing on his losing trades a win rate is just a number and not an indication of financial health in your trading.

My initial surprise yesterday at the high quality of content on this site has been adjusted down somewhat today with a wider cast of the net. Perhpas a symptom of catching the 'weekend traders' inputs.

Hi Pieter

Well if you have a look at Major Magnums results of the last month or so you will see he has been up to win ratio of over 85% on some lots of 30 trades - and then other days as low as only 50% - ie commercial level - which for me is then poor,

I have taken nearly 14k live trades over approx 8 yrs ( 11 yrs since I started and 6 yrs full time) and over the last approx 9000 trades have had win ratios as low as 62% and as high as 87% on on batches of 100 trades.

If you are referring to this thread with regards to the quality - I am sorry you feel that way.

I am a very successful intraday retail trader and if you would like to join in for a few hours any day this week - I will gladly prove it to you.

If you don't think intraday short term trading can be profitable - that is no problem as many other feel the same. However after spending well over 10k hrs watching live hrs - I can trade at the "coalface" - ie in the noise - and make a good return

I am sure there are a few thousand other traders like me - but there will not be many who don't have at least 5 yrs plus of experience behind them

All the best

Regards

F

 

[Forexmospherian]

Excuse me asking PieterSteidelmeyer- from the Ukraine - are you actually some one else ??

First thoughts from your comments and assertive style might point to another member previously called Random 12345.

I enjoyed many a comment with Random - and will miss him as he certainly knew a lot about the commercial trading world - but basically foot all about retail forex trading

If you are not Random or any other member already on the site - I would welcome a constructive debate on ways of trading along with hearing a bit more about you and how you have been so fortunate to speak and type such eloquent English - especially coming from the Ukraine

Have a great week - i will

Regards

F

 

[PieterSteidelmayer]

I've read a few of your posts on what you term a scalp trade and the boilerplate bio you seem to feel you need to inject every dozen posts or so. It wouldn't be fair to comment on your psychological issues on such a scant profiling, but from the few trading calls you have made which have been unambiguous, based upon the data I was able to access, they do not stand too close a scrutiny.

We have a couple of sayings here that sum you and this thread up rather well; roughly translated to "A crow will never be a falcon" and "An obliging fool is worse than an enemy".

 

[Forexmospherian]

I've read a few of your posts on what you term a scalp trade and the boilerplate bio you seem to feel you need to inject every dozen posts or so. It wouldn't be fair to comment on your psychological issues on such a scant profiling, but from the few trading calls you have made which have been unambiguous, based upon the data I was able to access, they do not stand too close a scrutiny.

We have a couple of sayings here that sum you and this thread up rather well; roughly translated to "A crow will never be a falcon" and "An obliging fool is worse than an enemy".

You sound very much like the old Random - but with a new slant

Maybe you will join in live this week and then we can make some calls together - that is if you do intraday trade forex ?

 

[Forexmospherian]

Hi Pieter

I would agree with you that profit is our main goal - ie we need to make a return on our capital that we find satisfactory and can also cover our labour costs of actually doing the work making the profit.

I think most retail traders would be very happy if they had say a $250K Capital account and made say 40 -50% per annum from it. The profit would easily cover their labour rate unless they were earning over say $100 per hour from alternative work

However the majority of retailers start off with under $5 or $10k and then look at making similar returns per annum on that capital. So on a $10k account making $5k would be looked upon as a good return - and they would be happy - however should they be ??

If they spend say 7 -10 hrs a week checking charts and studying etc - then the return works out at say over a 48 week year at say $11 - $13 per hr - so paying like a part time job - whilst risking your cash - is that good ??

Now if they spend say 15 -20 hrs a week - then really - they could be better off by sticking the money in the Building society - low returns but no risk and getting a part time job.

For me its all down to "efficiency" and therefore RR's are an important component.

For example a trade with a 50 pip stop and a 150 pip target - ie RR of approx 3 will take 1 - 2 days or even more on average. I can get a RR of 3 normally under 30 mins - so allowing me to be more efficient in growing my capital and therefore achieving 30 -50% returns a month on retail size accounts - rather than only achieving the same over 10 months or a year.

Surely that make sense - you would prefer to earn say $1000 per day then say $300 per day ?

Swing trading over a few days or weeks and similar proper investment trading is simply not efficient for a full time trader - unless he or she is lucky enough to have a large multi $100k or million plus capital account.

Taking a $10 k account up to say $1 million over 2 -5 years by compounding is simply not possible for 90% of experienced retail traders using their own money - even if they have a brilliant method or strategy - as some point between say 15 and 25 lots they will hit a "financial wall" and have problems with coping with large $5k plus losses.

This normally psyches traders out ( it did me and I have not revisited it - although if I had been 20 yrs younger - I would have done ;-) )

Hope this explains why RR's and efficiency are important for making money

Have a good week

Regards

F

How about answering this one Pieter ?

 

[PieterSteidelmayer]

hearing a bit more about you and how you have been so fortunate to speak and type such eloquent English - especially coming from the Ukraine

I am in the Ukraine, not from the Ukraine. I am originally from Germany. As for my English,we have schools and we tend to go to them and study the material until we achieve an acceptable level. We also have an educational oversee who is not doing battle with its own government and is able to assist both student and tutor in achieving those acceptable levels rather than wasting its energies with political squabbling.

If I have ruffled your feathers than that is only because you probably realise at least one person is on to you. I suspect I am not the only one to have spotted your game.

 

[PieterSteidelmayer]

You sound very much like the old Random - but with a new slant

Maybe you will join in live this week and then we can make some calls together - that is if you do intraday trade forex ?

I trade many sectors and I made a prognosis on usd/cad earlier today but the post does not appear to have been made available - pending moderator review.

 

[PieterSteidelmayer]

How about answering this one Pieter ?

Answering what precisely? You've made a number of assumptions and constructed a few hypothetical scenarios. You like the sound of your own voice, but it has nothing to say. But I am sensitive enough to realise this isn't what you want on a thread which is little more than an attempt to paint a picture of who you would like to be so I'll leave you to it. Good luck with the abstraction, you need a little more contrast here and there to make it believable. Primary colors are so 70s.

 

[SteveJM]

What should he do to achieve this do you think, huff and puff or wish really hard? If it were as easy as simply telling someone to try, you may as well suggest he try to get his win rate to 100%. Putting aside that rather vacuous advice, without a firm grasp of how much he is winning on his winning trades and losing on his losing trades a win rate is just a number and not an indication of financial health in your trading.

My initial surprise yesterday at the high quality of content on this site has been adjusted down somewhat today with a wider cast of the net. Perhaps a symptom of catching the 'weekend traders' inputs.

Why so cynical? You don't know me, yet I'm a weekend trader according to you. You say you're making a good living. Great! If you would have followed this thread over the course of several hundred pages as I have you would have noticed that MM .... oh wait a second, why bother explaining anything, its obvious you came on here for some cheap entertainment and to have a snipe. Just p*ss off and leave us in peace. As far as money management goes I'm very well aware that it's an amalgam of different factors, not just win percentage - but thanks for your wonderful insight - perhaps you'd care to start a new thread on money management for all the weekend traders?

 

[SteveJM]

Its normally bacon sarnies and cups of tea for me - much to my wife's disgust

It doesn't really matter regards trading performance as long as your blood sugar levels are up (but it matters regards your overall long term health) - there have been some interesting studies done that show low blood sugar levels affect your concentration and will power. You might think "why would falling will power affect a trader's performance? " But we need will power to stick to our trading plan and not be tempted into bad entries etc.

@Pieter - you need something for additional brain power as you fail to comprehend even the easiest of concepts .. ergo, I never said that eating bananas or carbs will make you a good trader, only that it will help to stop whatever performance level one has from falling away from optimum levels.

 

[Forexmospherian]

Monday - 3rd February 2014 - pre European Open

Morning Traders

Quick review and update on some key FX pairs I will be hopefully trading today

EU - After falling to the 3480 support area - the EU as bounced and is currently in a scalp buy mode from 3487 and needing above 3496 and 3500 to hold on for a larger pullback

Swissy - peaked at 9082 early on this morning and as pulled back and currently in a scalp sell under 9063

More to follow - before the hr

Have a good day

 

[Forexmospherian]

GU - fell to a support area at 6420 ish. needs really above 32 and 35 to be taking new scalp buys or holding them for higher. Under 6417 and 14 hold any scalp sells for the big round number or look at taking new sells

EJ - support areas around 137.60 /65. Needs below 56 and 51 to take more scalp sells and under 95 still in a scalp sell mode

AU - near the 8740 support area can only really look at holding scalp buys and 48 and 53 and under 36 and 30 more selling for lower

 

[Swedenfx]

Questions

Hi Forexmospherian.
I closely follow your great thread and I hope you can help me with some additional questions so I understand your successfull approach.

The time window you often talk about is from 51 to 09 and 21 to 39. So each window is 18 minutes.

1. So if you get an buy scalp alert from your LR let's say 1245 you will NOT take the trade, but if you get an alert 1251 you will take the trade? It's that correct?

2. Do you initiate a trade outside the time window at all? If yes, under which circumstances.

3. If you have a trade that you initiated fex 12.34 I assume you would not end it at 1239 if its looking promising just because the time window ends.but use other criterias to exit (failed to make an higher high etc). Is that right?

4. Sometimes you write that you just use exact hours (fex 1300) to decide what to do next since there are often manipulation from the MM etc around 00. So if you take a trade 1251 you close it before exact hour or do you only start new trades between1301 to 1309?


Thanks for sharing your ideas and trading methods.

Best regards,
Swedenfx

 

[Forexmospherian]

Hi Forexmospherian.
I closely follow your great thread and I hope you can help me with some additional questions so I understand your successfull approach.

The time window you often talk about is from 51 to 09 and 21 to 39. So each window is 18 minutes.

1. So if you get an buy scalp alert from your LR let's say 1245 you will NOT take the trade, but if you get an alert 1251 you will take the trade? It's that correct?

2. Do you initiate a trade outside the time window at all? If yes, under which circumstances.

3. If you have a trade that you initiated fex 12.34 I assume you would not end it at 1239 if its looking promising just because the time window ends.but use other criterias to exit (failed to make an higher high etc). Is that right?

4. Sometimes you write that you just use exact hours (fex 1300) to decide what to do next since there are often manipulation from the MM etc around 00. So if you take a trade 1251 you close it before exact hour or do you only start new trades between1301 to 1309?


Thanks for sharing your ideas and trading methods.

Best regards,
Swedenfx

Morning Sweden FX

1. Yes normally I like to take all new scalps- and even exit profitable ones in those 18 min time windows. The windows would account for over 85% of my trade entries and exits - but there will always be times changes - highs and lows can happen around the 44-45 mins and of course the 15 /16 mins past in certain sessions - but probability wise - its normally going to happen in those 2 windows,

2. Only occasionally and then it will be around 44-46 mins past hr or 14 -16 mins past - but those times account for less than 10% of trade entries or exits

3. Correct again if I started a new trade at 12.31 or 34 - I would normally hope it would carry on past 39 and not finish to 51 or even the hr. Similar say at 12.01 or 12.04 - I would hope it would carry on past 09.

Sometimes if a interim high or low happens at the start of a time window - ie 21 mins past or 51 min to - a scalp may then finish before the end of that 18 mins

Most of my scalps are 3- 15 mins max - and anything over 30 mins would only be in a 30% free trade mode

Hope that helps and all questions - no problems as happy to share with like minded intraday traders - who want a method that works

Have a good day

Regards

F

 

[Forexmospherian]

AU as been the best scalp for me above 48 and 53 and now hit 62. Either take profit or lock in some profit - Rs; within next 5 pips - although above 53 still scalp bullish

Got to do a school run in 30 mins - back then next hr

 

[Forexmospherian]

GU - breached below interim supports and as already mentioned 45 mins ago under 17 and 14 are scalp sells for the big round number or below

Off out now so leaving 30% on GU scalp sell - but with a tight stop in profit at 13

GL

 

[Forexmospherian]

8 45 am and back now

Moved my GU 30% stop down to 6397 - and its now in a scalp buy mode above 82 - will it take my scalp sell stop out - don't know yet - with 6 mins to new hr time window