Reduce size of stop

[TheBramble]

e.g., you are ong on the FTSE April at 4010 and want to place a stop at 4000, but the SB firm won't accept it this close. So you place an order to go short on the FTSE May at 4000. Admittedly, this leaves the problem of how to stop the May short, but you should be left at least market-neutral.

Not exactly market-neutral when you take the spreads into account. And the MAY Short (to use your example) would place him in exactly the same position as the original position he'd taken - they'd also want a stop too far away to make R:R sense.

Sorry to be unhelpful, but even with a trading pot 1000 times larger, your problem would be the same. I assume you're going for 'guaranteed' ( ) stops and the SB firms are no fools.

(a) As suggested above - set a mental stop and commit the time to the trade OR

(b) Move away from 'guaranteed' stops - they're not as guaranteed as you'd expect

 

[damianoakley]

Andyone:

In my opinion, your method of placing a stop near to an area of support or resistance is a sound one. In fact it's the method I use myself.

 

[TheBramble]

Very much in agreement. But not of much use if his SB wont let him play that close.

 

[gmca686]

Andyone,
Deal4Free get a bad press, but look at them. If you are playing small I do not see the need to transfer to a futures broker. With D4F you can set much tighter stops, 7 or 11 pips I can't remember, and you can easily move it up when your in profit. The idea that D4F can quote their own FX prices away from the "true" FX to suit their purposes is daft. The "professional" traders would kill them. I have sat looking at live D4F FX and the London stock exchange FX feed (Proquote) to try and spot the difference, and there isn't one! Maybe 1,2 pips in fast moving markets.
regards,
G.McA