3 Secrets For Profitable Forex Trading
There is a definite step-by-step process to becoming a successful Forex trader. This process does take some time, which accounts for many people not becoming successful on their first try. But those that take the journey and make it to consistent profits learn a lot along the way. Here are three things I feel are essential for becoming a Forex trading success story.
There are a lot of distinct ways to trade Forex, from scalping the lower time frames to trading on the daily and weekly time frames. But in my experience, it is the traders that have the persistence and stamina to trade the higher time frames that do the best. Higher time frames are more reliable, take less time to trade and are a lot less stressful than the lower time frames.
When I started, I was drawn to the lower time frames. I thought I could learn quicker and make more money in a shorter period of time. I thought I could keep my stop losses super tight and use higher lot sizes to rake in massive money in minutes. The opposite was true. However, when I switched to higher time frames, success started happening more regularly. So, the first secret is to start trading on time frames from 1 hour to daily. (My favorite is the 4 hour time frame).
New traders want to make more money on each trade by using big lot sizes. A lot of times this means using too tight of a stop loss instead of the proper stop loss based on price action. As a result, they get stopped out a lot and lower their winning percentage.
A better way to trade is to manage your risk with your lot size. Place your stop where the market tells you, and then adjust your lot size to manage risk. This way, you can determine a specific percentage of your account to risk on each trade, which will be the same regardless of whether your stop loss is 20 pips or 200 pips. So, the next secret is to use your lot size to manage your risk.
Forex trading is not gambling. And you can see by the first two recommendations, successful traders move away from the fast time frames with unrealistically short stops “hoping” the trade goes in their favor and makes them a ton a money. More often than not, this approach leads to losing a lot of money, and then any win you have only gets some of the loses back or to break even.
A better way is to have patience and treat your trading like a business. In the long run, creating a trading plan for slow, steady profits and developing the trading skills to trading the plan consistently is what creates a successful trader. Forex trading should be treated like a serious business, because when you do you can make serious money.
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January 11, 2011 | Posted by Edward Lomax
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