Know What is Stop Hunting

By Hass67

The intra day forex market is full of noise that it becomes difficult for new traders to understand where to put the stop loss. There is so much noise in the forex markets in the short run that prices tend to jump 10-20 pips for no apparent reason.

This becomes frustrating for many new day traders. Most constantly find their stop losses being tripped due to noise even when the rates are going in the anticipated direction.

Most of the new day traders use a static 10-20 pip stop loss. This is an arbitrary choice many traders make. How about using a trailing stop? If you place the trailing stop loss too close; you will find your stop hit too early. And if you place it too far; you will have to forgo potential profits if the price retraces later on.

You should place your stop loss on dynamic levels. Most of the professional traders do use stop loss but mostly place it on their computers making them invisible to their brokers.

Stop hunting is something the brokers are continuously doing. If a broker finds many stop losses at a particular price level on his price feed; he can easily trip them using a momentary blip in the price. You cant even complain. The momentary spike happened due to a sudden large transaction in the market.

More often than not, professional traders, trade with a stop loss at all, only keeping a mental stop loss. But you will need a lot of experience to trade this way.

Dynamic stop losses can be easily placed using Moving Averages, Bollinger Bands, SARs etc. Using a dynamic stop loss is a good way to manage your risk while letting the currency markets do what it wants.

The more experience you will develop as a forex trader the more you are going to understand that placing fixed stop losses actually hurts more. Using fixed stop losses can hurt you more emotionally, psychologically and profit wise than help you.

You should not try to trade before or after a major economic news release. You should not try to place stop loss close to or at round numbers. And you should also not try to trade in times of thin liquidity in the currency markets.

Stop hunting is something that you should know. Many forex brokers pry on new traders and keep on tripping their stop losses terming it market noise. - 23199

About the Author:

Mr. Ahmad Hassam is a Harvard University Graduate. He is interested in investing; options and forex trading. Discover a revolutionary new broker buster Forex Robot. Learn Forex Trading!

Trade Away to Prepare for the Rainy Day

By Rick Amorey

It is so difficult to think of the future, especially when you are bothered by the spending of the past. Why think of putting more money into your savings when you are still beset by your student loan? How can you think of your retirement years if you have to worry about current mortgages?

The recession is in full swing this year, and this looming financial problem will make you think twice before investing for your future. What if the total amount you have from ten years of storing extra income devalues by more than 50% before month's end? Sadly, this is a very likely scenario these days.

It is thus very tempting to live for the moment, rather than think ahead and invest. It's easier to think of this month's bills, or even this year's financial situation, instead of worry about what may happen in the years or even decades to come. I don't blame them for thinking this way, but I also think that this is not the most responsible way of thinking.

One of the unfortunate truths of the human condition is the fact that we all get old eventually. And when your body has wrinkled and your vision weaker than it used to be, you just wouldn?t be able to work as efficiently as you did in your younger years. By then, the best course of action would be to rely on your investments.

Obviously, you can't do that if all your money is stored in simple savings accounts with negligible interest rates. So think of investing as saving up for that rainy day; it may seem like it's so far away, but that doesn't mean that it does not matter at present. Save up, invest, and make wise decisions. Who knows? If you do it well, then you may have the capacity to retire earlier than expected. - 23199

About the Author:

The trading business carries no guarantee that you'll profit, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Rick Amorey instead suggests the comprehensive program of Emini Trading. Build up your portfolio with the help of Emini Trading System, and watch your money grow like a carefully monitored seedling.

The Essentials of technical Analysis: Part II

By Jack Haddad

Charting:

The time frame used for forming a chart depends on the compression of the data: intraday, daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annual data. Traders usually concentrate on charts made up of daily and intraday data to forecast shorterm price movements.

The shorter the time frame and the less compressed data is, the more detail that is available. While long on detail, short term charts can be volatile and contain a lot of noise. Large sudden price movements, wide high-low ranges and price gaps can effect volatility, which can distort the overall picture. Long term charts care good for analyzing the large picture to get a broad perspective of the historical price action. Once the general picture is analyzed, a daily chart can be used to zoom in on the last few months. Four of the most popular methods of displaying price data are by the following charts: line bar, candlestick, and point & figure. The line chart is one of the simplest charts. It is formed by plotting one price point, usually the close. For that matter, I don't favor them because I personally consider the open, low, and high to be as important as the close in technical analysis. However, at times, only closing data are available for certain indices, thinly traded stocks and intraday prices. Bar charts are perhaps the most popular charting method. The high, low, and close are required to form the price plot for each period of a bar chart. The high and low are represented by the top and bottom of the vertical bar and the close is the short horizontal line crossing the vertical bar. On a daily chart, each bar represents the high, low, and close for a particular day. Weekly charts would have a bar for each week based on Friday's close and the high and low for that week. Bar charts can be effective for displaying a large amount of data.

Using candlesticks, 200 data points can take up a lot of room and look cluttered. Line charts show less clutter, but do not offer as much detail (no high-low range). The individual bars that make up the bar chart are relatively skinny, which allows users the ability to fit more bars before the chart gets cluttered. If you're not interested in the opening price, bar charts are an ideal method for analyzing the close relative to the high and low. In addition, bar charts that include the open will tend to get cluttered quicker. If you're interested in the opening price, candlestick charts probably offer a better alternative. The beauty of Point & Figure charts is their simplicity. Little or no price movement is deemed irrelevant and therefore not duplicated on the chart. Only price movements that exceed specified levels are recorded. This focus on price movement makes it easier to identify support and resistance levels, bullish breakouts and bearish breakdowns. Contrary to this methodology, Point & Figure charts are based solely on price movement and do not take time into consideration. The topic on candlestick charting is broad and beyond the scope of this article. This method of charting originated in Japan over 300 years ago, and have become quite popular in recent years. For a candlestick chart, the open, high, low, and close are all required. A daily candlestick is based on the open price, the intraday high and low, and the close. A weekly candlestick is based on Monday's open, the weekly high-low range, and Friday's close.

Trendlines:

Trendlines are an important tool in technical analysis for both trend identification and confirmation. The general rule in technical analysis is that it takes two points to draw a trendline and the third point confirms the validity. An up trendline is formed by connecting two of more low points. The second low must be higher than the first for the line to have a positive slope.

Up trendlines act as support and indicate that net-demand (demand less supply) is increasing even as the price rises. A downtrend is formed by connecting two or more high points. The second high must be lower than the first for the line to have a negative slope. Down trendlines act as a resistance and indicate that net-supply is increasing even as the price declines. - 23199

About the Author:

Dr. Jack Haddad, MD, MBA has been professionally trading the stock market since 1997 and had an annualized return of 39.4%. Dr. Haddad has recently launched MD Capital Management, an Investment Fund with Charles Schwab. The fund utilizes option hedging techniques to generate returns while minimizing risks. For more info, visit Jack's online group: MD Capital Management.

5 Easy Steps To Loan Pre-qualification And Pre-approval

By Alexandria P. Anderson

One of the most important steps to home buying involves getting the right loan amount for your ideal property. There are several ways you can get prequalified to purchase a home and preapproved for a home loan, and it's generally a good idea to check your credit report before approaching this step. A prospective lender will be reviewing your credit report and other financial details in great detail as you set the prequalification or preapproval process in motion, and you can obtain a free credit report from any of the three major credit bureaus to check it for errors.

If you do find errors in your credit report, make attempts to have them cleared up as soon as possible and keep written records of all communications with the creditors or the credit bureaus themselves. After that, you're ready to approach the financial side of home buying; here are a few ideas for getting prequalified or preapproved for your first home:

1. Go online to review different mortgage programs. Websites such as LendingTree.com and Bankrate.com offer a number of loan packages and will also list the latest interest rates. Take the time to review several options and submit your personal information for preliminary review. You can expect to be contacted within a few days from a loan representative who can then guide you through the rest of the process.

2. Consult the right authority in your area bank. One of the most practical ways to follow when securing a prequalification letter or preapproval status is to seek the help of your bank's mortgage loan officer. As the author of the book "100 Questions Every First Time Home Buyer Should Ask", Ilyce Glink mentions, this process may be quite time-consuming compared to online processing. Nevertheless, this is more preferred by most people and they would opt to get started with the bank personnel's assistance. But either way, the same kind of service is delivered.

3. Transact using the telephone. Related prequalification services are also provided over the telephone by some lending companies, and you don't have to visit a bank or browse the Internet to begin. Secure the number through a bank or financial institution and from there, you may start sending yout personal details over the telephone.

4. Engage the service of a national lender. These lending companies may provide you a wider array of options than that of a bank or online processes; examples of national lending institutions are Countryside Home Loans and Bank of America. Know more about the current rates in their website and get your home loan pre-qualified after sending your personal information.

5. Use an aggregator website. This is helpful especially when you need a website that has rates and services from different lending institutions yet requires you to send your info only once, or if you experience difficulty choosing between banks and financial institutions. You have the freedom to select from a number of packages once you have sent in your personal details.

Getting prequalified and preapproved for a home loan is the first important step in home buying. Use any of the above resources to get the process started and get the best rates for your future mortgage. - 23199

About the Author:

About the Author: Alexandria P. Anderson is a Twin Cities real estate agent that helps people to find and purchase homes in the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota.

The Benefits of Online Gold Trading

By Alex Miller

Although the stock market is the best-known way of making money by trading, there are also several other trading options that you have at your disposal. Something that you should consider at some point is the possibility of trading gold for profit. This can help you to strengthen your existing portfolio and to pick it up in a market that has gone quite mad.

The simple fact is, gold has been used as a currency for thousands of years and even in recent years, it is one of the most stable parts of the world economy. Whenever one currency tends to go up and down, gold seems to stabilize in many cases. The only thing that you need in order to get started is a way to trade actively.

In order for you to get involved in trading gold you are going to need to go through a qualified broker. To put it quite simply, it is impossible for you to trade without doing this. Instead of calling a broker on the telephone, you can sign up for an online account and take care of all of your trading over the Internet.

Believe it or not, one of the most convenient ways for you to sign up for an online platform is to incorporate it in with your Forex platform. Having access to trading gold online in this way helps you to be active whenever you are inside of your account on the Internet. If the market happens to be active at the time you are trading, you will have the possibility to buy and sell gold.

One interesting way that you might want to think about trading in gold is by doing some options trading. By trading gold in this way, you're really only speculating on the possibility of placing the trade whenever the option runs out. You post a security that will not only cover the cost of the trade if it happens to go through, it will have some overage included with it. If you decide that the trade is not to your benefit, you simply cancel it and you only lose the additional security.

It is a very good idea for you to try options trading, simply because it allows you to minimize your risk to a certain extent. Since you're only speculating on the way that gold will move within the market, you can simply cancel the option at any time and get your money back. The only thing that will be lost is the additional security that was paid.

If the gold should happen to move in price in your favor, you can then allow the option to go through and make a profit. There are still going to be some security charges that are paid because of making the options trade but as long as it comes out in your favor, you are in good shape.

There are always going to be options whenever you are trading gold on the open market, but it is one of the more interesting ways for you to build up your portfolio. - 23199

About the Author:

If you want to find out more about gold trading, visit our website now.