Archives for February 2018

What an uneventful week!

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One of the tough things about trading is that some days trades are hard to find… so we end up sitting our hands.  I would rather have a day where I didn’t make any money because the charts did’t meet my trading criteria… than a day where I lose money because I forced a trade that didn’t meet my trading criteria.  Patience and discipline are as critical to your trading success as your ability to read what price it telling you.

This week had very few trade setups that met my criteria.  Some weeks are like that and other weeks are exciting and rewarding.

Today looked like it might be promising, but the moves didn’t unfold.

I very rarely take the time to mark up a chart to show a 10 pip move but USDJPY looked good to me today.

It looked good as we entered with a 15 pip stop loss for a potential 46 pips to our daily target at 106.30.  Price moved down to test its Asian low, then moved through yesterday’s low… only to find buyers and move back up to remain at its Asian session low.  Uneventful and boring but there it is.

Enjoy your weekend and good luck with your trading!

Waiting on the Fed today appears to have subdued the majors

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Traders will be waiting to see if the Fed’s gauge of economic growth implies the market’s expectation of 3 rate hikes for 2018 or possibly  a fourth?

The USD has been stronger this week and after a double-bottom and a bullish engulfing candle in the USDJPY, and entry long was taken risking 13 pips for a potential 72 pips to our daily target at 108.16 (not shown).  Price moved up, but fell short of testing its Asian high before the London close.  As price started to come back down in advance of the London close and FOMC meeting minutes, our trade is closed by our profit stop.

There is not a lot of major economic news releases this week, but the USD strength has continued thus far.  As traders we can only take it one day at a time.

Good luck with your trading!

 

 

The USD finally strengthens at week end but will it last?

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After being beaten up most of the week, the USD finally strengthened on Friday in a uniform move across the majors.

Most pairs were tradeable  but I liked the AUDUSD setup the most, and entered short with a 13 pip stop loss for a potential 70 pips to our daily target at .7905.  As price moved down and closed for a second time below its Asian high we entered short.  Price moved downward and tested the previous day’s high before moving lower.  We protected our profit in advance of the U.S. open.  Price continued downward past its Asian low.  We continued to move our profit stop down to just above the high of the previous candle and our trade was closed on a spike.

I’m not convinced the USD strength will last in the current market, but after being down most of the week it’s not surprising to see a reversal.

Good luck with your trading and enjoy your weekend.

Happy Chinese New Year!

 

 

 

AUDUSD reverses its Asian session move higher

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Australian employment rose 16,000 in January and the AUDUSD moved up during the Asian session.  When London opened, the Asian session high was not broken and price began to fall.  As price continued to move down we went short risking 16 pips for a potential 68 pips to our daily target.

Price slowly moved lower before slowing down just below yesterday’s high.  As long lower wick candles emerged, we tightened our profit stop to just above the previous candle high and we were taken out of the trade.

Although the market is expecting 3 interest rate hikes this year in the U.S. the recent CPI upside surprise has brought into question whether the FED will have to raise interest rates at a faster pace.  Normally one would expect this to be USD positive but the market is very erratic currently and the USD is having a hard time sustaining a bid tone.  The JPY on the other hand is up 6% versus the USD and is the best performing G 10 currency.  The BOJ despite this… says that it is not enough to require intervention.

Be cautious when markets are not making sense and correlations are fading…for the moment.

Good luck with your trading!

Trading the EURUSD higher as the USD loses its upward momentum

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Today was not an easy day to find a trade…unlike last week.

The EURUSD completed a 3 candle reversal and we were willing to risk 12 pips for a potential 48 to our daily target.  At this time of day, I would have been willing to take a 2:1 R/R.  Price climbed higher then ran into a price barrier on our 4hr chart and was not able to get above it.  As price lost momentum at this level, we gave it some wiggle room… tightened our profit stop and the market took us out for a modest gain.

On Wednesday there are a number of major economic news releases for the U.S. followed by crude oil inventories 2 hours later.

Good luck with your trading!

The week of Feb 5th – Feb 9th brought some awesome trades and major technology issues for me

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In the best week of trading this year, I experienced major technology issues and had to use 3 different computers.  I ended up buying a fourth computer and had some issues with it too.  I have not been able to post until now and although I have trades from each day last week, Tuesday’s trade capture is on a third computer but it wasn’t too different from Monday’s trade.  I’m posting 4 trades from 2 different computers and we will call it a week of trading.

The idea last week was to short the GBPUSD as the week started out with Brexit and political issues in the U.K.  On Thursday, BOE Governor Carney was speaking, so I looked elsewhere for a trade to avoid giving back any profits to volatility.  As oil had been declining all week, I found a trade setup long in the USDCAD.  The other four days were all GBPUSD shorts.

I won’t go into my usual description of the reward to risk, profit stop movement, levels in which price will test and retest as the trade progressed etc. because the trades are a little stale now.  It’s a beautiful sunny holiday here and it’s difficult to be inside on a computer.

So here goes the capture uploads for 4 of the 5 trades from last week.

The technology issues last week reminded me of how dependent we are on it and how complicated technology is these days.  One of my external drives also died.  Going forward I will keep things much simpler…which is how I like trading to be.

Good luck with your trading and with your technology!