Sunday, October 5, 2008

Forex Online Trading Analysis

There are basically two different ways to analyze the forex markets, fundamental analysis and technical analysis. In this article I am going to talk a little bit about fundamental analysis.

What is fundamental analysis? Fundamental analysis is a type of market analysis where you study the economic situation of different countries. You try determine the present and the future value of a currency by social, economic, and political variables. Fundamental analysis is suited for forecasting long-term movements. Fundamental analysis requires a basic understanding of supply and demand and what things affect those.

Fundamental analysis in usually broken down into two different categories: capital flow analysis and trade flow analysis. In capital flow analysis you analyze are capital flow going in or out from the country. If capital is flowing in to the country that means people are investing and currency is strong. And vice versa. In trade flow analysis you are trying to analyze the trade flows. If export > import (positive trade flow) it is good for the currency. And vice versa.

General in forex market the most important fundamental things to watch for is:

#1 Economic calendar (contains the info on when different stats are going to be published)

#2 Speeches (from FED or European Central Bank)

#3 Interest rates (rising interest rates -> currency will strengthen)

#4 Employment situation (decrease in the payroll -> weak economic -> lower interest rates -> currency will weaken)

#5 Trade balance and budget (significant trade balance -> weak currency)

#6 Gross Domestic Product (high GDP growth -> high interest rates -> strong currency)

#7 Retail sales (first indicator of the strength of consumer expenditure)

#8 Durable goods (rising durable good orders -> strong economy -> rising interest rates -> strong currency)

What to do with this data? Well, the most important to thing to keep in mind is that you actually follow the data! Look the economic calendar and don't trade if there are some stats coming. Wait and see first. Know which indicator is rising / falling and is there any difference between the expected and actual results (if there is, market will usually correct). Find out what is the indicator most traders are watching and look those same indicators. Popular one is interest rates and inflation indicators. Other traders will watch those, so they have an impact to the prices. Also pay attention to any news during the day, this currency markets can move fast.

For more info:

Forex Trading Profits

Are you interested in forex trading but not quite sure how to get started? Or are you a trading veteran looking for a new way to trade your account? No matter who you are, there is a way for you to make easy forex trading profits.

In this article I want to explain to you what an expert advisor is and anyone can use one to make money in the foreign exchange market. Oh yeah, and it works on full autopilot which means you do nothing.

An expert advisor is a type of forex software that runs on your trading platform. They are easy to install and the whole process takes about 2 minutes. After you have the advisor installed, you just activate it and let it go to work.

A good expert advisor will trade correctly and in profit 80-90% of the time. In my personal experience with one advisor, Forex Tracer, I am winning just about 90% of the time with my trades.

Expert advisors do all the work for you! You don't need to do anything or even have any knowledge of the forex market. Just check out stats whenever you want.

So how do you properly use an expert advisor? You need to try an EA on a demo account before you let it go live on your real money account. These demo accounts are free and will be set up once you download the expert advisor.

I recommend trying the demo account for 59 of the 60 days that are covered by the money back guarantee. An expert advisor is a small investment for a potential lifetime of forex trading profits. This is why thousands of people every day are turning to them.

Mistakes In Forex Trading

When you view the statistics of successful forex trading, it can be pretty depressing. Stats show that only 95% of forex traders are making any money. With so many trading forex, why is this? Here is a look at common mistakes newer (and some seasoned) forex traders make that cause them to lose money.

1. Get Rich Quick mentality. You have probably seen the late night infomercials about how easy and profitable it is to trade forex. Well, it is easy to actually trade, but difficult to trade well. Opening an funding an account can take as little as 24 hours and you can be up and trading. People will open up a broker account, fund it and start trading without knowing what they are doing. A good course of study on the currency pairs and how they tend to work with each other is a must before you start any live trading. You must be educated in forex to trade profitably. You can't just go on gut feeling. Forex trading should be done for the long haul. You are going to have those months where you are not in the positive, but a good trader will have more positive months than negative ones

2. Trading for the wrong reasons. Yes, there is a high associated with making a huge profit from one trade. However, do not treat forex trading like a day at the race track. You should not trade for the excitement of trading. Not to mention that there is a lot of time to be spent just waiting for the correct trade to come along. Also, don't start forex trading because you think it only requires a few minutes a day to make money. Even if you are scalping the market (making small quick trades), it takes time for those trades to develop and some days are just bad days to be sitting there waiting.

3. Not using a stop loss. This is where emotion comes into play. You should have a clear exit strategy when you enter a trade. Decide how many pips you are looking for and what your loss limit will be. If it is 50 pips, set your stop loss so that you are automatically triggered out of the trade when that many pips are lost. It is too easy for a novice trader to say "Well, it has to start coming back soon, I'll just wait a few more pips" and then end up getting a margin call because they are now down 250 pips waiting for the trade to turn around. Be disciplined and set those stop loss targets. There are always going to be new trades happening.

4. Jumping from strategy to strategy. Strategies take time to develop and time to personalize to your own trading style. That is why a demo account is important to practice. Once you have learned your strategy and how to adapt it to changing conditions - stick with it! New traders will sometimes bounce from one person's strategy to another, without giving any of them a chance to develop. One bad trade does not a bad strategy make.

5. Emotional involvement in your trades. Turning off your emotions is a critical tool in trading forex successfully. Not just the down emotions, but the up emotions as well. Have a strategy to get in and out of trades. Resist the impulse to trade, feeling like you are on a wave of good luck. And conversely - don't keep trading if you are down out of desperation.

Following these tips will help you be part of the 5% of successful traders out there, rather than the majority that do not succeed.