Glory Glory Manchester United. We came from 0-2 down and beat Everton with 4-2. That’s a excellent result. Everton did play well, but we just get better. After all, it was an exciting game. We are now 5 points clear and within one victory of winning the league.
I close the week in profit again with pathetic +0.3% (vs last week) , it was a disappointing ending. I just can’t get rid of the Friday jinx. The week’s performance was destroyed by this stupid Friday market. Anyway, I am not really satisfied with my performance this week. Firstly, I found myself watching the trading screen too frequent and have the tendency to exit a trade early even though profit target has been set. Well, some people say “You won’t go broke by taking profit”, I don’t buy this. It is important to hold on your winners to bag bigger profit, you need them to balance out your draw down period. I have no problem exiting a losing trade, since I really hate loser. The real work for me now is to hold on my winners and derive a better way to manage my profitable trades.
Well, I thought I can finish the week strong. But, hey, you don’t know what’s gonna happen next, that’s trading. Anyway, it is still a profitable week. Accept it, fool.
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Month in review April 2007
I was feeling a little bit pissed when compiling this monthly review. However, after reading through my trades again, I guess, I should not bother too much. This is just the first month of my live Forex trading, and I ended the month flat (well, up +38 pips, or +0.96 R), the most important to me is, I manage to recoup all losses incurred in the early of the month. The first two weeks was a total trial-and-error period. I finished my trading plan after 2 weeks, understood and found a way to deal with my bastard broker’s widened 20-pip spread during news time, and started trading the new plan since 3rd week. Despite my Friday jinx, I was actually up 189.5 pips , or +4.74 R for the last 2 weeks of April. I should not push myself too hard over this result. I do not plan to tweak my system again for the time being, I shall execute it through out next couple of months. The only possible change might be stop trading on Friday until I find a priest to get rid of my Friday jinx, uhm…LOL
All in all, I finished the month with a whopping +38.5 pips, +0.96 R. System accuracy was just 43.10%. I might not be trading next Monday. If I do, I will update it later.
In case any auditor wants to view my trading log, I have uploaded here.
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“The real man trades Futures, his son trades Forex, I am trading both, for my wife” 🙂
Tony Saliba discussed the elements of good trading in Market Wizards: Interviews with Top Traders
Clear thinking, ability to stay focused, and extreme discipline. Discipline is number one: Take a theory and stick with it. But you also have to be open-minded enough to switch tracks if you feel that your theory has been proven wrong. You have to be able to say, “My method worked for this type of market, but we are not in that type of market anymore.”
He continued to discuss trading rules he lived by
Always respect the marketplace. Never take anything for granted. Do your homework. Recap the day. Figure out what you did right and what you did wrong. That is one part of the homework; the other part is projective. What do I want to happen tomorrow? What happens if the opposite occurs? What happens if nothing happens? Think through all the “what-ifs.” Anticipate and plan, rather than react.
It was an exciting and challenging week for me. I started the week in red and fought my way up to close the trading week in positive, with +6.35 R. Some new rules were introduced this week. Though I am deploying SAR (Stop and Reverse) strategy, I decided to put a cap at maximum 2 trades a day for each currency pair. If I am stopped out at both direction, I am out. My strategy just doesn’t fit at that particular day. Secondly, I adjust my position size according to my equity growth. Thirdly, I would cancel all open orders before major news released. I use Forex Factory Calendar to identify important events.
When my bucket shop broker widens the spread to 20 pips during news released period, it will normally fill my order, and stops it out in the next minute. Man, I hate this.
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Not so bad, though no huge profit, it is always nice to close a trading week in positive note.
May the pips be with you.
Gav says, ‘The real man trades Futures, his son trades Forex, I am trading both, for my wife’
I have been a Mozilla user for quite sometime. I am running both Firexfox (Web browser) and Thunderbird (Email client) on my laptop.
Mozilla just launched Thunderbird 2.
Thunderbird 2, with its enhanced features, is intended to ease the organization of e-mail via message tags, advanced folder viewing, and speedier inbox and message searching. full article here.
Save the web, go mozilla.
After the “kinda frustrated..” day, I am having a “kinda happy” day. I have finally achieved my 100-pips day. In fact, I am up 200 pips today.
It is time for me to get my MP3 player, it was the reward I set for myself when I achieve a 100 pips day.(still IPod or Creative Zen?..)
A hit or miss game
I was surprised by the sell off of GBP crosses. I mean, I was surprised by the speed of sell off. I woke up in the morning with full of confidence to short GBP/JPY, and of course, my darling GBP/USD. I was trying to Long EUR/JPY as well. There were some buying during Sydney hours , but tone changed when Japanese was greeting Ohiyo(Good morning in Japanese, in case you are confused) to the Forex market.
I found myself exiting position prematurely yesterday due to some fears in me. I knew it was a mistake and a problem. Today I decided to close my trading screen after putting in profit target and stop loss orders. Long EUR/JPY was stopped out, and I went short at the same time.
Market was in selling mood, so all short positions were covered by take profit orders.
More works need to be done.
I am not sure if I can close the week with positive note, but I am pretty comfortable now, I have figured out a lot of problems and refining my trading plan along the way. It takes tons of effort to study and refining strategy. It is really a different game to me. What works for me in futures market , hurts me in Forex market. Anyways, I am enjoying the learning process, and of course, the pips.
May the pips be with you.
Oh I forgot to mention ” The real man trades Futures, his son trades Forex, I am trading both, for my wife” 🙂
