THE WEEKLY FX DRIVE THRU
INTRODUCTION:
Last week was a relatively quiet week for economic data releases. Equities, and in particular the U.S. long bonds led the FX markets, plus the now customary mixture of BREXIT, OPEC (OIL), U.S. Presidential Election and sound-bytes from the EUROZONE.
From a trading perspective, I was not very aggressive with trades, always trying to be selective and as choosy on entries as possible to maximize opportunities.
I would like to share some great news, the PREMIUM SERVICE total pips for 2016 currently stands at 11,618 pips, which exceeds 2014 (11,209 pips) and 2015 (10,686 pips). There are still a few weeks left this year, therefore, the final pip total return could move higher or lower depending upon what happens going into the year end.
At the conclusion of every blog (this one as well), I always include a very short a paragraph about trading longevity (see below).
Always remember longevity in Forex trading can only be achieved through trading with good RISK and MONEY MANAGEMENT, and above all set your position sizes in accordance with the size of your account and allow for some flexibility.
Last week, I revised my POSITION SIZING guidelines for my trading based upon the various currency pairs available. This is a user guide for subscribers to see what sizes I am trading, based upon my RISK attached to each trade set up that I suggest.
My business strap line “The Home of Single-lot Trading” is based upon my belief, and I have records to back this up is that regardless of how deep your pockets are, you can with RISK & MONEY MANAGEMENT, TRADING DISCIPLINES and POSITION SIZING MANAGEMENT make a good cash return from trading Forex.
This is not like gambling in Vegas. You do not have to go all in. I consider trading more like a RISK MANAGEMENT process. It is also not about making big profits trade after trade, that would be great but sadly the world of trading is NOT like that. It is about the consistency of your performance and taking profits at the right time whatever size, adding to your account. Yes, there will be losses but these can be minimized. Like every trader I hate losses, but they are a pre-requisite of trading.
I have never singled out a specific trade to review in this section of the blog before, but to amplify my point on trading small position sizes and being patient with trading I would like to demonstrate that good returns are possible.
The trade parameters were as follows: –
POSITION TRADE
REF#: POS 140
USD/SEK
LONG
ENTRY at 8.8800
STOP 8.2800
LIMIT 10.400
TRADE CLOSED AT 9.0200 – 26th October 2016
MY POSITION SIZE – 10% = 3 MINI LOTS
PROFIT FROM TRADE $465.60
COST TO TRADE $3.30
RISK AT TRADE INCEPTION WAS c.$200.00
I put a protected stop in place as the pair spiked after a news event. It pulled back and my trade covered early.
My point is where else can your RISK / RETURN be this good?
Whilst my RISK at the outset of the trade was $200.00. My trade basically cost me $3.30 to make $465.60. Where else is your return this good? There are places, but this is instant cash if required and it all happened inside 4 hours.
Obviously there are traders who would trade larger POSITION SIZES than me and many who will trade smaller POSITION SIZES. Regardless of your wallet size we can ALL make $$$.
Had you traded the lowest possible trade and matched my set up suggested 1 x micro lot with the above trade example: –
- COST TO TRADE $0.11 cents
- TRADE INCEPTION RISK $6.60
- ACTUAL TRADE REWARD $15.52
This is NOT a “blow my own horn” approach. There have been many better trades than this this year. I just wanted to show that you do NOT need to have a higher risk to enjoy a good return on your capital.
This particular trade is just fresh in my mind, as when I look at my “Tweet deck” page, I see a couple of tweets to me @ThePremServ from one very good trader and PREMIUM SERVICE subscriber who missed this trade and was kicking himself for doing so.
As I have said, probably 10-15 times in the past month or so, As Forex Traders, we are in a marathon not a 60 metre dash.
LOOKING BACKWARDS: THE FX MARKET PLACE
LAST WEEK’S FOREX and ECONOMIC NEWS – MY VIEWS:
MARK CARNEY (BOE GOVERNOR’S TESTIMONY TO HOUSE OF LORDS):
Basically my summary from Carney’s speech to the House of Lords committee was “Monetary Policy cannot do everything”. I think we heard something very similar very recently from Mario Draghi (ECB President).
My take is that he (Carney) can’t really do much now except wait. He did the initial support but now he needs to react to the politicians and to some meaningful economic statistics following the BREXIT vote. He will ignore knee jerk statistics to get a picture with a trend if possible and try to keep ahead of the curve.
That aside cable trades very heavy and within striking distance (GBP/USD) of breaking the recent 30+ years low of 1.2076. I still maintain its when rather than if we break this. The 1.2000 psychological number is appealing to the robots and big institutions. The weekly closing numbers with the GBP/USD must have the banks chartists frothing at the mouth with opportunities. At the same time there are always short covering rallies as there are always bottom pickers in the market. Eventually, one sound-byte from either a UK or EUROZONE politician probably based upon the Banking sector future of London being cast in doubt will send this cable crashing across the board.
I just want the best entry level to short the GBP/USD, GBP/CHF and get long EUR/GBP. Although the CHF is a little off my RADAR at the moment given that I fear a TRUMP victory we could see a JPY and CHF flight to safety trade for a while.
I digress…
I think with Theresa May giving Parliament a chance to debate the BREXIT, this will stretch out the date for EUROPEAN UNION discussions and this gives the GBP/USD the chance to recover a little. This is my hope. I have a LIMIT ORDER in place ready at my target entry. The problem is every time cable looks like it’s moving up, it quickly gets swatted down again. There are always sellers ready to enter.
Carney is on hold for the time being so it’s really up to the politicians to influence the cable price moving forward in my opinion.
U.S. ADVANCE GDP:
If ever there was a data release to screw with your mind, and your belief of what was good news and what was bad news this was it.
2.9% growth… almost 3%.
I expected the USD to rally like crazy across the board. It never happened, the opposite really and then we had the now customary Friday chop fest as traders close / adjust / set their trades for the following week.
On Friday last week I was set up from a couple of days’ prior for the DXY to retrace lower from its elevated position. The fall in the DXY never really happened the way I thought it would as the USD remained well bid. My retracement trades were left in place and on Friday last week whilst they never really came close to triggering LIVE…the NZD/USD almost did, it came within 35 pips or so.
The upshot of all of this was that I went to the sidelines to avoid the choppy market and started on this blog post instead of trading!!
LOOKING FORWARDS:
THIS WEEK’S FOREX and ECONOMIC NEWS – MY VIEWS:
THIS WEEK’S FOREX NEWS THAT INTERESTS ME:
(There are many more news items related to the Forex Market other than the ones listed below. These are the ones that interest me. You can go to www.forexfactory.com and www.tradingeconomics.com for a more comprehensive lists of all news events that are Forex related).
SUNDAY: N/A.
MONDAY: CNY – Manufacturing PMi.
MONDAY: AUD – RBA Rate Statement & Interest Rate announcement.
MONDAY: JPY – BOJ Press Conference and Interest Rate Statement.
TUESDAY: GBP – Manufacturing PMi.
TUESDAY: CAD – GDP.
TUESDAY: NZD – GDT Dairy Auction Prices.
TUESDAY: CAD – BOC Governor Poloz speaks.
TUESDAY: NZD – Employment Rate / Jobs Report.
TUESDAY: AUD – Building Approvals.
TUESDAY: NZD – RBNZ Inflation Report.
WEDNESDAY: GBP – Construction PMi.
WEDNESDAY: USD – ADP Non-Farm Employment Numbers.
WEDNESDAY: USD – FOMC statement and FED Funds Rate.
WEDNESDAY: AUD – Trade Balance.
THURSDAY: GBP – Services PMi.
THURSDAY: GBP – BOE Inflation Report, Interest Rates & Policy Statement.
THURSDAY: USD – ISM Non- Manufacturing PMi.
THURSDAY: AUD – RBA monetary Policy Statement.
THURSDAY: AUD – Retail Sales.
THURSDAY: CAD – BOC Governor Poloz speaks.
FRIDAY: USD – Non-Farm Employment Data $ Unemployment Rate etc.
FRIDAY: CAD – Employment Data & Unemployment Rate.
There is an abundance of news items this week.
The big ones in my opinion that I will be very interested in are: –
- S. Non-Farm Payrolls and the FOMC Statement.
- BOE Inflation Report.
- NZD Jobs report and Dairy Auction Prices.
- China PMi.
- Australian Monetary Policy, Interest Rate Statement and Trade Balance.
It has been some time since the agenda has looked this busy.
We must also bear in mind that the BREXIT and U.S. presidential election will be over the news wires like a rash, plus we are now in the same month as the alleged proposed OPEC OIL production cut, this should also start to weigh in.
As “THE DONALD” would say it’s “HUGE’.
FOREX TRADING IN GENERAL TERMS THIS WEEK:
It has been some time since the weekly data dump was this big, culminating with the U.S. jobs report at the end of the week.
Those of you who know my approach should not and will probably not be surprised by the following statement, I think this week will be a day trade only environment probably until Friday when a longer-term trading perspective will hopefully be able to be taken.
I am looking more at cross-rate pairs as we head towards the U.S. Presidential Election. My thought process for this is that should we see a surprise result with “THE DONALD” being victorious. I think that we will have major increased volatility for some time. I just don’t need this nor do I want this factor hanging over several trades. That does not affect my views too much on my longer-term trades that are currently in place. Hence my thought process moving more to the cross-rate pairs. Having said that, with the volume of economic data due this week, the cross-rates could be scarier than I bargain for.
We all saw what happened with the markets last Friday with the FBI announcement over re-opening the case against HILLARY and her emails. The JPY and CHF tanked, the MXN leaped up like a salmon. Somebody hopefully dialed 911 (999) for HILLARY as I think that the fire department will be required to put out the fire from her knickers burning following her claims that all was OK.
The bottom line is that trading small and being nimble will be the general order of the day over the next couple of weeks.
PREMIUM SERVICE subscribers please note, in section 5 I have noted my trade for the night of the Presidential vote.
THIS COMING WEEK – THE USD MAJORS (MY THOUGHTS):
(In this section I have as usual kept my charts as minimalist as possible. With regards to charting in my opinion less is more!! I hope that they are clear. All readers regardless of level of experience should be able to follow my thoughts from my comments to the levels on the charts with ease)
My comments are contained on the charts.
EUR/USD – Weekly Closing Price: 1.0981
GBP/USD – Weekly Closing Price: 1.2185
AUD/USD – Weekly Closing Price: 0.7494
NZD/USD – Weekly Closing Price: 0.7165
USD/CAD – Weekly Closing Price: 1.3391
USD/CHF – Weekly Closing Price: 0.9874
USD/JPY – Weekly Closing Price: 104.66
THIS COMING WEEK – THE NON-USD MAJORS PAIRS (MY THOUGHTS):
I don’t want to give away too much in this section as this overlaps with commentary that PREMIUM SERVICE SUBSCRIBERS receive in section 5.
I am maintaining positions with the EUR/CHF and AUD/NZD, in fact I added two more live trades to my trading position with the AUD/NZD and a further LIMIT ORDER is in place as well.
My overall longer-term view regarding the New Zealand economy has not changed and for the foreseeable future I have no problems adding to my bearish views through all NZD trading pairs except the GBP/NZD for BREXIT reasons.
Other non USD majors that are on my RADAR are: –
JPY and CHF pairs. I am being a little cautious with my near-term outlook with regards to these pairs given the U.S. election outcome. If we saw “THE DONALD” victorious I am of the opinion that we could see a flight to safety trade appear and the usual suspects of the JPY and CHF could be targeted. The FBI investigation into HILLARY’s emails could lead us down a path we were not expecting to follow.
Longer-term I want to sell JPY and CHF currencies (i.e. Long USD/JPY & USD/CHF). I just think that until the U.S. election is out of the way we have to exercise some caution.
MY CLOSING THOUGHTS:
This is a busy week for Forex traders; time to get down to Costco and stock up on caffeine, or if you prefer the off-licence / liquor store for something a little stronger. I have a feeling us “dark side” traders will be quite “cream crackered” by next weekend.
In addition to the Economic data dump do NOT forget at any time some idiot politician looking for 30 seconds of fame could take aim on a media sound-byte and change the direction of any currency pair at the drop of a hat. We have plenty of BRITISH and EUROZONE politicians who love the media, plus the OPEC ministers love a good rumour so be aware and be careful. Already there are noises stating that neither IRAN or IRAQ will freeze output. I stated at the outset of this paperless agreement that in principle OPEC agreements are not policed nor do they mean squat when a push comes to a shove. OPEC is a non-event in my opinion especially as energy dependence diminishes in the Middle East as soon as they realize this then maybe things might progress in a greater business-like manner. Right now it’s a shambolic collection of greedy feckers who have screwed with my disposable income for too damn long…. in my opinion of course!!
Plus, we have an FBI investigation being opened into a Presidential candidate days before the vote in the biggest economy in the FREE WORLD. In the words of “THE DONALD” this is “HUGE”. This will play on the markets this week. WE have to be really careful, maybe be sidelined.
I do NOT need to trade every day. I trade to make money in markets I understand. If I want to gamble in choppy markets I might as well go to Vegas and play roulette. I prefer to let trades come to me at my prices. I have a TRADE PLAN and I PLAN MY TRADES to my plan.
Do not get suckered into believing the market is moving strongly in one direction. It can and does change in an instant. We are close to several range extremes, which increases volatility and the number of false moves.
As usual…
Always remember longevity in Forex trading can only be achieved through trading with good RISK and MONEY MANAGEMENT, and above all set your position sizes in accordance with the size of your account and allow for some flexibility.
Take care,
Scott Pickering
The Pip Accumulator
http://weeklyfxdrivethru.com/disclaimer/
BLOG VERSION: #39 FOREXTELL
DATE: 29th October 2016.
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