With daily ATR's falling on average 15% across most of the majors and the crosses, along with several inside days, the price action chop fest has begun as the markets digest the Himalayan sell-offs, we have witnessed over the last few months.

This was intimated by how the intraday Ichimoku Clouds have gotten very finicky, like college students on triple espressos waiting to take their final exams.

Taking a look at the chart below, we can see how the Clouds or 'Kumo' have started the flipping contrast. Notice how the white portion of the cloud goes from top to bottom to top Mexican jumping bean style all over the charts for the last several days.



Remember according to Ichimoku theory, the cloud represents support and resistance levels. The thicker the cloud, the thicker the support/resistance it should offer. If its constantly flipping from thick to thin, then that basically is communicating an opportunity is right around the corner for the pair to reverse instead of continuing on in any particular direction.

Thus, if you are looking to catch any substantial move, the floor might drop right out from under you at any moment. This requires a more nimble trading approach as the flipping of the cloud results from the price action being direction less or zombie like bouncing from pillar to post looking for fresh meat. When I see this kind of chart formation, I generally result to the following tactical methods:

1) Drill down to smaller time frames (i.e. 1 or 5 minute charts) *we only suggest doing this if you've had practice/success at these levels and are choosing pairs with smaller spreads.

2) Super-size the time frames up to the larger parameters, aka the 4-hour or daily charts. This will create a pseudo-smoothing method and help one to see the larger ranges in play and play for rejections off the Bollinger Bands or 20EMA's with correlating flat Momentum readings (12 period.)

3) The last option is to stay out which has been my more enjoyable method besides the 1min time frames. Sometimes, there just are not too many ladies for me to dance with on the dance floor. When that happens, I usually re-evaluate whether I am in the right environment or or whether I want to dance at all. I do Tango dancing so if there are no ladies around, then I'm generally not dancing. There will always be another Tango Milonga to go to and there will always be another trade in the markets.

Remember the markets have a close relative called Las Vegas, and you want to make sure you are not always playing hands just because you have time and money to play. In the same fashion, you want to pick your games, tables and times to play where you are most likely to succeed. Based upon the current price action, this trader suggests smaller targets, trading pairs with tighter spreads, perhaps using Bollinger Bands and pivots if you are looking for a rejection play, and being more selective.

The chart below gives an example of such plays using the Bollinger Bands on the 1hr charts.



Chris Capre is the Founder of Second Skies LLC which specializes in Trading Systems, Private Mentoring and Advisory services. He has worked for one of the largest retail brokers in the FX market (FXCM) and is now the Fund Manager for White Knight Investments (www.whiteknightfxi.com/index.html). For more information about his services or his company, visit www.2ndskies.com.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Currency Exchange Terms Every Forex Trader If KnowF

Before entering the Forex market, you need to arm yourself with some terms that will be used in all courses or programs on this subject. The following terms have been set up with the idea of providing the novice forex trader with the basic concepts of forex trading. While they sound technical, most are easy to understand and apply.

Let us begin with the instruments that are sold in foreign exchange markets. Currencies are traded in pairs to the instrument will always be in the double name. The reason is simple: the basis of exchange is to exchange one currency against another. Thus, if the pair is the euro and the U.S. dollar, and the forex trader is taking a long position or buying the euro in the hope that it will appreciate, effectively the operator is also selling U.S. dollars to buy euros. Couples are the most active Great Britain and the U.S. Dollar Pound (indicated as GBP / USD), the Euro and the U.S. Dollar (EUR / USD pair), the Australian dollar and U.S. dollar (AUD / USD pair), the U.S. dollar and Japanese yen (USD / JPY pair), and the Canadian dollar and U.S. dollar (USD / CAD pair). These pairs has well over 80% of the total trade in the Forex market. The advantage in the negotiation of these currency pairs, they are highly liquid and allow investors to convert their holdings of cash very quickly to make a profit.

In each pair, the first currency is the base currency, the second is a place to hear the price of the pair, or commonly called "cross-currency". The second is the appearance of the pair of currencies and prices is recorded based on units of the quote currency to buy a unit of the base currency. Thus, assuming that the price of EUR / USD pair is 1.5, which means that 1.5 USD buy 1 GBP.

Each pair is quoted in terms of a bid ask spread. The price is the speed at which your broker exchange offers to buy the currency, while the selling price is the exchange rate of the broker is to seek to sell the currency to the exchange operator. The price will always be less than the selling price and the trader to buy foreign currency at the price and sell at the offer price. Prices will be quoted as asking: GBP / USD 1532 / 5, which means that the price is 1532 and the sale price is 1535.

A point of interest Pome price), as it is commonly called, is the smallest of changes a currency pair will experience, for example, a change in the GBP / USD 1532 to 1542 is a change 10 points. A margin is a deposit that is a minimum amount or a small percentage of your volume of trade you have to put in place. The remaining amount is provided by your broker. This amount may vary from 1% to 0.25%, also known as 100:1 and 400:1. Most often, forex brokers offer 200:1 to 100:1, and most customers. It is risky, but allows the operator to draw a large amount he or she would not otherwise have access.

Finally, a margin call may occur when the operator to change allows the balance in the account fall below the margin deposit percentage agreed with the forex broker. The broker to automatically sell your holdings or buy your short positions and clear account of the whole negotiation, the return of the profit margin the amount of the operator to protect the operator not to lose more money they have.



About the Author

Andrew Daigle is the owner, creator and author of many successes, including a free Web site called forex training and ForexBoost to http://www.ForexBoost.com CashCurve to http://www.cashcurve. com to learn more about other online business opportunities.

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