You might have at one point in time considered forex trading, but the complexities surrounding the trade might have put you off. At first, you might be scared stiff by complex terminologies like currency quotes, lots, technical indicators, economic data, zones, pips, Forex charts, and more.

Forex trading is a learning experience that requires patience and lots of learning to grasp the fundamentals of the markets. Forex markets are markets where currencies are bought and sold depending on the value of the other currency.

It is necessary to evaluate yourself before entering into forex trade by analyzing whether you have the drive, courage, and focus of the trading activity. Additionally, be ready for the lies and tricks of fraudsters who abound in this trade.

With that background information, the first step is to open an online account with a broker. There are hundreds of online brokers, each claiming to be the best in the market, and this is where your first challenge comes to light. This article serves as a guide to choosing a suitable broker based on the following criteria:

Security

In this trade, you need guarantees that your money will be safe and sound and that the profits you will be earning are safe. Don’t be deceived by the appearance of the broker or scammer in that case. Even the presentation of a seemingly well-designed website doesn’t mean the owners are genuine.

What you need to look at is the broker’s track record, the registration documents, and certifications by relevant authorities.

Initial Deposit Requirement

Many a time, the broker would ask you for a deposit. While it is ordinarily safe for you to tread carefully and offer fewer amounts, it is not prudent as it amounts to undercapitalization. A genuine or serious broker would ask for adequate initial deposits bearing in mind that small amounts could be wiped out in case of fluctuations. The key here is to invest what you can afford.

Spreads

Spreads are what is payable to the broker regardless of the profits or loss. Therefore, choose the broker with competitive spreads.

Deposits and Withdrawals

Your savings and profits should be readily available for withdrawal at any time you want. Similarly, if you are not satisfied with the services of a broker, the broker must facilitate your closure with ease. For deposits, the broker should provide seamless services.

Margin Requirements and Leverage

When choosing a broker, go for the one with minimum leverage. A broker should gradually increase leverage as you gain experience in the markets. As a beginner, don’t go for a broker who will start your forex trade with maximum leverage. You are still learning the ropes, and you need to develop your skills as time goes by.

Trading Platform

Your choice of the trading platform should be tamper-proof so that no one tamper’s with trades. Go for easy to use platform to avoid issues when trading.

Customer Service

You are better off with helpful brokers who will handle your issues of system delays, deposits, and withdrawals. It is paramount that the customer service desk understands the techniques of trading. Read through website reviews of the brokers to establish if they are the right fit. If their reviews obtain complaints, bear in mind that their service is poor.

Account Types

There are several packages available. The best way to go about this is to choose one with customizable features and those with adjustable leverage and margins.

Currencies Offered

Choose a broker with a variety of tradable currencies on offer. In essence, the broker should offer a rich mix of currencies from the currencies of developing nations to the currencies of developed economies.

Forex Regulations

Forex regulating authorities depend on your country and locality. CFTC and NFA regulate commodity brokerage in the United States, The Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) regulates forex trading in Australia. The Swiss Federal Banking Commission (SFBC) is the regulatory body in Switzerland. Financial Services Authority (FSA) regulated Forex in the UK.

Your Take

Forex trade carries a high risk, and high degrees of leverage can work either way, and it is imperative to carefully consider your objectives before deciding to invest.

Whether to invest or not is your individual decision based on your risk appetite and leverage. On entry, you need the courage to overcome the emotional aspects of the forex trade.

There are many experiences that you encounter along the way before you become an established trader. There are lies and tricks of fraudsters to overcome in this business.

Forex trading is a business just like any other business. Some people start trading forex as a full-time business or job while others do it on a part-time basis. Either way, anyone who is interested in the forex trading business should find time for it.

Continue reading “Things to Consider as a Forex Trader While Analyzing the Forex Markets”

The Fibonacci retracements use the Fibonacci sequence that was discovered by Mr. Fibonacci, an 11th-century mathematician. It is argued that there are Fibonacci numbers that occur everywhere in nature, and traders use this sequence in forex trading. Fibonacci retracements are identifiers of key support and resistance levels.

When a market curve has made a large upwards or downwards move and seems to flatten at a certain level, this is usually when traders can do the Fibonacci level calculations.

In Fibonacci retracements, traders set a target on a set of percentage points on a trade of a particular commodity. If the price falls beyond the last set percentage point, it is assumed the trade will continue in that particular trend until it stabilizes, be it on an increasing or decreasing trend.

This, therefore, influences the point at which a trader will want to buy or sell, ultimately influencing their bottom line.

The Fibonacci retracement can be used in trading to identify resistance levels, draw support lines, set up target prices, and place stop-loss orders.

The Fibonacci ratios have the potential to be used as a primary mechanism in countertrend trading strategy.

The Fibonacci sequence can be observed in nature occurring naturally. Some of the places the Fibonacci sequence can be observed are in the arrangement of leaves on a stem, branching of trees, fruit spout of a pineapple, etc.

The key percentage points at which most traders use the Fibonacci retracements are the 32.8%, 50%, and 61.8% marks. When these points are introduced in a trade graph, each percentage point coincides with a certain price of a commodity being traded.

The Fibonacci retracement levels are considered very important when a volatile market has reached a serious level of resistance or support.

The 50% mark is not a part of the Fibonacci numbering sequence. It is included because of the experience of market trading and used as a halfway point before a market resumes its trend.

Forex Strategies by Traders Using Fibonacci Levels

Different traders use different strategies to trade commodities and the stock market. So as a responsible investor, you need to find which strategy best works for you.

Different strategies utilize the Fibonacci retracement and they are as follows:

• You have the option of buying in near the 38.2 percent retracement level. You can then go ahead and add a stop-loss order placing it just below the 50 percent level.
• You have the option of buying in near the 50 percent retracement level. You can then go ahead and add a stop-loss order placing it just below the 61.8 percent level.
• When you get to the sell position near the top of the big move, you can put into use the Fibonacci retracement levels as profit-taking targets.
• In case the market closes to any one of the Fibonacci levels and then continues the previous direction, you can use the higher Fibonacci levels of 161.8 percent and 261.8 percent to try and find the future resistance and support levels. This is in case the market moves beyond the low or high that was previously reached before the retracement.

Trading Style

All traders have different strategies that maximize their profits, reduce their loss, and help them keep their emotions in check.

The Fibonacci strategy used in trading uses hard data, and if a trader sticks to his or her strategy then they should suffer very minimal emotional interference.

The Fibonacci strategies discussed above may be used to trade in the trading short term like for minutes or can be used a long term like for years.

Many traders have been successful in trading when using the Fibonacci ratios and retracements. They place long-term trades with long-term price trends.

The Fibonacci retracement has the potential to be better, more accurate, and more powerful if it is utilized and used together with other indicators or technical signals.

However, due to the unstable nature of currencies, trades are executed on a short-term basis.

Conclusion

Forex is not for the easily bored. To be able to trade successfully, you have to love numbers. The terms highlighted above are some of the most commonly used terms in trading forex. By understanding the terms used in the trade, you will be better placed to make informed trading decisions likely to influence your bottom line positively.

A trailing stop-loss request is a risk-lessening strategy whereby the risk on an exchange is diminished, or a profit is secured as the exchange moves in favor of the trader.

A trader can improve the value of a stop-loss by blending it with a trailing stop, an exchange request where the stop-loss cost isn’t fixed at a solitary and supreme dollar sum instead is set at a specific rate or dollar sum beneath the market cost.

A trailing stop-loss is not a necessity in forex trading; rather, it’s an individual decision. After studying the nuts and bolts of trailing stops, you’ll be better equipped to understand if this risk management tactic is appropriate for you and your exchanging procedures.

How do trailing stops work? When the cost expands, it likewise moves the trailing stops. When the cost stops increasing, the new stop-loss value stays at the level it was moved to, thereby securing the downside of the stockholder.

Some of The Trailing Stops Techniques Available Include:

Manual Trailing Stops Technique

More experienced merchants typically utilize manual trailing stops since it gives greater versatility with respect to when the stop-loss is moved. For this situation, the stop-loss request isn’t configured as trailing.

In this case, it is just a standard stop-loss request. The merchant decides when and where they will move the stop-loss request to diminish hazard.

If you are holding a long position on a stock, a typical strategy is to scale the stop-loss up once a pullback has ensued and when the cost is by and by increasing. The stop-loss is scaled up to just under the swing low of the withdrawal.

For instance, a broker enters an exchange at $20. The value climbs to $20.05, drops to $20.03, and afterward begins to move back up once more. The stop-loss could be scaled to $20.01, just underneath the short of the pullback at $20.03.

Indicator-Based Trailing Stops Technique

Pointers can be utilized to make a trailing stop-loss, and some are intended explicitly for this task. When using a marker-based trailing stop-loss, you need to physically shift the stop-loss to mirror the data displayed on the pointer.

Many trailing stop-loss markers depend on the ATR, which estimates how much a resource typically moves over a given period.

In the event that a forex pair ordinarily moves five pips every 10 minutes, the stop-loss could be trailed at a different of the ATR. The ATR (Average True Range) can display this interpretation on the chart if utilizing 10-minute value bars.

Markers can be viable in featuring where to put a stop-loss, yet no strategy is without flaw. The pointer may get you out of exchanges too soon or too late on certain events

It is recommended that you test out any marker you use with demo exchanging first and know about its advantages and disadvantages before using it with actual money.

What Is the Upside and Downside of Using Trailing Stops in Forex?

The upside of a trailing stop-loss is that if a significant pattern occurs, a massive chunk of the pattern will be captured for benefit, assuming the trailing stop-loss isn’t affected during that pattern.

As such, permitting exchanges to run until they affect the trailing stop-loss can bring about massive profits. A trailing stop-loss is likewise advantageous, assuming the cost at first moves well and then reverses.

The trailing stop-loss helps keep a winning exchange from turning into a washout—or possibly diminishes the measure of the misfortune if an exchange doesn’t work out.

The drawback of utilizing a trailing stop-loss is that markets don’t generally move in a perfect stream. At times the cost will make a concise but sharp move, which hits your trailing stop-loss.

However, it continues to go in the proposed direction without you. If you hadn’t changed the initial stop-loss, you could, in any case, be in the exchange and profiting from the favorable value moves.

When the cost isn’t moving well, trailing stop-losses can bring about various losing exchanges because the cost is consistently switching and striking the trailing the stop-misfortune. If this occurs, either you shouldn’t trade or use the set-and overlook strategy.

The set-and-overlook strategy is the point at which you place a pause based on current circumstances and later let the value strike one request or the other without any changes.

Final Thought

All in all, trailing stops tend to function well when they make massive moves and when those moves do happen, as illustrated above. However, if the market isn’t making massive moves, then the trailing stops can hinder performance as your capital decreases bit by bit.

The forex trading world has been using technical analysis indicators to get the upper hand in trading the trends. Fibonacci retracements use ancient mathematical scripts to evaluate the price movements and help identify support and resistance levels.

Throughout history, mathematical proportions and ratios have been used and continue to be used in everything from determining the shape of snail shells to the construction of buildings. However, if you want to use Fibonacci’s mathematical principles to inform your forex trading strategy, you need to understand the retracement concepts.

Understanding Fibonacci Retracements

When using Fibonacci retracements in forex trading, the areas of support are indicated when the price stops decreasing and vice versa for when the price stops increasing. On the trading chart, Fibonacci retracement levels are drawn in close relation to the price of the asset to be evaluated. Hence, it appears as a horizontal line on the chat that works by identifying retracement levels for analysis purposes.

To determine these levels, the trendline connects between the high and low. Ratios established at 61.8%, 38.2%, and 23.6% stratify the vertical distance. 50% is commonly used as a retracement level in this method of analysis. These retracement levels are valuable for forex traders because they help us evaluate the price action to predict future price behavior.

Evaluating the price action using Fibonacci retracement will help you identify strategic opportunities to buy orders, set stop losses, target prices, and much more.

You can combine this concept with other indicators like Tirone levels, the Elliot wave theory, Gartley patterns, among others. Resistance and support levels can be seen after significant price movements. Unlike moving averages, Fibonacci retracement levels don’t change over time; they are static price levels.

Hence, the identification becomes simple using these retracement levels, allowing you to react very fast when a price level changes. Think of these levels as infection points where you can expect either a break or rejection in the price action.

Creating a Trading Strategy using Fibonacci Retracement

You can use Fibonacci retracements for a few trading strategies. For instance, in bullish or bearish price action, you can use 38.2% and 61.8% retracement levels to determine a continuation pattern, as well as correlation and pullback degrees. You can deploy a breakout strategy if the retracement appears to be active in indicating resistance or support levels.

You can also adopt another strategy using the 38.2% retracement level to take long positions using a stop-loss order below 50% retracement level. You can alternatively use the 61.8% level to place a stop-loss order and enter a long position at a 50% level.

Around the peak of a big move, you can also deploy Fibonacci retracement levels in short order and use the levels as take-profit marks. However, while Fibonacci levels are popular technical indicators being used in forex trading, they don’t consider variables that affect the price action like trading volume, volatility, and other crucial data points, which makes them limiting at revealing more about a trading pair.

They purely reflect an asset’s price on the chart in relation to the previous price. Therefore, we recommend using Fibonacci retracement levels with other technical information for accurate predictions.

According to the key ratios, if you use the retracement levels, you can set target prices or stop losses because you can measure and evaluate continuation patterns through Fibonacci numbers. Resist looking at the same levels because prices can just fall short or push past a level.

Give yourself leeway for any potential price fluctuations around these retracement levels with reference to stop and limit orders. The versatility of retracement levels is not limited to a single time frame but across different time frames. Hence, relying solely on the retracement levels to take a position in the forex market can be detrimental and frustrating.

In Conclusion

Managing and molding a trading strategy is never easy, but by appropriately handling certain basics, it can be more accessible. The forex market always moves in waves, and the patterns keep repeating over time. Fibonacci retracement levels will help you mark reversal points. To position yourself for larger margins and better performance, we recommend combining Fibonacci retracement levels with other technical analysis indicators and strategies.