Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Learn Forex - How To Make Money Trading Forex, The Trade Process

On the forex market we are trading currencies, exchanging a currency for another. So we buy a currency hoping its value will increase compared to the value of the one we are selling. Yes, we, at the same time, buying a currency and selling another currency. An example may be a little more understandable.

We have dollars and want to buy euros. The pair traded here is EUR/USD, and the exchange rate is 1.25. You can read it like this : 1 euro equals 1.25 dollar. We hope that the euro value will be higher so that later we will buy more dollar. The exchange rate increase to 1.35, in this case we bought 1 euro using 1.25 dollar, and it now equals to 1.35 dollar. So we exchange our 1 euro back into dollars and now have 1.35.

We bought 1 euro for $1.25 and sell it back for $1.35, we made a 10 cents profit. Of course on the forex market you will not buy only one euro, this will be few hundreds or thousands, depending on your budget and the leverage offered by the broker.

Exchange rates are always moving. When I say that you "hope" the value will increase, many factors can be used to predict the rate, based on technical or fundamental analysis. This is not the topic of this article so let's have another example of a selling trade.

We take the same pair (EUR/USD) as above starting with the same exchange rate (1.25). We want to sell euros so we can buy it later at a lower price. Here we hope, or know that the value of the euro will depreciate. We sell one euro for $1.25. The exchange rate drops to 1.15. That means that now we only need 1.15 to buy our euro back. We exchange our dollars back into euros and again, make a 10 cents profit.

When you buy or sell, you always buy or sell the base currecy. The base currency is the first one in the pair. In the pair EUR/USD, the base currency is the euro and the USD is called the quote currency. When you decide to buy, you buy euro and sell dollars. When you decide to sell, you sell euros and buy dollars.

Think that you always need to exchange something two times. If you buy something and want to make a profit from it, you would prefer to sell it at a higher price. And so, if you are selling something that you will need to buy again, you would prefer to have it at a lower price.

Learn To Trade The Forex: Forex Online Trading Systems Can Make You Rich

Foreign currency exchange trading (Forex) is creating a lot of buzz in investment circles, because it’s making many people very wealthy. Unlike the New York Stock Exchange, the forex market is open twenty-four hours a day. You can literally trade from sun up to sun down.

This is great news for anyone who has a job and other daily responsibilities. You can trade after work, or early in the morning at the crack of dawn. How often you trade and the time of day you choose is totally up to you.

The reason why so many people want to learn how to trade forex is because they hear stories about average folks, who have become forex traders, putting some money into a few good trades and making themselves a bundle – we’re talking thousands of dollars.

Is this kind of success in currency trading possible for you?

Yes, and no.

Yes, it is absolutely possible for you to learn how to analyze the market and pick winning trades. However, this success will not come overnight and will not come without some study and practice on your part.

Was that a buzz kill?

I hope not. It’s just a little cold water being splashed in your face. Look, online forex trading can be a little like gambling in Vegas. You’ve got your cash on hand, you’re sitting there at your computer looking at all the charts and currencies: dollar, yen, euro, etc.

You’re just itching to make some trades and even though you’re still green under the gills, you’re ready to jump in on that hot tip you got from your fellow trading buddy. The rent money’s due and you’ve got bills to pay, but you just know that if you make this one trade - you’ll make big bank!

Okay, this is where the excited new traders get happy, go all in and then . . . lose lots of money they can’t afford.

That’s right. While experienced traders are making nice profits on that hot tip, the newbies are getting wiped out clean, because they really don’t know what they’re doing and are betting their hard earned cash based on pure emotions. The first thing you need to learn about trading currencies is that you should NEVER make a trade like a gambler sitting at a roulette table letting it all ride on red.

The best traders are the ones that know how to keep their cool.

The best traders also learn how to read the forex news and analyze what trades they think are best given certain market conditions. Another golden tip is that you should never invest money that you need to keep a roof over your head, food in the fridge and the lights on at home. People who do this are gamblers and we already know that gamblers lose most of the time.

Successful traders have learned to risk no more than 2-3% of their total trading account. So, while they may make thousands, these investors have learned how to build on their success. When you have a winning trade, you take that money and invest it again and again.

To be safe, while you are learning how to trade in the forex market, you shouldn’t use real money period. You can open a demo trading account and make your trades without risking a cent. This way, when you lose, you can study that mistake and try to correct it. While all investors, even successful ones, lose money, you’ll be learning how to minimize your losses and increase your winning trades.

A good online forex trading system will show you the ropes and teach you how to look at trends and study market movement. You’ll also learn how to put in a strategic stop loss to keep you from losing too much money when the market goes against you.

When the time is right, and you are confident you can trade successfully (with a cool head) using real money, then jump in and go for the gusto!

The Elliott Wave Theory In Forex Trading

The Elliott Wave Theory that is used in Forex trading is named after a man by the name of Ralph Nelson Elliott, who was around in the nineteen twenties and thirties. Elliott was the person who discovered that stock markets did not behave in a somewhat chaotic manner, which was previously thought to be the case. He discovered that the stock markets traded in a repetitive cycles that were based on the emotions of investors and traders that are caused by outside influences or the mass psychology that is predominant at that specific time. Elliott also explained about how the up and down swings of the mass psychology always resulted in the exact same repetitive patterns, which he then divided into patterns that he designated waves. To claim this observation made by him, Ralph Elliott came up with the name The Elliott Wave Theory.

The pattern that is shown when a trending market moves is what Mr. Elliott called a five three pattern. The first five wave pattern is called impulse waves, and then the last three wave pattern is called corrective waves. During wave one, the initial upward move is taken. This is caused by a small amount of buyers who purchase, and this causes a rise in the price. In wave two, people who originally bought sell their investment, and this causes the price to dip, however, it will not go as low as the start price before it starts being bought again. Wave three is generally the strongest and longest of all the waves. This wave is when the general public notices the currency and wants to purchase it. This causes a price spike which exceeds the price at wave one. Wave four is when more people start to sell again, so the price dips. Wave five is when most people buy, and this is when the price because too much. At this point the ABC corrective waves come in. The three wave pattern is considerd wave counter trends. Letters are used instead of numbers for this three wave set.

According to The Elliott Wave Theory, the Forex market moves in predictable repetitive patterns called waves. A market that is trending moves in a five three wave pattern, with the first five waves are impulse waves, and the last three waves are corrective waves. By understanding what the waves represent in the Forex market, traders and investors can understand how the market is moving and how to maximize their investment while minimizing their risks in the Forex market.