Saturday, October 29, 2011

Money Management

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Is there a secret to becoming a successful trader?
There is a method that all successful traders use, and it’s no secret. It’s called
money management.


Money management is not some vague industry lingo – it simply means the
knowledge and skill of managing your Forex trading account. As simple as that
may seem, it’s the key to a long and successful trading career. And yet it is often
forgotten or neglected in the thrill of the trade. We’d like to take this opportunity
to lay out some ground rules by which you can effectively manage your account.
Don’t go looking for the Big Win; it will most likely result in a big loss. Successful
trading means consistent trading, where small wins amount to large long term
profits. Never assume that all your trades will be profitable, and plan on losses.
Add caption


You should only risk a small percentage of your total account balance on each
trade. This simply minimizes your risk, so that even if you end up losing your
entire investment on a trade, it doesn’t have a critical effect on your account
balance. The recommended amount is 2% of your account balance per trade.
More aggressive traders go as high as 5%, but never higher than that. It is a very
important rule to keep, since the lower your account balance drops, the harder it
is to rebuild it.




Using Limit Orders
Learn to use the Stop Loss and Take Profit orders effectively. These orders protect
your investment and realize your profits. They are very simple tools that can make
all the difference to your account balance.
Size of Trades
You are suggested to open small trades, because in the case of a losing trade, you
can then open the opposite trade with a bigger investment or higher leverage,
thus compensating for losses.
Practice with Virtual Money
Use virtual money mode for practice. One of the unique features of eToro is that


our platform provides you with a practice environment. Virtual money mode
works exactly the same as real trading mode and uses the same real time rates,
with the small difference of no risk involved. We recommend using the practice
mode to get to know the platform and gain Forex trading experience.
And even after you’ve begun trading with real money, it is the perfect place to try

Sunday, October 2, 2011

Introduction About Forex



Retail participation in off-exchange foreign currency
(forex) markets has increased dramatically in
the past few years. If you are a retail investor considering
participating in this market, you need to fully
understand the market and some of its unique features.
Like many other investments, off-exchange foreign currency
trading carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for
all investors. In fact, you could lose all of your initial investment
and may be liable for additional losses. Therefore, you need to
understand the risks associated with this product.
You should also understand the language of the forex markets
before trading in those markets. The glossary in the back of this
booklet defines some of the most commonly used terms.




This booklet does not suggest that you should or should not
participate in the retail offexchange foreign currencymarket.
You should make that decision after consulting with your financial
advisor and considering your own financial situation and
objectives. In that regard, you may find this booklet helpful as
one component of the due diligence process that investors are
encouraged to undertake before making any investment decisions
about the off-exchange foreign currency market.
Finally, the discussion in this booklet assumes you are funding
your forex account with US dollars. The principles in this booklet
apply to all currencies,however 





Simple Trade

Are you ready? It's time to trade!






Here is a to-do list of actions to be taken as you open a trade:
- Identify the pair to buy/sell
- Decide on the initial investment amount
- Choose the appropriate leverage
- Consider applying trade limits (covered in the next chapter)
- Open trade
Let’s say that after spending some quality time on gazing at the charts of several
currencies, you’ve concluded that:




1) The EUR is trending up
2) The USD is trending down
Now, what is the reasonable decision based on this conclusion?
Clearly you can profit by first selling USD and buying EUR, and then buying
cheaper USD and sell expensive EUR.
We could do this by buying and then selling the EUR/USD currency pair.


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A reminder - buying is done at 'Ask' price, while selling is done at the “Bid” price.
Imagine that you bought $100 worth of EUR/USD with a leverage of 1:100 at the
exchange rate of 1.5461. The details of your trade are:
Investment $100
Leverage 1:100
Units sold 10,000
EUR/USD (Ask) 1.5461
In plain English, what you’ve just done is bought (100X100=) 10,000 Units of EUR
/USD, which at that specific rate represents 1.5461 USD per 1EUR.
Now, let’s assume that at the end of the day, or possibly even a few minutes later,
the EUR/USD rate has risen to 1.5538. You sell those 10,000 Euro/USD Units at
the new rate of 1.5538 and get $177 back.

How can I trade





Is there a secret to becoming a successful trader?
There is a method that all successful traders use, and it’s no secret. It’s called
money management.
Money management is not some vague industry lingo – it simply means the
knowledge and skill of managing your Forex trading account. As simple as that
may seem, it’s the key to a long and successful trading career. And yet it is often
forgotten or neglected in the thrill of the trade. We’d like to take this opportunity
to lay out some ground rules by which you can effectively manage your account.
Don’t go looking for the Big Win; it will most likely result in a big loss. Successful
trading means consistent trading, where small wins amount to large long term
profits. Never assume that all your trades will be profitable, and plan on losses.
You should only risk a small percentage of your total account balance on each
trade. This simply minimizes your risk, so that even if you end up losing your
entire investment on a trade, it doesn’t have a critical effect on your account
balance. The recommended amount is 2% of your account balance per trade.


More aggressive traders go as high as 5%, but never higher than that. It is a very
important rule to keep, since the lower your account balance drops, the harder it
is to rebuild it.
Using Limit Orders
Learn to use the Stop Loss and Take Profit orders effectively. These orders protect
your investment and realize your profits. They are very simple tools that can make
all the difference to your account balance.
Size of Trades
You are suggested to open small trades, because in the case of a losing trade, you
can then open the opposite trade with a bigger investment or higher leverage,
thus compensating for losses.
Practice with Virtual Money
Use virtual money mode for practice. One of the unique features of eToro is that
our platform provides you with a practice environment. Virtual money mode
works exactly the same as real trading mode and uses the same real time rates,
with the small difference of no risk involved. We recommend using the practice
mode to get to know the platform and gain Forex trading experience.
And even after you’ve begun trading with real money, it is the perfect place to try


Money Management



Is there a secret to becoming a successful trader?
There is a method that all successful traders use, and it’s no secret. It’s called
money management.
Money management is not some vague industry lingo – it simply means the
knowledge and skill of managing your Forex trading account. As simple as that
may seem, it’s the key to a long and successful trading career. And yet it is often
forgotten or neglected in the thrill of the trade. We’d like to take this opportunity
to lay out some ground rules by which you can effectively manage your account.
Don’t go looking for the Big Win; it will most likely result in a big loss. Successful


trading means consistent trading, where small wins amount to large long term
profits. Never assume that all your trades will be profitable, and plan on losses.
You should only risk a small percentage of your total account balance on each
trade. This simply minimizes your risk, so that even if you end up losing your
entire investment on a trade, it doesn’t have a critical effect on your account
balance. The recommended amount is 2% of your account balance per trade.
More aggressive traders go as high as 5%, but never higher than that. It is a very





important rule to keep, since the lower your account balance drops, the harder it
is to rebuild it.
Using Limit Orders
Learn to use the Stop Loss and Take Profit orders effectively. These orders protect
your investment and realize your profits. They are very simple tools that can make
all the difference to your account balance.
Size of Trades
You are suggested to open small trades, because in the case of a losing trade, you
can then open the opposite trade with a bigger investment or higher leverage,
thus compensating for losses.
Practice with Virtual Money
Use virtual money mode for practice. One of the unique features of eToro is that
our platform provides you with a practice environment. Virtual money mode
works exactly the same as real trading mode and uses the same real time rates,
with the small difference of no risk involved. We recommend using the practice
mode to get to know the platform and gain Forex trading experience.
And even after you’ve begun trading with real money, it is the perfect place to try

Stock Options Trading

If you own an option to buy or sell a stock, you can exercise that 


option any time on or before the expiration date. options trading requires you to identify stock options at extremes in volatility. These volatility extremes indicate the options are expensive and should be sold, or cheap and should be bought.This allows you to take possession or to sell the stock at the fixed price of the option regardless of the current market price of the stock.Trading stock options can be fun and it can also be risky. If you trade the right way the rewards are great, but if you don't you'll lose money.


A stock option is not a physical thing like holding shares in a company. Instead it is a contract between two parties. When you own stock (or shares) you actually own part of a physical entity--a piece of a company. An option is an agreement, or contract, where one party agrees to deliver something to another party within a specific time period and for a specific price. Options can also be less risky than holding stocks, but that is not always the case. If you plan on stock options trading at some point make sure you understand fully the risk and downside of each trade. Also, options take more attention and can amplify the movement of a stock in your favor or out of your favor very quickly. So options trading is not for everyone, especially if you are not comfortable taking on risk or managing positions.


Once you learn the power of stock options, investing will never be the same again. The versatility and profit potential of stock option investing is nearly unmatched in the stock market arena.Some of the successful investors believe that options trading is an investment of the rich. Trading in option allows you to make more money on the stock than if you bought the stock itself. Usually traders with small funds opt for option trading as they do not have the means to buy the actual stocks and they are able to make profits while risking only a small amount of money. So, when used properly, options trading is suitable for traders of any risk tolerance. 

Tactical usage of Leverage

If you’ve been at all exposed to the world of Forex you’ve probably heard the
word “Leverage” being tossed around. But what exactly is “Leverage”?
Leverage is a very important part of Forex trading, and it’s critical that you know
exactly how it works and how to use it. It is the term Forex traders use to refer to
the ratio of invested amount related to the trade's actual value.
Forex brokers usually provide their customers with the option to trade on
borrowed capital, so that traders don’t have to invest tens of thousands of dollars
for the chance to make any real profit. When you trade at a leverage of 1:100, or
X100, it means that for every $1 that you invest in the market, the broker invests
$100. As a result, you can control an amount of $10,000 by investing $100. eToro
provides traders with the opportunity of trading at up to 1:400 leverage.
It probably won’t surprise you when we say that with greater opportunity for
profit comes greater risk. Just like slight fluctuations in currency rates can make
you significant amounts of money, it can also cause you to lose your money very
quickly. The higher the leverage, the larger the profit that you stand to make and
the quicker you might lose your investment. A leverage of 1:400 can make you
more money than a leverage of 1:100, but it also puts your initial investment at
more risk.
If you trade with a leverage of 1:100 the market would have to move 100 pips
against you for your position to be wiped out. On the other hand, if you trade with
a leverage of 1:400 the market would only have to move 25 points against you for
your position to be wiped out.
We recommend first opening a position with a low 1:100 Leverage, and only once
you see that you’ve hit a strong trend, consider opening one with a 1:400
leverage.
The Ratio between Minimal Lot Size, Trade Size and Leverage
Fundamentally, the minimal lot size for a trade is $10,000, thus the leverage
limitations are set according to the amount you choose to trade:
Trade
Size
Minimal
Leverage Lot
25 400 10,000
50 200 10,000
100 100 10,000
The advantage of trading with Leverage is that while your profits potential is