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The myth of risk management - Hack it :) I speak to a lot of traders, new and veteran. It's surprising to see how so many are not sure how risk is calculated and what the exposure really means in terms of P&L. This obviously is a major block in the road on the way to gaining confidence necessary to avoid losses. So let's break it down - *P&L is calculated by lot size * movement. Example: If you have 100 ounces of Gold (1 lot) - That's $100 in P&L (Profit/loss) for each $1 Gold moves in value, so if the price 1890 and you are buying 1 lot , price moves by $5 higher - That's a $500 profit ($100*$) , same thing in reverse, if it would drop by $5 that's a negative of -$500 in open P&L. Leverage decides what you are technically able to open in terms of margin used. So if your leverage on Gold is 1:100 - The value of a 1 lot trade is the price of Gold multiplied by the amount of ounces , so let's say 1890*100 = $189,000 value trade, but your leverage is 1:100, so you would only need $1,890 of used margin (189,000:100) to open the trade. But if you have 1:20 as leverage, you would need 5 times more used margin to open the trade. So a common misconception is that your risk is your leverage. That's not true. Your risk is your lot size. But if you have very high leverage , than you can open very high lot size with a small account - Which is extremely dangerous and not advised. So what does an experienced , smart trader do? No matter what his leverage is, he understands the short-term and the long-term range of movement, and opens a lot size that fits the size of his account considering the range of movement. If the account size is $100,000 , and you are buying 1 lot of Gold: The weekly range is 1840-2,000 , the short-term range is 1880-1910 - Price is 1890 So the exposure is ~$1,000 in the short-term (1%) back to the short-term support 1880 , compared to $2,000 on the short-term resistance (2%) of 1910. The long-term exposure is to 1840, meaning a $5,000 exposure 5% ($100*$50) from 1890 - but 2,000 is the top of the weekly range, meaning - $110 up ($110*100) = $11,000 (11%). So didn't really matter what the leverage is 1:20 or 1:100, what matters here is the range and the lot size. Thank you for reading! ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you liked my educational idea please like and follow! It would mean the world to me! I promise to answer all comments/questions - I encourage you to communicate :) Thank you so much for reading - Looking forward to reaching as many of you guys as I can :D -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
BITSTAMP:BTCUSDEducation
by Exactus
Why do traders mostly lose? Point of viewFor 3-5 minutes while going through this forget what you know about trading. First thing is : Let's remember our goal, every successful action/plan started with a clear goal that led the way: In our case it's profit When starting to trade seeing the numbers go up and down plays with your head and emotion quickly tempting you with the unlimited potential at your fingertips. Even experienced traders that had some lucky streaks forget that the wanted end result is simple - to be in the money, meaning, making profits consistently. In order to secure our goal of making profit we need to first start with remembering this is not a 'get rich quick' scheme and there is no magic - A big bunch of money won't fall on your head out of nowhere, at least not consistently. Now - remember this : It's a lot better to be consistently profitable than to have a series of a few winning streaks . With this in mind, it's great if you would put up a sticky note on your screen reminding this - As at times it gets hard keeping sight when numbers run wild. I see many traders look at between 5-10 crypto currencies, 3 commodities and 10 currency pairs - Deciding based on a variety of different things what to trade on every time. This way of action has no structure at all - Which makes it very hard to reach a certain target: profit. It is necessary to have focus, structure and a plan with a single minded mission: PROFIT. But not just any profit - smart profit, a profit that was a result of planned action. So how do you make a plan? The easiest way to effectively craft a well thought out plan is to focus on between 2 to max 3 instruments Learning the range, price action and tendencies of 2-3 instruments can be done within a few weeks going through 1h, 4h and weekly time-frames and determining the short-term and long-term projections of each of the 2-3 instruments. Once you start seeing the patterns and understanding the price action continue by implementing what you learned on the instruments on a demo account testing a possible strategy that relies on clear idea of what to do with every possible scenario. You may not get it right with the first strategy, so try others until you find one that shows consistent results - while mastering the 2-3 instruments you have chosen and continuing to following up on a daily basis on relevant news, changes in trends on short-term and long-term projections. For me - Because I've dedicated years trading and following Gold and WTI , learning how and why it moves - I prefer trading a swing trading strategy, keeping trades open between 3 days to 2 weeks usually, this puts my bigger picture understanding of the instruments into true effect The difficulties you will find while searching for your strategy are - *Greed *Fear *Lack of patience *Lack of discipline in plan Don't let them in - Remember your plan and one and only goal : consistent profit! Thank you for reading, Let me know what you think and what you would like to hear more about :D
BITSTAMP:BTCUSDEducation
by Exactus
3
Anaplan (NYSE: $PLAN) Solutions Fix Supply Chain Issues! ⛓️Anaplan, Inc. provides a cloud-based connected planning platform to connect organizations and people. Its platform in-memory data storage and calculation capabilities deliver calculations of data in real time and provide a single source of information for planning, ensuring the consistency, quality, and integrity of the data that is used in various areas of an organization, such as finance, sales, supply chain, marketing, human resources, and operations. The company delivers its application over the Internet as a subscription service using a software-as-a-service model, as well as offers professional services related to implementing and supporting its application. It has operations in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific. The company was founded in 2008 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
PLong
by RedHotStocks
1
Is Trading “Gambling” or “Risky” ? Explained in business terms.Hi everyone: The question that most people will ask is whether trading is the same as “gambling”. Throughout the 9 years of my trading journey, this has always been brought up and asked about many times. Of course anyone is entitled to think based on their perspective and view, so I am not here to argue or convince them otherwise. Rather, I am here to share some key aspects of what I learned in trading for the last 9 years, as well as years in the business world to discuss the difference between “Gambling” and “Risky” in trading and in business. Most people who have never traded in their lives, but have heard about trading, usually assume trading is some sort of get rich quick scheme. They often assume it's a type of “gamble”. Since most people around them probably lost money in trading. It's not surprising as the statistics don't lie, 90-95% retail traders lose money in trading and quit eventually. But what most people don't know is “why” and “how” they lose money in trading. It's usually a combination of poor mindset and emotion. No systematic plan, no risk management, get rich quick thinking, revenge/over trading, fear of missing out, and alot more psychological issues. They did not put in the time and effort to succeed. Which then resulted in traders losing money and quitting. Eventually making up excuses of why they fail in trading, and blame the market, the broker, the strategy. All these no doubt also resulted in what normal people will say trading is a “gamble.” On the other hand, is trading “risky” ? Trading is just like any other businesses out there, that will be risky due to unforeseen circumstances. Businesses face external factors that they can not control, just like in trading. Businesses have internal expenses, overhead costs, labour, loans, C.O.G.S…etc as well as many competitions within their respected industry. It requires hard work and determination to succeed. Even for larger businesses that are where they are today, they were all risky when they started. Was Amazon Risky ? Was Tesla Risky ? Was Facebook Risky ? Absolutely. But that did not stop their owners from putting in maximum effort and time to make it work. Trading is no different, you are the owner, director and the CEO of your trading account. So, don't confuse and get “gamble” and “risk” mixed up. It's up to us individually to acknowledge and understand the difference between the two. The truth is, successful traders understand the difference between “gamble” and “risk”. To remove the “gambling” aspect from trading, is to have a well written trading plan, proper risk management, right trading psychology, positive mindset and control emotion. Whatever strategy you decide to implement is not really the cause of your success or failure, but rather those I mentioned above. This way, you remove almost all the “gambling” aspect away from trading, and it is now “risky” but bearable for you to handle. Will trading always be “risky” ? Sure, it is a business and anything can happen unexpectedly and out of nowhere. But successful traders understand the importance of treating trading like a business, so contingency plan, back up plan, trading plan, management plan, and much more should be carefully thought out so you will know what to do when you are hit with sudden surprises like in a business operation. The worst thing we can do is to not be part of any “risk”. If we are so relaxed, laid back, and have no stress to motivate us to move forward, then we stay within our “comfort” zone. We become so glued to our 9-5 job which we then think it's safe. But, we will forever be in a rat race against many others who are better than us in credentials that will land that higher position/salary that we want. “So to me, without taking a “risk” in life is the biggest “gamble” that you can do in life.” Welcome to let me know and share with everyone what you think about this topic :) Thank you Jojo
BITSTAMP:BTCUSDEducation
by jojofang0901
41
A brief explanation on the importance of risk managementEvery human activity has its ups and downs. You may face good days and bad days and it’s a norm in any other human kind activities. Read history! Did all dynasties get consistently stronger? In politics, did popularity rates of political figures get better day by day? Sure not! Even in natural events, you see uneven decreases and increases. Not only the annual rainfall rates are not always the same, but the rate of increases and decreases varies from year to year. So strategies and setups won’t always work because they simply are man-made things to predict a human-based activity! They may fail, expire or disused someday, because this is the neutrality of nature and creatures including humans and their markets. For the last instance, even stars grow and fall. I know there are some traders who claim their strategy will never expire. They may be liars, but they are not necessarily liars! Those who believe their strategy will never expire will admit that their strategy had bad days too. I like to say their strategy has expired and reactivated again and since they consider longer cycles (monthly, yearly or even bigger) they believe their setup has never expired. If we want to be more precise their strategy has expired but just for shorter periods (may be just for hours!). Let me explain a little more technical, every setup is compatible with specific conditions of the market and they will fail in other markets’ conditions and traders are not foreteller but predictors, so they sometimes may get conditions have changed and sometimes they predict it wrong or get the change so late! So they sometimes make profit and sometimes don’t. For example RSI overbought and oversold strategy do not make profit in trending market on the side of the trend! I mean if markets are bullish, overbought is a norm not a sign of reversal (most peak of reversals happens in overbought or oversold but not every oversold is a sign of reversal in a trending market) and in a super bullish trending market you almost can’t find any RSI oversold. So you should use another setup! ( some traders using kind of strategy which has different setups for different conditions of market, they actually guess when their strategy is going to expire) I divide the professional traders by methods that they choose to avoid using an unsuitable for market conditions into four general categories. 1- Ignorers: Since they got a conservative risk management strategy and they could easily ignore expiration phenomena and trade without worrying about expiration. 2- Rule makers: They have different setups for different conditions. They specify some rules to distinguish market conditions and adapt new setups to their trades. Rules could be created by using both indicators or indicator-free (price action) chars. 3- Sentimental Market traders (in case of expiration): Some traders do not use specific rules! They simply just sense market conditions has changed. They differ from rule makers because they don’t use a specific rules every time. They may use some rules unconsciously but those rules may differ time to time. 4- Equity curve analyzers. They simply analyze equity curve! They make specific rules to start using or stop using a strategy! For example they will stop using it if it is a loss-maker one for 2 weeks (this one won’t work in most strategies) or they simply try to use price action rules to analyze EC of a setup! “Mark Douglas (1990) is saying that if traders were to chart their equity, these charts would look very much like the typical bar charts and charts like these also can have the same predictive value as in the markets” “Procedia Economics and Finance 32 ( 2015 ) 50 – 55” these kind of traders may use indicators like SMA or WMA to predict profitability of a setup in future and they are also eager to use price action rules. I believe no method is superior to another, the way an experienced trader use the method is important! But having a method to avoid large losses is necessary. And all traders consciously or unconsciously use one of them. Most price action traders are ignorers. Their strategy may expire but for short period of time. For example mine is expired right now but I’ll continue using it cause I know it’s temporarily and I don’t know when exactly it will reactive again. I also use a self-made auto-trading expert which use different indicator based setup and since the period of expirations of that setups are long, I use EC analyzing methods to detect expirations . No matter which method you use, you can’t be an always winner trader! Ignorers may loss and they will name it exceptions. Rule makers’ rules may detect and signal expiration too soon or too late! The 3rd and 4th kind of traders may make mistakes too. There is no single trader in the world with 100% win rate in long-term! That's why you need to limit our risks, I like optimism in life (I prefer pessimism in back-tests) but you should not be deluded, you should think what happen if you lost some consecutive trades? If you risk more than you can handle consecutive losses emotionally, You will empty your trading account, no matter how good a teacher you had or how much you have practiced or how great trading past you have or how experienced you are or even how much you believe your emotions are in control of you (you actually can’t control in real big loses trading), YOU NEED TO LIMIT YOUR RISK by managing it in a way that your trading is profitable enough and simultaneously do not be destructive at certain times "Profit a little less but more consistent." There are also too many other important rules for money and risk management and you should take them into consideration too. Best Regards, Alisignals
OANDA:XAUUSDEducation
by AliSignals
GBPUSD LONG - Einstein Says So Hi traders Please check out our simple analysis of Gbp/Usd. Again this was on our watch list from a 4hr our perspective last week so I thought id share the daily perspective to give you the bigger picture. I do anticipate we could see the top of the channel but my exit will be at the 0.618 of the impulsive move. Do you agree with this set up? If you do let me know in the comments below. Hope you have a profitable week and remember keep it simple stupid! The Fx Chartist
Long
by TheFxChartist_
1