Limit orders

This time rather than hurl myself into the market I tried a limit order for WSD short at 10400. Certainly at first appearance a better way of doint things
Also used the close position popup to size the deal - something I'd wish I'd seen when I had the RIO deal going definitely would have reduced to 0.50
For the record - the market jumped up over 10400 held on an reduced exposure by 0.25 at start point. Took another 0.25 profit and finally closed at +50 pips

P&L +31

Reduced exposure on AUDUSD short by 0.10. Current size is 0.40

P&L -4

Buying at the top / Selling at the bottom

I wonder if this tendency is because the price is pausing at these points? Pausing long enough to execute at the wrong time?

The final deal

God what an evening. Shall I repeat my manta?
Don't try and catch falling knives

Given that despite the euro being in horrendous trouble is actually gaining against the aussie it really looks to me as if the aussie is heading for a correction.
But rather than reverse my previous thinking with AUDEUR I have decided to go short long term on AUDUSD with a plan to just leave it

Sell AUDUSD Forward Sep @ 8730 (stop 9400)

My stop is at 9400 which is most of what remains of the tatters of my account!

The wrong thing at the wrong time

Every time the wrong direction at the wrong time

RIO -124
AUDEUR stock market wipeout plunged by - 50
Trying to sell AUDEUR -14

Total FAIL

Lessons to be learned
Don't try and catch a falling knife no matter how much the indicators shout at you

Hideous Risk

Long RIO @ 3227- Christ the spread is huge!!!!!

Pivot 3203, S1 = 3115, R1 = 3282, S2= 3037, R2 = 3370

Long AUDEUR @ 7071

Missed the AUDEUR by about 10 pips so in at this level

EURUSD P = 12866, S1 = 12736, S2 = 12659, R1 = 12943, R2 = 13073

Shoulda held in there

AUD jumped from 7015 to 7050 and kept rising against EUR at approx 15:00. Another moral victory ;-)

Managed to go short GBPUSD at 10:27 which was good move to regain. Out now as currency could be greatly effected by news

P&L 14

Setting up order to go long AUDEUR at 7035 which is between pivot point a support according to calculator (P = 7053, S1 = 7025, S2 = 6974)

Close AUDEUR

Didn't do what I expected overnight so closed

P&L -3

Went long on GBPUSD 15175 0.75 (up from my usual 0.50) per pt. All indicators on up trend, then dropped away closed at 15134 dropping through a resistance at ~15150

P&L -31

Long AUDEUR @ 7015

I noticed that the aussie did not fall as much as I thought it might and that even as I said before go on to make new highs.
With my other theory of once the %K indicator crosses into the >75 region with RSI lagging is a time to go long I have gone long here. Also I note that of all the central banks Australia is the only one putting it's rates up, 4.50% currently.
As it happens hourly and daily indicators are very similar

Close EURAUD @ 6981

Have decided to come out of this one with a small profit. I feel it is a bit of a risky bet as the euro is a dodgy currency at the moment however much the Australia seems to be marching headlong into it's own house price bubble. Australian Central Bank interest rates 4.25% (up on 06/04/10)

It could well press on to make new highs from here

P&L 15

Note : they raised them again to 4.5% today at 7am

Short AUD/EUR @ 7012

I noticed that the AUDEUR is right at the top of its range. Also the daily RSI is dropping even though the price is rising, and the hourly and daily stochatics have turned over. However, this could mean nothing, and could be far too early, but note the big drop the previous night
Giving this one 88 pips of breathing room

Wall Street Daily quickie

My "feeling" was that with the Greek deal and no other particularly bad news I reckon that buying some Wall Street before the bell would be a good trade. Also the setup look good so I went long at 13:48 11055

As it happens I was correct and sold with a 20 pip profit (11075). A trade lasting about an hour. Of course I sold out too early as of writing the index stands at 11100. However it's easy to forget that the deal dropped to -18 at one point.

I think I should be looking for a 2:1 profit margin?

P&L +20

Moral victory

Closed deal for +5 profit but a moral victory as the graph shows. Now must wait until a similar set up shows itself on other currency pairs

Not taking this one

For posterity here is a deal I have decided to reject as the indicators for daily are the exact opposite of the hourly. The hourly indicates buy - the daily says sell

Short EUR/USD @ 13329

Probably a bit too early with this one and really should have waited, therefore will allow a fair margin. Stop at 13410
Using my new theory of all RSI, MACD and Stochatics are close to the top although MACD is further ahead than the others

Back where I started

After a bad morning tried to get back in the evening. Another mistake really - as I already know that after 19:00 the volatility drops, and without volatility profits are sparse. Still - went for a short on 15278 GBPUSD because of my "setup" ie stochastics crossing into the <20 and RSI still high. However lost faith and closed at 15301 20:54 (mainly because I wasn't sure when the market would close). The pair then proceeded to do exactly what I predicted and dropped to 15267. As before though a poor trade because without volatility these trades don't work properly.

A better trade would have been short on Wall Street Daily at 19:30 when I opened the dealing platform at 10087. My feeling was of a late selloff. As it happens I did take a short at 11020 and closed a 11015 right at the end of the day when the selloff gained a bit of momentum. Was this instinct or just guessing

P&L - 12

Back where I started!

Follow your instincts

Interesting scenario today. I opened up a long position on GBPUSD for the 7:30-8am surge. It arrived then died away. At the same time I noticed that the EURGBP was in a "setup".
I had both open at approx 8:30 and despite that my instincts were to go with the EURGBP because the stochastics for GBPUSD were in the >70 for longer than I though would be good and RSI was dropping and the EURGBP was showing stronger signs of trending up I went with the GBPUSD because I reckon I know more about it's movements.

P&L -5 (EURGBP) 8:30am
P&L -18 (GBPUSD) 11:30am

In hindsight should have gone with my instincts?

Evening deal

"Traditional" trading thinking would have it that once the stochastics move into the the >80 territory it is in overbought territory, and <20 territory is oversold. On examination of charts would seem to indicate actually going long on the "overbought" signal and short on the "oversold" is a more succesful route as the stock keeps trending up until the point at which it changes direction. It is then at the trader's discretion to take a profit.
This would seem to avoid the prediction trap that I have been falling into.

13198
13200

P&L = +1 woot!

Maybe use RSI to dectect once a trade should be closed when it moves into >70 territory (overbought) <30 (oversold)

Morning deal

With my "research" showing that a lot of action occurs at between 7 and 9am I decided to do a quick bit of dealing. Waited until there was a surge down then when short 1
Open 15221
Close 15209
P & L +12
Very short deal space
The question is : is this luck or actually instinct?

Well, after nearly a year away from dealing because of a horrendous loss trying to be too clever on a bond deal.
Basically I tried to set a buy above and sell below based on when the Fed decided to either continue or stop their QE policy. What actually happened was that the market oscillated wildly first rising to my buy before dropping to the stop loss at the same time activating the sell position before rising to it's stop loss end result was an 800 GBP loss.
On my other account I could have made about 100 on a USDJPY short but I failed to cash in and the position reversed.

So slowly getting back to trading. Have noticed that most of the GBPUSD action seems to occur at about 7-9am then again at approx 3pm. It would be best to deal here I think. Have made 3 small but positive deals

However made a poor deal today going long on EURUSD 0.5GBP. Unfamilarity with the movements of this pair was my downfall? I thought I could see a double bottom and thought the bad news had been priced in. P/L -47 (could have been worse but I shut it down) Also a credit agency downgrade on Portugal smashed the euro

Correctly surmised that there would be panic sell on Wall Street about 45mins to half and hour before the end so went short 1 GBP a point. Did this twice for a profit of 23GBP but if I had just stayed in I could have tripled this. Oh well, live and learn

Have my eye on Next as a short