First Post Booker Trade

I opened my first "post booker" trade this morning at 4:15 a.m. in the GBP/USD following a break of the lower channel at 1.7849.  Since then is has worked itself against me a bit barely stopping my position out.  As of 4:42 a.m., my position is still open.  Of course it would be nice to come out on top in my first trade since starting 1 on 1 training but we'll have to wait and see.

There are some economic reports coming out of Eurozone and Germany during the current session along with U.S. Consumer Confidence and Existing home sales at 10:00 a.m. EST.  I'm off to the gym at 5 a.m. and will try to pick up the US session at 7 a.m. this morning (My routine sounds like Raghee Horner's.)  She has stated that she sometimes looks at European session action before going to the gym and then concentrates on the US session.  I was going to the gym before all of this so I don't want everyone to think I'm trying to fanatically emulate her behavior though if this is what it took to consistently be profitable, I would do it.

Top Forex Sites

The Top 100 Forex Sites has been updated.  Please remember this is based on traffic reports from Alexa, a subsidiary of Amazon.   There are some new sites in the top 100 that weren't there before.  I'll actually have to get to the point where I'm keeping history so we can all see if certain sites are changing in rank from week to week.  No surprise that Saxo Bank is #1 again considering all the advertising they do.

Top 100 Forex Sites  

Rob Booker Week 2

I'm counting this as a new week even though I didn't sign on with Rob Booker 1 on 1 training until late last week.  

I got up early this morning (4 a.m. EST) to look for setups specifically in the GBP/USD.  The real move happened earlier than this between 2:00 a.m. and 3:00 a.m. so I kind of missed it.  I really don't know what to do if there is a large move like this before I wake up.  It kind of makes me feel like there's no way I can just jump in and feel at flow with the market.  There may be a way of trading after this or this may be one of those times when you just sit on the sidelines.  There was a time when I jumped right in the market just to be in it but I didn't feel any urge to do so this morning.

I haven't heard much from Rob in the past couple of days.  I saw him online this morning but he was off before 11 a.m.  He has previously stated that he tries to stay out of the market on Monday and just concentrates on trading the rest of the week.   

It's tough for us full-timers to find enough time to trade during the more volatile times the market has to offer.  I will continue to try to get up early for the European session but I almost think that 4 a.m. may be a bit too late.  If I find out that this is the case, I'll try to do what I have to trade the US session at 7 a.m.  I have to be at work by 9 a.m. so I don't know if it is a viable alternative to trading the European session.   I can always look for setups between 7 a.m. – 8:30 a.m. and if I enter a trade, set the appropriate stop loss and limits before going to work.  I can then manage the trade if my position is still open from my Treo.  I can either do this or get a job working 2nd or 3rd shift.  This isn't something I would ever do but it may be an option for you.

Free Raghee Horner Webinars This Weekend

Raghee Horner announced today that she will have 2 webinars this weekend.  The first is called "Setting Up Your Entries with Advanced GET Charts."  This webinar allows you to watch as Raghee walks you through the three type of entries she uses. The second is "Master Order Execution with Raghee Horner" with a description as follows:

Raghee will share her entry techniques using eSignal's Advanced GET charts
which attendees of this FREE WEBINAR can get free through TradeDirectFX*.
Advanced GET charts will allow you to set up the Wave, draw trendlines, support,
and resistance as well as use all the Fibonacci retracement and extension levels she uses every day. 
See set ups of momentum trades, swing trades, as well as Raghee's Wave/CCI
trade and learn specifically when to use each.

Both webinars are this Saturday, the first at 1 p.m. EST and the second at 4 p.m. EST and are FREE. I've been to her previous 4 webinars and found them all very beneficial if not for her commentary also for the contacts you meet in the room.  

I've already registered for these 2 events.  I would recommend you do the same.

Click Read More to see the attached email with register details. 

[Read more]

New Forex Trading Goal and Performance

I've been keeping track of my performance for the past 18 weeks where every trade has been recorded and end of week performance graphed.  I have since created a new goal and performance page since signing on with Rob Booker 1 on 1 training.  The old page is still intact and the link to it can be found from the new page at http://www.forexproject.com/My_Forex_Goal/ or from the left menu, My Goal & Performance.

My long-term goal remains the same, quit my day job and trade full-time.  Isn't this goal what we all stive for?

My goal this week is to just net 20 pips!  That's it.  It doesn't sound like much but from Rob Booker's recommendation, that's what I'm sticking to.

Forex Volume April 18th Report

The latest Commitments of Traders Report was released today.

Name	Open Int	Long Pos	Short Pos
Crude Oil	495795	183102	116353
CAD	40999	23225	16307
CHF	43779	10744	32912
GBP	49814	27302	22208
JPY	118999	38749	79890
USD Indx	18272	11223	4994
EUR	86016	70019	14677
NZD	6072	5272	800
AUD	30108	20597	9436

Crude Oil – ↑ Very Bullish

CAD – ↑ Very Bullish

CHF – ↓ Very Bearish

GBP – ↑ Bullish

JPY – ↓ Very Bearish

USD Index – ↑ Very Bullish

EUR – ↑Very Bullish

NZD – ↑Very Bullish

AUD – ↑Very Bullish 

Rob Booker Posting from Week 1

The traffic to the site has increased quite a bit since I announced that I will be training with Rob Booker.  Therefore, to make it easier for those of you interested in keeping up with my training, I've added a link to the left menu titled, Rob Booker Posts.  You can also visit http://www.forexproject.com/Rob_Booker_Training/

The posts are neatly categorized by Week so if you click now you will see only the category, Week 1.   You can always go to the above link when you want to just view anything related to my training. 

Studying in Advance for Next Week

Booker has me a lot more attentive to upcoming Economic Releases and the trade opportunities that can arise.  Therefore, taking 1 day at a time, I took a look at the Global Economic calendar for Monday, April 24th to see if any pairs may exhibit volatility due to any releases.   It generally looks like a light day with NO economic releases out of the United States.  The UK does have a couple of releases at 4:30 a.m. EST including Retail Sales (month over month), Public Finances, and Money Supply (month over month.)  Last month during the retail sales announcement, the GBP/USD moved about 30-35 pips following. 

Therefore, I will plan on getting up at 4:00 a.m. Monday morning to look for a trade opportunity in the GBP/USD using short-term charts (15 minute?)

I'll be going through more of Rob's lessons this weekend and will keep everyone updated on my progress.

I hope everyone had a great trading week.   Have a relaxing weekend. 

Rob Booker 1 on 1 Day 2

I was pretty busy at work yesterday so I only had a little bit of time to go through the MACD training lesson.  Not much to report with this lesson.

I have made a decision to start waking up at 3:50 a.m. EST 3-4 days a week to see what this does for my trading.  Rob has told me to apply New York Session rules during this time frame which requires boxing in the price action.  Instead of using the NY time period, the box in will occur between 00:00 GMT and 07:00 GMT which is 8:00 p.m. EST – 3:00 a.m. EST.  

Rob has said that it is important to do the audio/video stuff daily.  At the end of the NY trading session, Rob posts multiple videos for multiple pairs with his trading commentary which I find very beneficial.  He calls this Charting School.  Since he will be back at his home base next week, I believe he posts charting school before the session also which may give me some ideas on setups.

During the first few days of 1 on 1 trading, I am already very satisfied with the direction.  Though Rob has some generic trading strategies and rules that he wants you to learn, he is responsive to your emails and tries to work his strategies around your interests and style.  He even told me that as soon as next week, he will start to post some Euro review session like he does for the New York session.  Now I don't know if this is just for me or if others have requested this but since I will be trading the Euro session in the upcoming weeks, this can only help my trading.

Rob was away this week writing his book which I think we will be getting a pre-release preview of.  

I will try to post as much as possible regarding my 1 on 1 trading going forward.  My posts in the upcoming weeks will give you a pretty good idea of what I've been learning so keep tuned.   

Most Volatile Pairs during Asian Session

Before I dive into this post, let me tell you that from everything I've read and watched from Rob Booker (and from everything he has directly told me) it doesn't seem like the Asian session exists to him.  Now he hasn't told me this exactly but he seems to concentrate his effort on the NY Session from 7 am EST – 11 am EST.  I told you earlier today that when he was working full-time, he was trading the European session and he did tell me yesterday that you will get a lot of trade opportunities from 4 am EST.  So from the information I've gathered, I'd have to say he recommends trading during the hours of 2 am and 11 am EST.  

What about the Asian session?  For those of you that work in the United States or Canada or anywhere close to the Eastern Time Zone, the Asian session gives us a chance to actually trade when we get home from work without having to get up in the early morning hours with 1/2 a nights sleep to trade the European session.   

I will ask Rob if he recommends trading the Asian session or if any of his student have success doing so.

What I wanted to do in this post was to mention the most historically volatile pairs during the Asian Session thanks to Kathy Lien from FXCM.  Kathy did a good amount of research on this subject and I thank her for the information though I have asked for absolutely no permission to use it.  These PIP ranges are for the time period between 7 p.m. – 4 a.m. EST

Currency Pairs	PIP Range
GBP/JPY	112
GBP/CHF	96
USD/JPY	78
USD/CHF	68
GBP/USD	65
AUD/JPY	55
EUR/CHF	53
EUR/USD	51
USD/CAD	47
NZD/USD	42
AUD/USD	38
EUR/GBP	25

As you can see from the chart above, the best options for risk-tolerant traders during this time period are the GBP/JPY, GBP/CHF, and USD/JPY.

For risk-averse traders, AUD/JPY, GBP/USD, and USD/CHF provide more moderate volatility.

The only problem I see with the risk-tolerant pairs, at least 2 of them is the spread.  The GBP/JPY spread at FXCM is 9 pips, the GBP/CHF 15 pips! The USD/JPY offers the lowest spread on FXCM at 4 pips.

The risk-averse pairs are a bit better spread wise with AUD/JPY at 8 pips, GBP/USD at 5 pips, and the USD/CHF also at 5 pips. 

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