Good ship Lotsapips $5k Challenge 2012

Capitan Wraith is a FOREX new comer who has recently ridden the back and wrestled with both the bucking Bull and raging Bear. Accounts smashed and tattered, having learned from the hardships of FOREX he is now embarking on a voyage to the land of profit. Wraith is keenly looking for a crew to join in this epic journey.

Live accounts, regular updates, watch me stride triumphantly into the land of profit or be smashed recklessly on the rocks of loss.

Learn from me before you make the same mistakes.

All Kidding aside my Forex club at work has issued a challenge of turning $100USD into $5000USD the fastest (cough cough). Winner is first to $5000USD or the trader with the most cash left on 16th Dec 2012.

This is a tall order but thought it might be fun to post all the live trades here for feedback. This will prove to be either a quick ride to ruin or a lot of fun. I'm tempted to just leave the $100USD in the account and see how that fears in December.

Parameters so far.

 

1. START 12th Jan 2012. New Zealand time
2. Times will be in NZ daylight savings time (my local time) though the charts will show FXCM server time
3. Trading a FXCM micro account and using FXCM Trading station as the software
4. Starting balance $100USD
5. I will endeavour to keep this updated on a regular basis ie. If I trade that day.
6. I will provide a report of the trades and profit and loss for the week. This will be the same one provided by my live account only my contact details etc will be removed.
7. I will try to provide reasons for my entry and exits from trades with charts.

 

1. I'm not a forex professional and trade for fun and so follow my methods or do as I do at your own risk.
2. You are unlikely to learn anything new that's not already available here by way of strategy except how I execute it.
3. Keep posts cordial please.
4. Always looking for ways to improve so please feel free to constructively contribute to help me rip my colleagues apart.

Plan for week starting 16/01/2011 Post #7 indicators entry exit points excreta.

Also will be posts and videos on a blog here and when possible videos on youtube

I will be mainly trading the following pairs.

EUR/USD
GBP/USD
USD/JPY
NZD/USD
EUR/NZD
EUR/AUD

When looking at the details on the FXCM charts or reports 1 lot = $1000 hence micro account.

Well Off to a bad start already.

Haven't lost any cash yet but I did over deposit so had $115 in account instead of the $100 that I needed oh well life will go on.

Also missed a lot of nice movement on pretty much all the currencies I'm trading while in bed last night. It would have been nice to have got a few pips last night to start with but at least nothing was risked and lost.

It can only get better with this start. $5k beckons.

Well the title of this posts says it all. As promised I have included a trading statement form 11th Jan to now and it makes for very very unpleasant reading.

I was like a man possessed yesterday, breaking all of the good habits I have been successfully keeping at bay on my main account for the last 5 months.

A short list of how badly I did yesterday..... cry

 

1. Not following and sticking to my risk plan hence burning through 49% of my starting $115
2. Entering trades just because I wanted to see something running
3. Not entering on higher probability trades
4. Getting consumed by competition and allowing that to dictate panic trading
5. Trading on a big news day without looking at fundamentals. I still have a lot to learn about fundamentals and usually don't trade these days while I'm getting a feel for their effect
6. Left trades running while I slept that were not designed to be daily+
7. Opened to many trades at once
8. Didn't pick a direction to trade and stick to it, instead chopping and changing randomly on whim

Just glad I resisted doing any of this on my main account, which safely stayed closed yesterday meaning I missed the EUR/USD move but at least didn't lose anything.

So what made me do all these rookie mistakes all over again? after I though I had a little more control of them. I think a lot of it has to do with the psychology of account size, and competition. $115 is not a lot in the big picture and I treated it like that. Instead of biding my time I wanted to run to many hail Mary's just to get ahead of my colleagues in the competition. I forgot my FOREX style of late that has been successful for me in taking small gains and minimising losses. After-all this competition has all year (or until someone hits $5000USD, which I think will take a while).

Current competition spread $10 - $237. So I'm not sitting to badly and with the ability to top up accounts to $100USD I'm not out of the running yet.

(hangs his head in shame and rocks back and forth)

Well the past two days have humbled me again. Actually has been a very good exercise in shoring up my short comings as a trader to re-evaluate. I'll continue to look but going back to "MANAGING that RISK". Taking a deep breath and thinking before jumping.

Well it's been a crazy couple of day so far. My account plunged to $39 topped it up with a $55 and $25 deposit which are allowed in the competition if the balance of the account is drops below $100 it can be topped back up to $100.

I should have stayed clear of the Swiss and GBP today as they contributed heavily to the days losses.

Had two opportunities to close out trades +$200 which would have placed me in profit after the deposits of the last two days ($195). However I was greedy I lost the opportunity. Had my stops hit a few times accounting for losses against the EUR/USD as they were set to tight and I manually moved them in too tight. I went in heavy on the move ignoring my risk policy and had a couple of margin calls also eat away at my daily profit.

All that chop should now be left behind me for next week as I settle into my plan.

Account statement included. Overall -13% on investment so far.

Well I had a bad start to this competition but I'll now revert to the tried and true method that's been ticking my larger account over nicely for the last 5 months, though it probably wont win me the competition it may just see me reach 5k by Christmas.

THIS IS NOT A STRATEGY just the way I've rolled for the last 5 months on my main account. Follow it at your own risk, back-test it to see that you can follow it before going whole hog. Nothing is new here it's just they way I mix many of the plans available for you to see here on Forex Factory and elsewhere.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7029/6...8f5f4d0f_b.jpg

The exit indicated on the chart are hard exits based on MACD rule bellow. Here most of the trades didn't go to the hard exit point because they were tripped by one of the other exit rules.

Indicators (indicators are just that, indicative and are just for increasing you probability's and not definite and can give you false signals) don't forget to keep an eye on the FUNDAMENTALS, support and resistance.

This system trades mostly from the 15 min chart but I will look at the DAILY, 4Hour and 1Hour charts for trends. If I want to really play it safe I'll only trade with the trend. I also look at the currency forums here. I'm learning a lot more, about how others are feeling and their reasoning, its been very very helpful to see others charts and their interpretation of fundamentals influence.

This will only yield a few trades a day on most currencies. You may have to adjust the settings to get something that fits nicely with the way you trade and the currencies you trade.

15 Min Chart

EMA 20 Orange line
EMA 100 Purple line
Bollinger Band 31 1
Heikin-Ashi
MACD default but 2 horizontal lines at + - .00015
Woodies CCI 33 3 2 horizontal lines at + - 80%

Opening conditions.
Long

1. EMA 20 crossing to up side or above 100 EMA
2. Previous candle has closed outside the upper Bollinger band
3. MACD line is at Zero or above and Histogram bar is touching or broken through +.00015 line
4. Woodes CCI shows green and is touching or above 80% line

Short

1. EMA 20 crossing to bottom or below 100 EMA
2. Previous candle has closed outside the lower Bollinger band
3. MACD line is at Zero or bellow and Histogram bar is touching or broken through -.00015 line
4. Woodes CCI shows red and is touching or bellow -80% line

Closing conditions
Manual out
Get out when you feel its right.

The 4 , 2 and out.
Let the trade run for 4 periods (1 hour). After the four periods exit the trade if 2 candlesticks in a row changes colour get out. I often exit this way without waiting for the candle to close. Usually after 5 or some minutes into a candle you can expect the candle to remain that colour.

Limit hit
Set limit as you see fit for the conditions

MACD histogram line swings to the other side. Eg from above the line to below the line. I will sometimes hold on depending on how many pips I have ahead at this time as it will sometimes swing back for further gains if the line penetration is small reverting to manual out or other condition to be meet.


I plan to follow this to the letter next week with my improved risk plan and see if I can focus more to grow the account.

Also attached is my risk spreadsheet new and improved with high/low open close data etc.

Well I lost I made a sum total of $272 before a winer raced ahead and made the $5k. He used and all in stratergy with almost flawless EUR/USD trades. Trading only the one currency was probably the best practice and whith all the movement in the past 2 weeks it made it quite easy for him to complete the challenge.

Oh well next challenge will be .....