Palmer's Journal 1 (Post here)

Hello Everyone,

I am new to forex and in this journal I'll be posting my reasoning and my trades as I trade. I have paper traded since September.

I was introduced by a roomate and started with Jim's price action thread and read a couple threads between and since, back in August. The 4-hour tunnel method was also pointed out to me so I adopted that. I recently opened an Oanda account in order to figure as much out as I could about real trading using only a $100 account. I will be posting my predictions and accumulating knowledge and feedback on this journal. In Journal #2 I will keep only my trades, a running profit/loss total, double check my money management and purely crunch numbers and analyze my decisions after the trade is made.

So, here goes (these notes are from 1/10 prior to entering any trades, but since Forex factory wouldn't let me post a journal until today they were predictions when I placed the limit trades and saved the pictures). I've picked up pieces of knowledge from posts, my roomate, and random sources, so feel free to ask questions of my notes aren't clear. Also a big hello to anyone that stops by, I have read a coupled pages on different journals and I hope to meet many of you over time.

As of 1/10/07:
I don't quite know how to put the picture in a readable format- I have uploaded them for now. In time this will improve.

USD/CHF
(Weekly)The Weekly trend was definitely down.
(Daily) The double high-low close bar suggested it was going down.
(4 Hour) The three bearish (down? I get them terms mixed up) bars in the graph suggested a trend continuation, and the consolidated bearish inside bars suggested a possible breakout to me.
(1 Hour) I also saw a possible pin bar (not really at a swing point, but still a pin) and either didn't find good confluence with Fib's or didn't try.

Entry: 1.09859 (below the lowest low of the last week)
Take Profit: 1.08950 (first tunnel entry/exit point)
Stop Loss: 1.10600 (Resistance support per the 4 Hour)
Outcome: Profit

The attached picture of my Oanda trade shows this trade was successful. In fact it was over before I was able to check on it the next morning. Had that not happened I would have moved the stop/loss and take profit up (and possibly been less profitable). For an exact running count see Journal #2.

EUR/USD
(Weekly/Monthly)The trend was definitely up. The weekly had a pin bar which looked strong to me, and looking back on my picture it looks like it poked through the 60% fib retrace on the weekly.
(Daily) The double low high close bounced off the 50% fib retracement. Both suggested strongly to me it was going up, but it had to break the resistance I saw at 1.4815 that used to be a support.
(4 Hour) The 4 Hour didn't show any decisive price action, but it looked to me like there was a resistance at 1.4815 (mentioned previously). For this reason set an entry point at 1.4545 which would be close to the first Tunnel 4h entry/exit point.

Entry: 1.4845 well above possible fake breakouts & drawdowns
Take Profit: 1.4955
Stop Loss: 1.4765
Outcome: Partial Profit

The limit order was placed on 10/13. After checking on this order this morning the words "don't let a winner become a loser" echo'd in my head over and over. My current major concentration for improvement is knowing when to enter/exit and knowing when to take profit (I tend to take it too early or to late). So I moved the stop/loss up to a guarenteed 25 pips profit on this one (got stopped out), but I am considering re-entering this trade.

It's late and I need to get ready for working in the morning of course, but I'll update this weekly and perhaps daily. My Journal #2 should be up tommorrow depending on my female committments. These are the only trades placed since 1/10/8 and I will be sure to include every trade so I get an accurate picture overall. Finally, not all pictures can be uploaded... I'll have to post the rest on the next post.

-Cheers

EUR/USD
(Weekly/Monthly)The trend was definitely up. The weekly had a pin bar which looked strong to me, and looking back on my picture it looks like it poked through the 60% fib retrace on the weekly.
(Daily) The double low high close bounced off the 50% fib retracement. Both suggested strongly to me it was going up, but it had to break the resistance I saw at 1.4815 that used to be a support.
(4 Hour) The 4 Hour didn't show any decisive price action, but it looked to me like there was a resistance at 1.4815 (mentioned previously). For this reason set an entry point at 1.4545 which would be close to the first Tunnel 4h entry/exit point.

Last Chart

7 AM:

No trades taken. No price action in any currency found that is strong enough, or has support from fibs, retracements or other indicators.

MA's aren't being used (aside from the ones provided by Tunnel 4h).

I'm posting in this journal and not your "Number Cruncher", hope you don't mind. It sure looks like you did your homework and I'm wishing you all off the best.

M&M

The only trade I feel remotely confident about:

USD/CHF Grade B trade

The weekly agrees with the Daily chart: strong downtrend with trend continuation (bearish bars).

(Daily) The latest daily bar hasn't finished yet, so it's not a complete DBHLC, but to be honest the major impetus for this trade came from the 4-hour tunnel method.

(4 Hour) Price was ranging between new support/resistances, but appears to have broken down and is approaching the first exit/partial profit point on the 4-hour tunnel. Given the close proximity and the strong downward trend I believe there's a good chance the trend will at least continue until it hits that exit point. In fact, typically with Tunnel, the price doesnt change or rebound until the trailing 6 ema crosses the exit point, so (my hope is) price should go past the exit point before pulling back if there is a price correction.

(1 Hour) Based on the support levels seen in the 1 hour (not completely reliable given the short time frame) I picked 1.0830 as my entry. I honestly would like to place my entries 10-20 pips below the "resistance/breakout" points to prevent false breakouts from triggering an entry, but given that I can't really predict just how far this trade will go (bearish) I wanted to enter early and exit early if possible.

Currently the spread is 3 pips, and my stop loss is about 50 pips. I am leveraging 400 oanda units at 50x leverage (thus comitting $8 of capitol). If the trade is successful I will take profit at 1.0770 (roughly 4 cents a pip x 60 pips = $2.40). If the trade goes against me I will lose 50 x .04 = $2.00, or 2% of my account.

That's it. There's a lot of other alluring trades, mainly the X/JPY, or GBP/X ones, but they're all in a strong trend movement- I don't see any clear entry points and I don't know when they'll reverse even temporarily.

The last trade of USD/CHF never went through, I don't know why price acted as it did and need to review the charts again. If anyone has an opinion please share it. At times like this I wish I had time for fundamental analysis as well.

Current Trade: EUR/GBP Grade C

Honestly I don't feel confident about this trade so I should not trade. That said, there are a couple price action signals I found that suggest that this trade might breakout down (bearish).

(Weekly/Monthly) Both show a strong uptrend
(Daily) There appears to be a DBHLC followed by a downtrend that hasn't finialized yet (today's bar isn't finished). There isn't enough information to be sure this is actually a strong trend from just 2 bars.
(4 Hour) Two fibs, drawn from consecutively previous lows, show confluence right about where price is, and the last three bars (including today's) appear to be hitting a resistance at around .7480.

Entry: .7420

Purely speculative, the only way I expect this trade to be entered is if the price moves down strongly.

BAD TRADE- I closed the trade. Not gonna do it.