Trading in the real world.

Hi B,T,

well what I'm showing here are all trades that happened in FX-ATM, and I show all trades for the time period I'm posting trades here, not just the ones I picked out because they were nice winners. So it would be pretty easy to unmask me here if I'd just come up with trades that never happened in FX-ATM. I've got many subscribers that signed up a year ago already...plus you can see all issues from the last couple of months in the download-archive.

I'm just posting my account statement because someone here asked me to do so, to show that I trade those trades myself. Of course they could be faked, but send me an email and I'll do my best to show to you that they're not. Here in a public forum what I showed already is pretty much the most I can do and I hope that's understandable. Plus I think that's a lot already to be honest, I've not seen many traders showing account statements in a public forum or anywhere else in the past.

Showing trades here before they happen? Well...that would probably cause some of my subscribers to get quite angry

Plus showing one or two trades wouldn't proof anything.

So sorry but I just can't offer you more than this. If you have any questions though or an idea what else I could do, let me know, I'm really as "transparent" as possible.

Happy Trading!

Marco

For a couple of days I did no trades at all. Sometimes there simply are no opportunities...but finally on August 25th I got what I had been waiting for in the pound...

I sent out the following trade suggestion on August 25th:

Consider buying GBP/USD at 1.5480 stop-market. Suggested stop at 1.5405; suggested first target at 1.5555 (move stop-loss to breakeven when filled); suggested second target at 1.5705. Basis is a possible strong breakout above 1.5480


http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/371/gbpusdt.jpg

Here's how I managed this trade:

1. 08/26 Long at 1.5480; suggested stop at 1.5405
2. 08/26 First target hit at 1.5555; suggested stop now at 1.5465
3. 08/27 Stopped out at 1.5465

Another winner, again not a big one but as you know "Many a little makes a mickle"

And that's what trading often is like, you get some small wins and some small losses...and those pretty much balance each other out. But then sooner or later you get a nice runner and that's usually what brings your account to the next level...at least that's what it's like for my trading style most of the time.

But the other way can work, too...there are many ways to skin a cat. Just be sure you don't end up switching from one way to the other all the time...or to think about what's THE BEST/PERFECT way to trade all the time but never actually trade...

Otherwise you might end up as a chart puzzle freak instead of a trader...which is fine if you enjoy it and have nothing better to do, just don't expect to make money with it

And as usual, the account statement:

http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/2100/gbpusdstat.jpg

Happy Trading,

Marco

Another month passed by so it's time for me to look at my trading results in more detail again. My subjective impression for October is, that it was a tough month to trade. Many markets didn't really move a lot and looking at the charts I quite often thought that probably a lot of traders might have a hard time making profits. There just haven't been a lot of clean and strong moves...

I traded quite defensively this month and I think this is the reason why I still managed to come out ahead nicely. There were 7 trades in FX-ATM. Out of those 7 trades, 5 were winners and 2 trades were small losing trades. Risking 2% on each trade, the FX-ATM performance for October was 5.88%.

For more details have a look at the FX-ATM Performance Report

Of course I will show all of those trades in detail here, when we've arrived in October

Happy Trading,

Marco

I was on vacation from the end of August till September 11th so I did no trades during that time. Of course FX-ATM subscribers got those two weeks added to their running subscriptions...

When I came back I spotted a trade in EUR/CHF...

I sent out the following trade suggestion on September 13th:

Consider selling EUR/CHF at 1.2925 stop-market. Suggested stop at 1.3005; suggested first target at 1.2845 (move stop-loss to breakeven when filled); suggested second target at 1.2685. Basis is a possible strong breakout below 1.2925.

http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/4435/eurchf2.jpg

Here's how I managed this trade:

1. 09/14 Short at 1.2925; suggested stop at 1.2925
2. 09/14 EUR/CHF dropped nicely; suggested stop now at 1.2945
3. 09/14 Stopped out at 1.2945

Good start, but finally I got stopped out with a small loss...big deal...what to do? Next!

And my account statement:

http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/8703/eurchf2stat.jpg

Happy Trading!

Marco

No trades for a few days, boring markets and no good setups...but then finally on September 28th I noticed a nice opportunity in GBP/AUD:

I sent out the following trade suggestion on September 13th:

Consider selling GBP/AUD at 1.6430 stop-market. Suggested stop at 1.6525; suggested first target at 1.6335 (move stop-loss to breakeven when filled); suggested second target at 1.6145. Basis is a possible strong breakout in the direction of the trend.

http://img121.imageshack.us/img121/281/gbpaud.jpg

Here's how I managed this trade:

1. 09/28 Short at 1.6430; suggested stop at 1.6525
2. 09/28 First target hit at 1.6335; suggested stop at 1.6435
3. 09/29 Suggested stop at 1.6375
4. 09/29 Suggested stop at 1.6340
5. 09/30 Stopped out at 1.6340

Nice, stress-free trade. Quickly hit the first target with the first lot and was stopped out with a nice profit two days later. So nothing to complain about...uh well I got a few pips slippage on the entry but who cares

And my account statement:

http://img585.imageshack.us/img585/4415/gbpaudstat.jpg

Happy Trading,

Marco

I'll be giving a free webinar, "THE LAW OF CHARTS BASICS, DISCUSSION AND LIVE EXAMPLES" this Thursday at 16:00 GMT. For more information and free signup, see this page.

Here's the session summary:

"Learn how to read and trade any forex chart using the Law Of Charts by Joe Ross. In this session Marco Mayer, who has had extensive personal training by Joe Ross over many years, will introduce you to the Law Of Charts. You will learn how to read any forex chart in any timeframe. After this there will be time for discussion and some live market examples"

Happy Trading,

Marco

Lets see your contract size Micro Mayer!

hahahahahaahhaaha

That just made my day




Happy Trading,

Marco

Around the same time as the GBP/AUD trade I also did a trade in EUR/CHF.

I sent out the following trade suggestion on September 27th:

Consider buying EUR/CHF at 1.3300 stop-market. Suggested stop at 1.3230; suggested first target at 1.3370 (move stop-loss to breakeven when filled); suggested second target at 1.3510. Basis is a possible strong breakout in the direction of the trend.


http://img201.imageshack.us/img201/4268/eurchf3.jpg

Here's how I managed this trade:

1. 09/29 Long at 1.3300
2. 09/29 Suggested stop at 1.3250
3. 09/30 Suggested stop at 1.3265
4. 09/30 Suggested stop at 1.3290
5. 09/30 First target hit at 1.3370; suggested stop at 1.3295
6. 10/01 Suggested stop at 1.3360
7. 10/01 Suggested stop at 1.3400
8. 10/04 Stopped out at 1.3400

One of those trades that start off slowly, almost don't move at all for a day or two and then take off...

Also if you look at the account statement you can see that I got out of the position on Friday and in again after the weekend at the same price. I always do that because I've got no interested to hold a huge position over the weekend...instead I prefer to control my risk as precisely as possible.

And my account statement:

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/2606/eurchf3stat.jpg

Happy Trading,

Marco

I just got an email that the recording of my latest webinar is online now, you can find it here.

Next webinar will be Q&A session, so if you have any questions on past webinars or FX-ATM just send them over to me

Happy Trading,

Marco

I'll be giving another free webinar, next Wednesday at 17:00 GMT. For more information and free signup, see this page.

Here's the session summary:

"In this session Marco Mayer, editor of Forex At The Market (http://www.fx-atm.com), will answer all of your questions sent by email ([email protected]) before the webinar. Of course it will also be possible to ask questions during the webinar. If there's still some time left, we'll have a look at some live markets to show you how to use the Law Of Charts in action"

Happy Trading,

Marco

Okay, back to the trades...next one was a trade in GBP/USD.

Consider buying GBP/USD at 1.5875 stop-market. Suggested stop at 1.5805; suggested first target at 1.5945 (move stop-loss to breakeven when filled); suggested second target at 1.6085. Basis is a possible strong breakout in the direction of the trend.


http://img703.imageshack.us/img703/3384/gbpusd2.jpg

Here's how I managed this trade:

 

1. 10/05 Short at 1.5875; suggested stop now at 1.5850
2. 10/06 Suggested stop now at 1.5870
3. 10/06 Stopped out at 1.5870

A couple of things are worth to be mentioned here. First of all as you can also see on my account statement, I didn't get filled on the inital breakout I wanted to trade. I had a limit 5 pips above the entry attached to the stop-market entry order since I didn't want to get more than 5 pips slippage. This lead to my orders getting rejected but I got filled a few hours later when GBP/USD pulled back to the breakout-level.

Unfortunately the first profit target was missed on this trade by a few pips. At this time I moved up the stop-loss close to breakeven and got stopped out there with a tiny loss.

Account statement for the trade:

http://img543.imageshack.us/img543/4945/gbpusd2stat.jpg

This is something a lot of new traders don't think about. Will their strategy work in real market conditions? Better think about it. When playing games on historical charts there's no slippage, you always get filled etc...but entering the real world of trading things change. Now you have to face slippage, might not get filled on your limit-order or only part of it etc etc...and that kills a lot strategies that look oh so great on the charts.

Another thing is that if you start out with a small account, you actually might not always get the very best fills. Most big players out there trade strictly in million or at least 100k lots and your 13200 units might not get filled where you hope. While writing this one case came to my mind where that actually happened to me, so I'd like to show it to you here so that you get an idea what I'm talking about.

Usually I calculate my risk very exactly. So if I want to risk a certain % of my account, I might order "odd lots".

In this example I wanted to buy 1.088.530 units of EUR/JPY for a daytrade. See what I got:

http://img502.imageshack.us/img502/4...illexample.jpg

As you can see the million lot got filled at 112.735, but for the remaining 88530 units I got filled half a pip worse at 112.74.

Now if you're swing-trade that really doesn't matter, at least for me. But if you're daytrading it's something worth to consider: Don't trade odd lots...

Happy Trading,

Marco

Has been a while since my last post but I simply didn't have any time to spend on trading forums lately. Same was true for webinars in December, sorry about that - but I'll be back with two webinars in January!

Okay anyway, let's continue with this little journal here. For those of you who are new to it: I post ALL swing trades here that I did in my own trading account and that were suggested as possible trades in FX-ATM. This is crucial. Usually what they show you are just those nice winning trades...but that's not a realistic picture of real trading. Losses happen, too.

Also I made it a habit to post my account statements for the trades at the end of each post. The reason for this is that at the beginning I was asked to do so to prove that I'm not just another clown posting funny charts. And I can understand that very well and would advice you to ask for that from ANY trading service you might be interested in. You can't learn trading from a chart-artist, you want to learn it from someone who actually trades and puts his money where his mouth is. Otherwise it's the same as trying to learn how to play the piano from someone who draws pictures of piano artists...uh well maybe that analogy is not perfect but I'm sure you get my point.


So...let's get back to the next trade! This one actually was a winner...a deal in AUD/CAD...one of my favorite cross-pairs of 2010

I sent out the following trade suggestion on October 6th:

Consider buying AUD/CAD at 0.9905 stop-market. Suggested stop at 0.9860; suggested first target at 0.9950 (move stop-loss to breakeven when filled); suggested second target at 1.0040. Basis is a possible strong breakout in the direction of the trend.

http://img163.imageshack.us/img163/9291/audcad.jpg

Here's how I managed this trade:

1. 10/07 Long at 0.9905; suggested stop at 0.9860
2. 10/07 First target hit at 0.9950; suggested stop at 0.9905
3. 10/07 Suggested stop at 0.9980
4. 10/07 Stopped out at 0.9980

Nice trade, quick move up, no stress...nothing to add

Account statement for the trade:

http://img121.imageshack.us/img121/2710/audcadstat.jpg

Happy Trading,

Marco

I just wanted to use this opportunity to wish all of you a happy new year 2011 and all success in your trading business!

Happy Trading,

Marco

I'll be giving another free webinar, next Thursday at 17:00 GMT. For more information and free signup, see this page.

Topic of the webinar will be "Trading without “voodoo” by using The Law of Charts"

Here's the session summary:

"Learn why magic indicators and magic chart patterns don’t work in the real markets. Get a more realistic perspective on how to trade, by keeping it simple and learn how to read and trade any forex chart using the Law Of Charts. In this session Marco Mayer, who has had extensive personal training by Joe Ross over many years, will introduce you to the Law Of Charts. You will learn how to read any forex chart in any timeframe. After this there will be time for discussion and some live market examples."

Happy Trading,

Marco

Webinar recording is online now.

Next one will be on January 27th about Risk- and Moneymanagement. More details, soon.

Happy Trading,

Marco

I'll be giving another free webinar on Tuesday at 17:00 GMT. For more information and free signup, see this page.

Topic of the webinar will be "Trade like a pro - Manage risk"

Here's the session summary:

"In this session we’ll have a look at why risk- and money management are so important in trading, regardless of the strategy/method/system you’re trading. In fact, whatever trading method you use, if your money-management is wrong, you have no chance to succeed long-term. We’ll discuss leverage, what kind of risks you’re facing trading Forex and look at different kinds of money-management methods. Marco will also show you how to actually calculate your risk correctly for each trade and figure out the right position-size for a specific trade."

Happy Trading,

Marco

Hi there,

wanted to let you know that I'll be giving another free webinar on Thursday at 17:00 GMT. For more information and free signup, see this page.

Topic of the webinar will be "The Law Of Charts In Action: Live Market Analysis and Q&A"

Here's the session summary:

"In this session Marco Mayer, editor of Forex At The Market (http://www.fx-atm.com), will look at some live markets with you to show you how to use the Law Of Charts in action. During the session there will be plenty of time for questions regarding specific markets, trades, the Law Of Charts or trading in general"

See you there!

Happy Trading,

Marco

Hi there,

wanted to let you know that I'll be giving another free webinar on Thursday at 17:00 GMT. For more information and free signup, see this page.

Topic of the webinar will be "Trading without indicators by using The Law Of Charts: Q&A and Live Market analysis"

Here's the session summary:

"In this session Marco Mayer, editor of Forex At The Market (http://www.fx-atm.com) will do a very brief review of the Law Of Charts, and then look at some live markets of your choice with you to show you how to use the Law Of Charts in action. During the whole session you’ll be able to ask Marco anything related to the Law Of Charts or trading in general."

See you there!

Happy Trading,

Marco