Why not just open the trade and check back every few days

back every few days ?

Hypothetical scenario.

1. Find 10 pairs that are currently in an uptrend as seen on the daily chart AND have traded at least 50 points higher at some point in the last 4 weeks than they are currently.

2. Go long 1 lot on each pair with take profit set at 50 points. Turn off the monitor , walk away and check back every few days.

Barring any unforeseen huge geo political events (Russia invading the Ukraine) , unexpected rate changes, or important economic reports that come in way above or way below the analysts expectations then there should be a high probability of the primary trend continuing or staying in the range and returning to the previous price levels. Whether it takes 3 days, 3 weeks or 3 months I would think there is a strong possibility of at least 8/10 of the pairs regaining the previous price levels (unless they were yearly highs/lows).

Thoughts ?

fine whilst you are winning, but before you know it, most likely after the first loss - you will be tweaking and adjusting and adding layers of complexity to try and remove those inevitable losers.

But you have hit upon the approach that over time can be very profitable. People can just not maintain simple methods though.

Agreed..fear and greed cause us to abandon our original plans and then in retrospect we see that we should have stayed the course. I have had many a good trade while asleep and away from the computer.

I gave up scalping a while back and I am doing just what you are describing.

Never been more profitable in my entire trading career.

Scalping is not for everyone - took me years and huge losses to accept that.

I watch 1H SMA crossings and MACD signal crossings on anything including CFDs. 10% margin per trade at 50 leverage

and that's it. 80% success where stops are moved and trades are closed whenever the indicators reverse ( in or out of the money).

You can find yourself in a very large trend in your favor but never in a large trend against because the indicators have turned.

Do you have specific profit targets on the long term trades or just look for reversals ?

Just reversals - hence the 80%

If not I would have probably more like 98% success rate but much less profit.

Monthly target: 40% minimum which I (easily) made last year.

a good way of doing this is on the close of the daily bar in uptrend, if its green buy on the open downtrend sell on open. stop on the other side of the bar. take profit just trail stop behind the next bars low or high... set and forget

regards damien

I used this method for my longer term account and it was actually more profitable than the one with multiple trades a day. I suppose the key here is patience, only enter a trade when the signs are fully there.
Also, using this approach the quantity entered should not be too big, as what I learnt from the trading without a stop loss thread. It was something about if your trades could wipe out your account when no stop loss is used, you`re trading too big for your capital.

No more than 10% NAV on any market if you do this with a max of 6 orders. Once you are seriously in the money start creating B/E stops and move them with the trend. Remember the second the indicators (whichever ones you use) turn on the close, you MUST close the position in or out of the money and reverse (if you wish to do so).

For me I trade 1H, and check the account about 5 times a day for reversals. I am trying to create some form of EA that warns me via SMS of a "being close to" reversal, but my broker asks outrageous fees for their API. Plus CFDs are excluded it seems.

This would indeed be perfect for some form of EA. I am trying.

If I had a coin every time I trailed the stop and price turned around and took me out just to turn back again and explode in my direction I would have many coins.

WOW @Spike Surfer, 40% monthly, that's awesome. I am new to forex, what would be the setup on my indicator(screenshot) of your setup (your set and almost forget it method)? Do you have any screenshots of where your setup bought and sold a successful trade? thank you.

1H chart. Use easy indicator(s) like SMA, WMA, MACD, Williams AO. Backtrack on your chosen market and paper trade (yes actual pen and paper). No clear trigger? Change indicator parameters. I use basic MACD on some markets and basic AO on others. The best markets to trade are trending linear most of the year (like a sinus wave) - find them.

Every market has different characteristics. Find the triggers for your markets/indicators. Trade on those triggers and on those triggers alone. Meaning no SL/TP. I do make sure a large profitable trend cannot turn into a loss by setting B/E stops once I am like 5% in the money on the 10% margin used per trade. This is a little tricky because you must calculate what it would take for your trigger to reverse and estimate that point. Ideally your TP would be there. Check on every candle close and recalculate when profit rises.

For beginners: one indicator/market/trigger at the time and paper trade one or two months of history until you are sure of your trigger. Then demo it for a month. Then risk whatever you can afford live until you double and take it from there. I wish I had done so, it would have saved me a lot of aggravation and heart ache.

For experts/scalpers: try trading on 15M and 5M if you are trading full time and have the right emotional mindset. I have not so I am not. It does work, but it is just too much stress for me personally to not second guess my own triggers on those volatile time frames.

There is no one size fits all. There is no fast track. There is no holy grail. Maybe patience itself is as close as you can define a traders holy grail. It takes a lot of work and effort to find those triggers and they are personal to you and your trading style. There will be losing streaks on consolidating markets. Do you have the stamina to persist and trust your triggers? No trader can predict when consolidation turns into trending. Leave that to the ones behind the scenes. You MUST find your own triggers so you can believe in YOUR triggers. You will thank me later for that.

I have said all I am going to say about my personal methodology - I wish good wisdom and patience to you all.

This could work, but you can make more money with more trades in between time on the swings in the trend.

Bilstein uses a technique very similar to this. look him up and follow his thread replies and you will see.
The frustrating part is seeing it come into profit, and then going into loss because you weren't supposed to be checking that day.

I don't let that happen.

Again, if you can pick good long term trends, with reasonable thinking why they are so, and going with the swaps, you can make money with this

laid way back technique

Now if you pick five pairs of pairs all following different long term trends, such that an unexpected surge against you in one will lead 80% of the time to a surge in your favor in the other...

This too, can be done, and is even more secure.

All the work is done ahead of time. Then you trade. Then you take in your money.

you are onto a good thing, I think.

This is a splendid idea!

It did work for me in real life. I was collecting and holding USD (and still do) since 2003. In 2016 I have spent all profits gained by the price difference in EURUSD. A new 100k car and a nice red brick facade of my new block of flats project. Now waiting for the second wave to go down to 0.85-... That will be a lot of fun! Fun starts Mar'18 or May'18...

To be more specific, I buy the USD, every single month. On average is something like 0.2 to 0.8 lots. Leverage is 1:1. Good or bad year for the USD, does not matter to me. #iBuyUSD.