Single Currency Basket Trading

Journal to test my Single Currency Basket System.

Goal - To increase my account (demo) from 50k to 60k (20%) in one month (start 1st September- end 30th September)

How does my system work?

I trade USD, EUR, GBP, JPY, CAD, AUD and NZD as a currency basket.

For example, if I wanted to buy NZD as a basket, I would place the following trades-

Buy NZDUSD (1 lot)
Sell EURNZD (1 lot)
Sell GBPNZD (1 lot)
Buy NZDJPY (1 lot)
Buy NZDCAD (1 lot)
Sell AUDNZD (1 lot)

System Rules

1) At New York close (17:00 EST) check daily currency strength indicator to see if conditions are right to place a trade.

2) Place one currency basket (6 currency pairs @ 1 Lot each) approximately 1 hour after New York close (wait for the spreads to narrow)

3) Stop Loss- Set EA to close all trades @ -$2500 (5% of initial deposit)

4) Take Profit - Set EA to close all trades @ $5000 (10% of initial deposit)

5) If neither SL or TP are hit, then manually close all trades an hour or two before New York close.
(If profit is $2500 before London session starts then close all trades and take profit)

6) Don't place a trade on Fridays


What is the benefit of using this system?

Takes only 10 minutes or so per day (no watching computer screens or charts for hours on end)
Fully mechanical trading decisions - not a lot of analysis required
Potential to profit from big intraday moves if they happen (and cut losses if trades go against you)

Trade Explorer attached- I don't trade everyday, only when the set up is right.

Hopefully I can achieve my goal - your comments are welcome

Currency Basket #1

Sell CAD

Manually closed all trades before London opening

Starting Balance $50,000

Profit $2678

Closing Balance $52,678

Currency Basket #2

Sell JPY

Manually closed all trades before London opening

Starting Balance $52,678

Profit $2747

Closing Balance $55,425

Interesting....what do you use to determine currency strength, and which EA do you use to control trades?

Hi Kraven. Thanks for your interest.

I have my own currency strength indicator that I made in excel (I don't know how to code- wish I did!). But Excel seems to do everything I need it to do for now. It took me a while to work out, but I figured out how to get live price data into excel from MT4 and slowly built the indicator from there, testing out lots of ideas. Once I had access to Daily Close prices and live price data I was away- dreaming up all sorts of ideas and then forward testing and back testing to see if I could get a better handle on the market. My indicator produces two readings. I tried to work out by back testing and forward testing how these two readings related to each other, and was there a predictable pattern that I could take advantage of. It turns out that currencies have their own idiosyncrasies, and I have found what two readings work best with each currency. Of course it is not 100% accurate as the market is never predictable, which is why I would always use a SL. But it does seem to be around 70% accurate. So if I get 7 good basket trades and 3 bad basket trades that hit my stop- hopefully I will still make a descent profit.

The EA I use is a free download which I found by searching the net for quite a while. I can set a SL or TP for all positions in my account based on a monetary figure rather than number of pips.

Currency Basket #3

Sell EUR

Manually closed all trades around 3 hours after London open

Starting Balance $55,425

Profit $2559

Closing Balance $57,984

Currency Basket #4

Sell AUD

EA closed all trades @ -$2500

Starting Balance $57,984

Loss $2553

Closing Balance $55,431