Did you know Liverpool had one of the first futures exchanges in the world? You probably knew that import and export was a big part of the city’s success in the nineteenth century. And yes, sadly, the slave trade played a big part too. But I had no idea of the history of futures trading […]...
Trading is a very personal endeavour. What suits one person perfectly might torment and irritate another because it doesn’t fit their trading ‘personality’. But when you can chop bits from one system and slot them straight into another there’s no need to reinvent the wheel. In fact, there’s no reason why you can’t build your […]...
I was flicking through an old trading journal of mine the other day. It’s a bit tattered around the edges but those pages contain absolute pearls of wisdom. Now don’t worry, I’m not blowing my own trumpet here. These notes were from when I was still trying to figure things out. I’d been reading all […]...
Our natural response to risk and uncertainty is excellent at keeping you away from harm in many real-world situations. It is what has kept the human race alive for millennia. But it’s not so good when it comes to working with risk as a tool to make money, like we need to when trading from […]...
An email arrives from a particularly peeved trader. Two sentences he wrote say it all… (1)‘ It’s almost magical the way I can see several promising trades but choose only to trade the two that stop me out, while the others usually go on to win.’ Now doesn’t that sound like a familiar story? If you’ve […]...
Autumn 2006. It was a Friday. Rumours were flying… there were big stop orders sitting 32 ticks below the current T-Bond price and the big players were going to go after them. All I had to do was jump in and get involved too. It made sense on the chart and I could smell the […]...
Have you ever done the infamous ‘Spreadsheet Millionaire’ exercise? It’s where you layout a foolproof master plan that proves just how quickly you’re going to trade your way to a million. All by averaging ‘just’ a 2% daily return. Because how hard can it be? That’s only, like, one winning trade a day. Sounds easy, […]...
You might run candlesticks as your day-to-day default chart, but when you’re doing your bigger-picture analysis you might look at line charts and bar charts too. They can all help bring additional bits and pieces to your attention: patterns or price features you might not always spot so easily when running your regular candlesticks. So […]...
You might know I’m not a massive fan of technical indicators… (I’m talking about things like Stochastic Indicators, MACD, RSI and all those other exotic sounding tools.) If you’ve been following my stuff for a while you’ve probably noticed I lean more towards pure ‘Price Action’ when it comes to technical analysis. And that means […]...
Ever feel you’re not quite in control of your trading actions? Do greed and fear drive your decisions rather than a proven trading plan? Let me tell you exactly what signs to look for. And then I’ll tell you what to do about it. 5 ways reckless ways to ruin your trades 1) You trade […]...
You know, there’s a lot you can achieve by observing the natural world. And I’m not sure if I’ve been overdoing the BBC4 documentaries recently but it’s really been on my mind. I watched an engineering firm in Africa put a super-efficient ventilation system into a shopping centre. They based it on the natural structure […]...
A question arrives from Jin: “I have no problem identifying high probability trades and opening them. My problem is FOMO* on a big runner. So I end up getting stopped out at evens or a small loss after giving 20,30,40 points or so back. Even when I recognise I should bank this profit. Can you […]...
There are LOTS of new traders in the markets at the moment. It’s a knock-on effect of people working from home or being furloughed from their jobs. So I’ve been nosing around some online trading communities. I’ve been trying to get a feel for what people are trying to achieve at the moment. And also […]...
Her vicious eye stared me down. Ill-intent chilled my bones. She looked behind to check her friend was there to back her up and released her fury: “Cruuuuaaaaaaaaaaaaak!” Then, with a theatrical ruffle of her feathers, she went back to pecking the soil. We’ve got three new hens. And the old ones are NOT happy! […]...
In an ideal world the market moves nice and smooth. It sets off strong in one direction (up or down, we’re not fussy) and we wait for a pause. We look for a little pullback. And then we enter the trade. This is the Continuation signal we’ve been examining recently. It’s the ‘bread and butter’ […]...
