Moving Average Secrets

Wednesday, 10. February 2010


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One of the most popular technical analysis indicators is the simple moving average also known as SMA, if you learn how to use these correctly they can be a very useful tool to help you to make good trading decisions.

The 50 simple moving average, or 50 SMA, is simply the sum of the last 50 values for each period, divided by 50, this is a moving window, as time moves on so does the average. Notice that I used the term period because this indicator works on any time period in exactly the same way.

It can be used on monthly, weekly, daily, hourly, 30 minutes, 15 minute and on whatever time period you want to monitor and trade. Although the SMA is the most commonly used there is also the exponential moving average or EMA. This is a weighted version of the formula using the mathematical exponent function to give more weight to the more recent values, this has the effect of making it a slightly faster average that many traders prefer.

The truth is that it probably does not matter if you used the SMA or the EMA, what does matter however is that you use one or the other and then be very consistent with it. Do not switch between them, it is more important that you learn to trust your chosen indicator then a slight difference in its value.

The simple moving average is primarily used to determine what the current trend of the stock is, depending on the value used it could be a short term, medium term or long term trend. An important point to note is that moving averages are really only useful when the stock is trending, if the moving average is flat, i.e. horizontal on your chart it can become very choppy, this is a good time to not trade.

The general rule is that if the current price is above the SMA the trend is up, if below the trend is down. This is very important to understand because it forms the basics of trend trading and trading with the trend.

For the short term trend many traders like using a 5-8 SMA or EMA, here is a trading secret, never trade again the direction of the short term tend, actually this is really just common sense when you think about it.

Moving averages often act as support or resistance, many traders use the 15, 21 or 30 SMA for this purpose.

There are a number of other very important moving averages that you need to know about, these are the 50, 100 and 200 SMA, and this mainly applies to the daily and weekly charts. A lot of big players in the markets, the mutual funds, investment banks etc use the 50 and 200 SMA as support and resistance, if they decide to buy or sell based on these you need to follow suite, the 100 to a lesser extent. These are very useful averages to watch if you trade EFT’s like an Oil ETF.

A useful tip is that when a stock breaks through one moving average it will often move all the way to the next, for example, if a stock breaks the 30 SMA it may move to the 50 before finding some support or resistance.

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How To Trade Options Correctly

Sunday, 7. February 2010

There is a lot of hype surrounding options trading, and for good reason, it’s a good way make a lot of cash fast, or can be used to grow your capital consistently month after month.

There’s also a lot of hype about how complicated it is and why you need to spend thousands of dollars on options trading education before you get started. Needless to say this last statement usually comes from trading seminar companies trying to sell your their trading course on options.

Lets cover a few of the basics about options and set you straight about a few important points. Firstly yes it is true that you can make a lot of cash trading options, but of course you can also lose just as fast.

When trading stocks your leverage is 1:1, if you go on margin you can get get 1:2 leverage, but thats about it. With options it is not as straight forward to calculate the leverage but generally speaking you can get between 1:5 and 1:10 when you buy an option on a stock, or ETF.

So with 1:10 leverage, when the stock increases by 5% your option can increase by approx 50%, and this can happen in just a few days, this is why swing trading strategies using options on stocks is so popular.

However the downside is that a big loss can also happen, if the stock drops by 5% your option can also drop by 50%, at which point you may want to close the trade and save some of your option value, it really depends on what your stop loss and risk.

What I’ve just described is called directional option trading where you are betting on the getting the direction of the stock movement correct, this is highly speculative. Options can also be used in option strategies which are much more non-directional, such as covered call trades, credit spreads and Iron Condors. In these trades there is much less dependance on getting the stock direction correct, but it still matters.

So should you learn to trade options?, in my opinion you should not do directional option trades until you become an expert stock trader 1st. This is because you really need to be very precise with your entry and exit strategy and trading plan, and be very good at technical analysis.

Whereas if you want to do non-directional option trades you don’t need to be such an experianced stock trader to be successful, but of course it does not hurt either.

Learning how to trade options is a very useful skill you have, but don’t rush into it and blow out your account. Make sure that you get a good options trading education before you start, and also make sure that you have a very solid stock trading education as well, such one from Top Dog Trading Review.

Knowing Forex Market

Thursday, 27. August 2009

The foreign exchange market is where currencies are bought and sold. Banks, governments, financial institutions, currency traders, speculators and money managers indulge in currency trading. Foreign exchange emerged as a separate economic activity very recently in the 1970s. The forex market as it is called is now worth US$4 trillion every day. Over 60 percent of the trading is speculative trading while the remaining is related to transactions of goods and services including real assets and financial assets. Speculative trading is when the investor does not proper analysis before investing or the risk in investment is very high with also the risk of losing even the sum invested. The foreign currency market has been expanding in leaps and bounds.

There are two types of foreign exchange rates. They are the spot exchange rate and the forward exchange rate. The spot exchange rate is the current exchange rate at which two currencies are transacted between each other. The forward exchange rate is the rate that is quoted and traded today, but whose delivery and payment are made at a specific future date. Since 1940s, the Western countries had fixed their currencies to the dollar and the exchange rates were expressed in terms of dollar. But this was changed to the floating exchange rate in 1971 where the market demand and supply of the currency determined its rate.

Currencies are bought in the forex market. The investors hope that its rates will appreciate in the near future so that these can be sold to make an earning. Understanding the forex market requires understanding how the exchange rates are set and what influences them. The investor should learn forex trading by getting to know all the practical details of the business. There are a number of ways one can learn about the forex market and one of them is to try out the various learning tools available in the market. Some of them are The Forex Video Course, The Magical Forex Trading, Instant Forex Profit, The Forex Assassin, Professional Forex Training, Auto Cash System and The Forex Strategy Workbook.

Experts in forex market have successfully played the market to their advantage and raked in huge profits but their number is small. An inexperienced retail trader or speculator is disadvantaged will have less information as compared to the experienced ones. So it is not true that the same returns can be expected with the same set of tools, data sources and techniques. There is much more to it that what one may see in the first instance.

Trade In Currency

Sunday, 16. August 2009

Currency trading is the main activity of the foreign exchange market. The barter system was the prevalent system in the ancient days when trade was limited in volume and in geography. In this system, goods were exchanged directly. As trade expanded, the barter system became unwieldy. Something had to be done to make transaction manageable. That was when coins were introduced as a convenient intermediary for exchange of goods. The coins were made from precious metals as gold, silver as well as copper. It became convenient now to buy and sell goods. However, there was a catch. When the goods were of higher value, coins became problem. More coins and heavier coins caused a problem. With trade expanding even more, it became all the more important that a solution had to be found. That was when banknotes came to be introduced to add to the coins as representing higher value. The banknotes, in order to have a value, were pegged to valuable metals as the gold standard. However, later this was de-linked and now its value is as decreed by governments. The central banks controlled by national governments issued these banknotes.

Each country had its own currency. Trade between countries required that the transactions had to be carried out in multiple currencies. The expansion of international trade in goods and services required that the central banks and governments purchase more of the currencies of countries with which they carried out trade. Currency trading emerged and soon became a distinct economic activity. The exchange rate becoming determined by the market, the demand and supply regime, more and more players entered the market such as currency traders, financial institutions, and money managers.

The transactions in the forex market have crossed US$4 trillion per day. The forex market has become a foremost global economic activity. The forex trading is explained in a variety of learning tools which explains how the forex market operates and how to become a successful investor in the market. Some of these are Forex Trading Explained, Forex Trading Made EZ, Tax Lien Investing, Instant Forex Profit, The Forex Video Course, Professional Forex Training, The Magical Forex Trading, Forex Assassin, The Forex Strategy Workbook and Auto Cash System. In order to find out what others have to say about these tools, search for instance Forex Assassin reviews for Forex Assassin.

Over half the investments made in the forex market are speculative. The currency exchange rate is susceptible to quick changes due to economic, political and even environmental factors. The forex market is also vulnerable to rumors.