When you trade in the forex market without strict rules to manage your cash-flow, you are not trading but in fact gambling. From time to time traders may fall into the trap of buying or selling way too much of a currency pair and risking way too much of the money in their accounts based solely on hunches, also known as ‘feelings’; but this is a sure way to accelerate disappointment in the market. When you start out as a beginning trader it is important to devise a method of calculating how much risk (by default) you would be willing to risk on any position.
Money management rules such as the 2 percent rule are designed to protect us in the long run. You are probably wondering how, and I will explain that in a moment, but first an example. Case and point, Mark decides to make only 10 trades a month, he is what you would call a conservative trader. Mark has a simple rule that stipulates that if he makes four consecutive losses in a row he would pull out of the market until the next month; and for every profitable position he closes, he will risk only a third of his profit in the next trade that he makes; fairly simple rule and very effective in the long run in ensuring that his gains remain consistent.
So what rule can you apply in your trading strategy or how should you go about managing risk? Choosing the right means to protect your capital depends a lot on your style of trading, your account size and even your own personal tolerance for market speculation.
While using a reduced lot size is a good way to start, it will not be very helpful if you have a number of open lots. You must understand relationship between the currency pairs of the forex market; if for example you were to make a short trade on GBP/USD and a long trade on USD/JPY, you are unduly exposing yourself twice to the USD. This equates to having 2 lots of USD in a long position. If the USD price drops, you would lose…twice! Try to keep the lot numbers to a minimum and this is especially encouraged for beginning traders. You can also consider placing only 2 percent of your forex account at risk as mentioned earlier for any opened position, a common technique used by many traders.
Here is an example I hope will show you practically and in a different angle what we have covered here today. With a newly opened forex account 1000 dollars, I risk only 2 percent of that in every trade that means each position is worth 20 dollars of my account. I plan to have only 10 trades a week with a target of 100 dollars profit after all trades; this means I would have to endure the risk of losing 10 trades to suffer a maximum of a 100 dollar loss on my account. Naturally, I do not expect to lose 10 trades consecutively nor lose over 100 dollars in my account, and as fate would have it, I make 6 winning trades but lose 4. The following week I use the gains of my previous trades as risk and consistently repeat this cycle. This example shows you how you can keep your capital safe, and work more on growing your profits and choosing winning trades, I how you found these tips informative.
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