While you’re still setting out, you don’t want to risk blowing your entire account on a single bad trade. You can avoid this eventuality easily enough by limiting the capital you allocate to your positions.
The standard FX trade size is one lot, which will give you a large exposure and can see losses mount up quickly. Look for a provider that enables you to trade in smaller sizes – with City Index, you can set your own sizes outside of traditional lots and mini lots.
Risk management might be the most important factor in dictating your long-term forex trading success – and the basic building block of any risk management strategy is the stop-loss order. Stop losses are instructions to your trading provider to close your open position if it moves a certain number of points against you. They are useful…
With a plan in place, a style in mind and some practice under your belt, you can begin thinking about placing your first live trades. With dozens of FX pairs to choose from, though, deciding where to start can be tricky. Often, it’s a good idea to choose one or two pairs to begin with,…
Leverage is fundamental to forex trading – without it, you’d have to commit huge amounts of capital to earn a return. However, it is important to understand the effect that leverage has on your profits and losses. When you trade using leverage, your provider is in effect lending you the additional funds needed to cover the…
Letting profits run and cutting losses is an oft-repeated mantra among traders, and with good reason. For beginner traders, it can be hard to put into action – when you see a trade in the green, it can be tempting to close it immediately and realise the profit. Similarly, accepting a loss can a tricky…
Another key consideration when you’re still in the early days of trading is not to take on too much too soon. Opportunities abound in the FX markets, but successful traders know which ones to seize and which ones to let go. It’s best to begin by only having one trade open at a time, giving…
Making a plan is an excellent start, but to truly trade like an expert you’ll want to keep meticulous records about your progress – noting down the outcome from every position and keeping track of the factors that made it a success or a failure. Luckily, you don’t have to do this all manually. Your…
