FOREX end-of-week Summary (14-18 Dec 09)

Trading last week went off pretty well, making a profit of approximately 20%. To recap, I had been following reports from Actionforex closely and making my trades decision base on the prevailing trend and resistance and support. Limiting my trade on only two currency pairs help me to maintain focus and ability to follow up. Also limiting to the maximum of having only two trades at any one time also helps in managing my account. I am still trading with a lot size of 0.05 on my mini account, though the risk of every trade maybe higher than 5% of my account, depending on the width of my Stop Loss margin. However as mentioned in my earlier post, I have my reason for doing that, it may not be considered as calculated risk but at least I am well aware of what I am getting into for every trade. As my account grow in size, I would be able to utilise the calculated lot size, but at this moment, its still not possible. If I manage to continue trading with this rate of "success", I would be able to trade at the calculated lot size by end of Jan 2010.

My analysis for one of the USDJPY traded last week, which I hope to get some comments from other traders. I made a BUY on USDJPY at 89.80 on 16 Dec 09 and had my TP and SL set at 90.75 and 88.80 respectively. As can be seen from the attached chart, the price went near my TP and came down strongly nearly hitting my SL but managed to recover after that. On the 18 Dec 09, I had my SL adjusted to 89.37 as the market is recovering and the last low point not considering the strong downward movement was 89.37. Eventually, my SL (89.37) was hit and after that market recovers and is now beyond my TP of 90.75. I am not feeling sore or sad that I had made a wrong decision to adjust my SL which eventually was hit and eventually going beyond my TP. I am trying to learn from this trade so as to make better decision in future for similiar situation. Please comment whether I should have adjusted my SL to the minor support at 89.37 or should have left it at 88.80.

FOREX end-of-week Summary (7-11 Dec 09)

Pretty good week with 8 trades, making a profitable week. Relying heavily on analysis report from ActionForex, following them closely and making my trade decision and exit. I am also training myself to spot resistance and support from my chart and the reports help me to confirm that I am right. So far so good, had been getting them rather close to what was reported. Next week, will be selling EURUSD and buying USDJPY week, however I am getting wary of the holidays season coming up. It's a well known fact that most banker will pull out the fund during this period and go enjoy their holidays. Hence, I have to be extremely watchful of the market movement.

Still growing my account to a more significant amount... ;p

FOREX end-of-week Summary (30 Nov-4 Dec 09)

Beginning of the week was good, making profitable trade but near the end of the week, EURUSD went into correction and hit my SL resulting in overall loses for the week. I understand that this shouldn't be the case as the loses should be within 5% of my account size. However due to some reason, the lot size traded have to be as such hence resulting in more than 5% lost. My account is too small and the calculated lot size is zero lot!!! ;p

Nevertheless, I am gaining experience and making good progress. ;p

FOREX end-of-week Summary (23-27 Nov 09)

Looking at the summary, you would have guess correctly that last week trading was good and my account had doubled. Over the weekend, analysis was made to check what I had done the past week to ensure such result. Apparently, most of my trade were made along with the trend that the currency pairs was going. My TP and SL were set at the respective resistance and support. Hence, I could simple say that only two lines were used in my setup and of course others tools / indicators were used to confirmed the preceding trend. I am making good progress again and I am expecting to repeat the process and grow my account progressively. No more silly mistakes and trade decision made by greed and quick gains thoughts.

Always remember TREND IS YOUR BEST FRIEND!!! ;p

FOREX end-of-week Summary (16-20 Nov 09)

Pretty much the same as last week, however the trade that was held from last week eventually hit my SL after failing a few times breaking through the resistance. In between I managed a few small trade to gain a little, but overall for the week, negative growth...

FOREX end-of-week Summary (9-14 Nov 09)

Started the week with small investment in accordance to my risk management and made some short term gain. Took a long term trade but entered the trade too late, however I decided to hold on to the trade in loss as the support had yet to be broken. Even at the end of the week, the support had yet to be broken, hence I hold on to the trade over the weekend. At the meantime, I did not take any other trade so as to allow maximum margin available in my account. Hopefully the price go for the resistance level when the new week start... ;p

FOREX end-of-week Summary (2-6 Nov 09)

Another week of negative result that almost made me to quit trading for good. Decided to stop trading for the week and analyse all the loses I had made. Next week, I will make a come back and trade more successfully. ;p

FOREX end-of-week Summary (26-30 Oct 09)

Exactly the same method and selection decision, but was caught by the beginning of the week, early hours movement. Also because of the size of my account, was not able to hold on to the big losses, so had to close the trade prematurely. Additional USD70 was credited into my account by IBFX as promotion credit, matching 10% of my deposit. Well, have to rebuild my account again, though feeling a bit disappointed by the result, I will have to persevere and continues on.

Kusu Islands revisited... 29 Oct 09

It's the annual Kusu Island Pilgrimage 2009 and since I am currently jobless and nothing to do in the day, I asked Ruilong along to the island. We met at about 4pm at Marina Bay MRT Station and took a bus to Marina South Pier where the ferry is. Once we arrived at the pier, we bought our tickets at the booth and went onboard the ferry.

The ferry left shortly after we went onboard and headed for Kusu Island. It was just a short fifteen to twenty minutes ride and we arrived. Kusu Island, also known as tortise island or formally as Pulau Tembakul, it's a small island with two lagoon and a chinese temple as well as a malay shrine.

After entering the island, we went to the temple and bought the offering and prayed. After that, we walked around the island and experience the changes it had went through after so many years. Like I mentioned, it's Kusu Island revisited... The last time I visited the island was like 20 over years ago, when I was still very young.

If I had not remembered wrongly, I actually stood on this statue for picture before when I was young. Wonder if I am ever able to find that picture again...

We went over to the tortise santuary and used the left over vegetables to feed the tortise... There were so many of them, some in the pond while some it the tortise shelter.

We continued walking around the island and took some pictures. We went to the Malay Shrine and had some drink at the food centre before taking the ferry back to mainland.

After reaching back at Marina South Pier, we took a bus out to Tanjong Pagar MRT Station and travelled back to the east and had our dinner at Bedok Market Block 85 before proceeding home.

Lawrence Sim Belated Birthday Celebration

Lawrence Sim's birthday falls on 21 Oct 2009. His event staff, Carol Ho and one of the boater, Eric Cheong jointly organised this kelong get together trip for him. We met at SAFYC Sembawang Clubhouse on 24 Oct 09 to take a ride on Eric Cheong boat to the kelong.

Once everyone arrived, or rather the maximum capacity of the boat was reached, we set off to the kelong with the first batch onboard. Eric and myself came back to the Clubhouse immediately after dropping the first batch at the kelong to ferry more guests over to the kelong, including Mr Sim.

Once everyone had arrived, we started BBQ all the good food we had brought along as well as the freshest seafood you can ever find, provided by the kelong.

Oysters and Mussels fresh from the kelong...

Half way through the BBQ session, it was the kelong harvest time, the net was hauled up and everyone crowd around to see what prize it's going to bring up....

The BBQ session continues after that and knowing that it was Lawrence Sim's birthday recently, the biggest catch was presented to him.

More boaters came along to the kelong for the BBQ while the first group who had eaten their fill, roam around the kelong and interact with each other. After the second group had taken their fair share of food, it's the singing of birthday song and cutting of cake for Lawrence.

After the cake cutting and having a taste of the delicious cake, some went back to mainland and went home, while the rest stayed on and chat and played mahjong till the next morning... ;p

It is something different that I had never experience before, simple kelong yet so much to explore and experience. I wouldn't mind going back to the kelong in future and spend another peaceful day on it...

FOREX end-of-week Summary (19-23 Oct 09)

I had a wonderful week trading, especially the last few trades I selected. Account growth - 27%.

Next week onwards, it would be a test for me to go through discipline and to cultivate the trader's mind. Since I am out-of-job and without income, I will have to rely on my trading income. I was told that as full time trader, they do not have monthly income and they trade to make money not to create monthly income. I guess I have to make a difference here and decide how to go about it to have the best of both world. I understand the reason behind not having a monthly income but in this realistic world there are times where you have no choice. With discipline and a strong mind, I'm sure a difference can be made. Good Luck!!! ;p

FOREX end-of-week update (12-16 Oct 09)

Closed a few trades in the beginning of the week in the negative. These were brought over from last week trade. Using the longer term trading method, took a few trades and at the same time deployed short term trading method and traded intraday. Overall result for the week is positive. ;p

Overcoming Yourself...

I read this on facebook and thought I duplicate it here for all to read and get enlighten... ;p The original posting can be found here.

“You are who you think you are”… this is very true in every aspect of that statement. It is not difficult to see that we are often our biggest obstacle… not the problem itself… not the people around us… not fate… not destiny… In every situation (even in the worst), there is always a brighter side of things… a positive side that we can focus on…

So how do we move from a state of helplessness to a state of empowerment? How do we overcome those negative thoughts that are distracting you and keeping you from moving ahead? How do we overcome ourselves?

When something bad happens (and I can tell you.. bad things will ALWAYS happen), there are two ways that we can respond to it... react negatively to it… or react positively to it… We all know the consequence of our negative response and the need to respond positively. Then why it is easier said than done? Is responding positively really so difficult?

Honestly, there may be a million answers why humans respond negatively when they know that they shouldn’t. I’m sure I can write a quite an endless list of it but why would I want to do that? Do you see where I’m heading? I mean why spend good energy & efforts to try to measure something that will give you an undesirable outcome anyway? Isn’t that unproductive? Why don’t we focus on the positive thoughts? But how to do that when negative thoughts keep popping up before you? (familiar?)

Here’s how I do it. I saw a joke about a problem solving flowchart and I thought to myself that the answer could be in a simple flowchart below:-

Well, if you’re the sort that screams… “but… but”… GET REAL… GET DECISIVE… In life, there are not but’s.. I mean, seriously,… if you cannot solve the problem and nothing can be done about it, then dwelling on it or feeling lousy about it (till the cows come home) ain’t gonna help either. Discard those contemplating negative thoughts immediately before they consume you.

And if you’re the type that goes… “what if this”… “what if that”…. Try using “so what if” and “so what are you doing about it?” instead… For example:

“So what if I have cancer? What am I gonna do about it?”…

“So what if I’m a bankrupt? What am I gonna do about it?”…

“So what if I’m gonna die tomorrow? What am I gonna do about it?”…

You see, it is not “what if I’m gonna die tomorrow” that will matter… it is what you decide to do AFTER you make that statement “so what?”…

“So what if I’m gonna die tomorrow? I still have now till tomorrow to be happy?” THAT… my friends… is what makes the difference… Instead of sulking your way to your grave, won’t one be better off enjoying whatever one has left till then..

In this perspective, the problem don’t matter anymore. Since you cannot do anything to change the destination, you can always choose how you wanna get there, can’t you?

FOREX end-of-week Summary (5-9 Oct 09)

It had been an exciting week for me; monitoring, deciding, watching and finally taking the trade. This is only yet another week of result, but I can feel that I am more confident and more experience in selecting trade opportunities. Out of all the trades that I took, roughly more than half are positive trade. From the graph above, 3 trades were losing trade and the last losing trade bring me back to a new low for my account. I called that a greedy trade, I was already gaining 15% on that day and had told myself there's no more requirement to take any more trade and can rest early that night. Well, I looked at the chart and took LONG on GBPUSD, mistake! Chart and indicators showed that the reason for my trade was not wrong, but reading the report on actionforex tells me that it was already near the top and price movement would weaken and start to come down. Took the losing trade and hit my SL at 150 pips. Continued looking for opportunities and successfully took 4 winning trades to reduce the 150 pips lost. Due to market closing, I was not able to hold on further to breakeven my losses, but in any case, it's still a overall gain for this week. ;p

Something to share - Retiring without tears

This article was published in The Straits Times on 2 Aug 2009. Someone emailed it to me and I find it enriching and valuable, hence I decided to quoted it here to share with readers of this blog. The 8 key considerations when planning your retirement nest as mentioned in the articles are summarise here for your convenience:-

1. Retirement age
2. Years of retirement
3. Retirment lifestyle
4. Inflation
5. Financial commitments
6. Medical expenses
7. Leaving a legacy
8. Existing assests and post-retirement income

The article is as attached below

Aug 2, 2009

Retiring without tears

What you need to factor in when doing your retirement sums
By Lorna Tan

More Singaporeans are facing the grim reality of retiring later or having to lower their lifestyle expectations when they do retire. This is partly because they fail to plan early for their retirement, if at all. Recent surveys on retirement have indicated that the majority of people are unprepared for retirement. An annual Future of Retirement study from HSBC - It's Time To Prepare - has found that an alarming 91 per cent of Singaporeans do not have any idea what their retirement income would be, and only 9 per cent are prepared for this phase of life.

In addition, while 39 per cent feel that they understand their short-term finances very well, only 23 per cent can say the same about their long-term finances. Said Mr Sebastian Arcuri, HSBC Singapore's head of personal financial services: 'The lack of understanding and knowledge of long-term financial milestones like retirement could be intensified by the current economic downturn, which may have led more Singaporeans to divert their attention to short-term survival needs instead of their long-term goals.'

Last month, HSBC launched a free retirement planning service for its mass affluent customers who have at least $200,000 with the bank. To improve your prospects of a comfortable retirement, you cannot afford to delay reviewing your retirement nest egg. Here are some considerations.

1 Retirement age

For a start, it is important to determine at just what age you hope to retire in order to work towards retirement goals, said Mr Ho Kien Hung, a manager at Alpha Financial Advisers. The earlier a person does this, the more time he has to plan, and to resolve any hiccups along the way. Failing to plan for a specific retirement age may result in a person procrastinating over his retirement plans and ending up with not enough savings to retire comfortably, or having to continue working even after reaching the desired retirement age.

2 Years of retirement

This refers to the length of time that you require your retirement funds to last. Of course, to some extent, this is in the lap of the gods. But based on current statistics and the retirement age of 62, most Singaporeans can expect to live a further 20 to 30 years after retirement. According to statistics from the 2008 World Population Data Sheet, the life expectancy is 78 for Singapore males and 83 for females. You should also take your family's medical history into account. Given advances in medical science, people are living longer and it would be wise to make provisions for additional years of retirement, said Mr Arcuri. Mr Darren Lim, 78, wished he had done all this. When he retired from his job as a tennis coach at 60, he never thought he would live past 70. By the time he was 70, he had used up his retirement nest egg and is now depending on his son for monthly cash handouts.

3 Retirement lifestyle

A comfortable retirement means different things to different people. Your expectations of just what a comfortable retirement will look like affects how much you need to set aside for your nest egg, said Mr Arcuri. For instance, if you plan to travel around the world when you retire, you are likely to need more income than someone content to pursue hobbies and activities that are easier on the pocket. The choice of which country to reside in is also a consideration, as the cost of living in some neighbouring countries is much lower than in Singapore.

Here are some questions you could ask yourself. Do you still plan to work? Do you plan to go for an annual holiday? Would you consider downgrading to a smaller car or even switching to public transport?

Such retirement lifestyle requirements would help to determine the bare minimum sum one needs for a retirement nest egg, said Mr Albert Lam, investment director at IPP Financial Advisers.

4 Inflation

You cannot ignore the impact of inflation, which is the increase in the general price level of goods and services. This is because inflation adversely affects the purchasing power of your money. For example, based on an average annual inflation rate of 3 per cent, $1,000 today would be worth only $642 in today's terms in 15 years' time. As a result, a retirement income that is enough to sustain you in your first year of retirement may be insufficient by the 10th year, said Mr Arcuri.

5 Financial commitments

Consider what your likely monetary commitments in retirement are. With more people marrying and starting a family later, you need to consider whether your house would be fully paid off by the time you retire, and whether you still need
to support your children in their studies, said Mr Ho. Other dependants may include aged parents, said Mr Arcuri. If so, you would need to ensure that your retirement income also caters to their needs.

6 Medical expenses

Studies have shown that medical expenses are substantially higher in the last years of life. As they have the potential to put a major dent in your financial security, medical insurance plans that can take care of health-care related expenses should be considered. Mr Christopher Tan, chief executive of wealth management firm Providend, says that when working out your retirement income, take into account the premiums of medical plans and other insurance policies that you still need to pay beyond your working years.

7 Leaving a legacy

Be it a desire to leave an inheritance to the next generation or a charitable bequest, your legacy plans would also determine how your retirement portfolio is structured. In either case, a portion or all the capital has to be left untouched, said Mr Arcuri. Hence, you would need to make provisions to ensure that the earmarked assets would not be drawn down to fund your retirement.

8 Existing assets and post-retirement income

When working out your retirement income needs, consider your existing assets as well as future income streams. For instance, you can project the values of assets, like your Central Provident Fund savings, insurance policies, unit trusts, bonds, shares, properties and even antiques, till retirement, said Mr Ho.

You may also receive post-retirement income in the form of pensions, annuities or property rentals.

lorna@sph.com.sg

Copyright © 2007 Singapore Press Holdings. All rights reserved. Privacy Statement & Condition of Access

FOREX end-of-week Summary (28 Sep-2 Oct 09)

FOREX end-of-week Summary (21-25 Sep 09)

Total of 16 trades for the week which 3 of them were negative trades. Good result but upon analysing I found that though there is only 3 negative trades, but the amount in term of dollars is high. Thanks to RSI 'POP' I was able to make that losing trade back. I will have to work on this flaw to reduce my risk factor. Now in my arsenal I have RSI 'POP' and Moving Average crossover on multiple timeframe. I have to stay discipline and sustain my trades.

FOREX end-of-week update (14-18 Sep 09)

Always make your decision for a trade at the end of each candlestick, no matter which timeframe you are in. I made a few trade decisions before the candlestick end and cause me substaining a few losses. When I learnt this lesson and enforced it, I was able to make better decision and recover much of my losses. Key is PATIENCE!

FOREX end-of-week summary (7-11 Sep 09)

As mentioned in my previous entry, I applied the common indicators with uncommon application as well as my refined longer term trading method. So far so good, out of 8 trades, only one of them was a negative trade. ;p Yet another great tools added into my arsenal, and with this great tools combined, I continue with my journey in FOREX trading and to attain my goals.

My trading plan had also been refined along the way, and instead of making the 10% growth daily, I change it to growth of minimum 10% each week. This would reduce my risk significantly and would also reduce the stress level haha... The only thing that had yet to be addressed properly, which in fact most traders would say that it's the most important one, would be calculating the lot size relative to the placement of SL. In every trade that anyone take, the setup involve indentifying the SL before even deciding on the TP. This will in turn allow one to calculate the lot size based on the risk one is willing to take on each trade, commonly 3-5% of the account. Seriously speaking, I had not been hard and fast on this rule and this is the reason why my trading journey had not been able to sustain in the long run. Small profit, big losses...

Also in the past, it seem that I had been trading rather blindly when I enter a trade, I do not know of the exit point. I only see the exit when in profit but not the other way round, resulting in big losses. Hence it is important to decide the SL first during setup before entering the trade and the exit signal must also be defined clearly. Using common profit, uncommon application need time to monitor the trade, but the exit signal are clear to me, be it in profit or losses. I will have to build on defining my exit signal clearly for my longer term trading method.

For now, my goals remain the same, to grow my account to breakeven and subsequently into profit. It will take along time, but like what the saying goes, "Late is better than never!"

FOREX end-of-week Summary 31 Aug - 4 Sep 09

Experienced a big loss in the beginning of the week, but manage to reduces my total loses by the end of the week. Attended Common Indicators, Uncommon Profits by AsiaCharts at Singapore Expo. Gained some valuable ways of using the various indicators, will test them out coming week... ;p

Gabriel Wong & Tan ChinSiang Farewell Dinner

Attended Gabriel and ChinSiang Farewell Dinner last night (4 Sep 09) at Yellow Light Thai Restaurant along East Coast Road. It was ChinSiang retirement and Gabriel farewell dinner for completing his service. I reached there extremely early after going for my pre-employment check up at Collyer Quay and haircut. Hence had a cup of tea at the coffee shop nearby.

Went over to the restaurant at 630pm and went to the second floor. The entire area was booked by us for the dinner. The place was cozy and food was good. Only thing was that I did not stayed till the end of the dinner as I had a mahjong session at 930pm. ;p

The man taking pictures for memories...

Gabriel, enjoying the catch he had... And not forgetting our food for the night... Of course there were more, but they ended in our stomach before I could take any pictures ;p

FOREX end-of-week update 24-28 Aug 09

Trading longer term definitely have it advantages, the charts that you analyse to look for opportunities to trade are filled with less noise that reduces the chance of you being fake out. Though you may not always be correct, at least the fake out are reduces significantly and success rate would be higher, which in term will result in profit on the long run. Having attended a few seminars and workshop, a few more to come, I understand my trading plan and method better and is able to make better decision and being selective about my trade. Attending seminar and workshop definitely helps, not forgetting researching and self-studying (reading) helps too. It's just about which way works better for you. ;p

FOREX end-of-week update 17-21 Aug 09

Made some positive result using the same method but using 1 hour and 4 hour timeframe, hence trading on a longer term. Read that beginner should always start with at least 1 hour timeframe so as to learn the price action of the market. Went to the invest fair on Saturday 22 Aug 09 at Suntec and attended a few seminars, as well as walk around the exhibit. Had a few interesting topic going on, one which really interest me was the Property Investment Program. Will attend the preview workshop, but unlikely I would be able to make it for the program itself, knda too expensive for me, at least for now. Nevertheless, I am having quite a few seminar and workshop coming up the next few days. Will be attending them and gain some insight to investment as well as FOREX trading. ;p

FOREX end-of-week Update (10-14 Aug 09)

Haven't been trading for the past few days, as I had been rather demoralised by the result and hence had been reading and trying to find out what went wrong before starting all over again.

Fireworks on National Day 2009

After work on National Day 2009, I sat at Wateredge and enjoyed my teh tarik while waiting for the rest to be ready. We are going on a cruise on Michael Chor's boat to view fireworks for NDP 2009. Once all of them had arrived, we walk over to the boat and get ready for the cruise.

The boat - Sparkling and...

The Master of the boat, Michael Chor

After leaving the Marina, we head towards the NDP 2009 at Marina Floating Platform. As we proceed the wind pick up and the sea became quite choppy... but we enjoyed it nevertheless.

Sunset

The National Flag flew pass while we enroute to our viewing area

When we arrived at the area, there were many other boats around, including those from our Club SAFYC. So we dropped the anchor and waited for the Fireworks to start. While waiting we had chicken wings, tibits, drinks and chat.

View of Singapore Sky Scrapers

Fireworks were partially blocked by the new building, a Hotel belonging to Sands @ Marina Bay.

After the fireworks, we headed back to SAFYC and had our dinner before retiring for the day and made our way home, that was already about 11pm... Happy Birthday Singapore! ;p