Money Matters Now

My hunch is that if you’re a novice or inexperienced trader, you will have heard and may have been advised to stay well clear of any stocks that are volatile, or highly volatile. Well, this advice is not necessarily wrong, but you need not overlook these stocks altogether.

Correctly traded, the possibility of higher returns, or returns over a shorter period of time, is a key feature they have, over the less volatile stocks. Because of their nature, their price will move both quite erratically, and further, in any given time frame than their more slowly moving cousins.

Commodities and currencies for example serve to show the characteristics of volatile stocks, and it probably best to trade them of software that allows dual functionality, in that it has both data feed and a trading platform. The advantage of this is that the data feed is real time.

With most end-of-day static trading data feeds, the closing price for the day is downloaded after the market close, and you see it on a static chart. But real time feed is exactly that, and you can open and close your positions literally based on the price movement you see happening in front of you.

Most real time software allows you to zoom in on your position too. You may prefer to trade in a time frame of as little as five seconds, if you wish, so it’s really easy to macro-analyse your trades.

Although I wouldn’t necessarily advise it, but because you are following your trade face to face so to speak, you could omit using a stop loss facility, which most day traders use, since once they’ve opened a position they tend to close down and allow the stop loss to do it’s work for them.

As said, trading volatile stocks requires close attention, but the advantage of this is there’s more potential to gain more from your trade in a shorter time frame. You may only need to be exposed for twenty minutes or sometimes a few seconds. Taking a currency trade like the US Dollar against the UK pound or USD/GBP, for instance, you should be aiming for a maximum gain of say 3 points, no more. This gives your capital the minimum exposure for the maximum return.

By: Ian C Jackson

About the Author:

Daniel S. asked:


The currency trading market offers many great opportunities to make money. However, before you jump into the financial forex market, you’ll need to proceed with caution and not to rush into it. Here are some of the mistakes or pitfalls you must avoid in order to protect your life savings:

1. Over Leverage

This is a one of the most common mistakes committed by forex traders, especially those who are relatively new to trade the forex financial market. If you can only afford $5000, do not trade $10,000. Trade what you can afford to lose. Do not put all your entire savings at risk. Just like any business, losses will happen, but you need to control your risks and protect your capital.

2. Over Confidence

Don’t ever forget that the forex market is smarter than you. So don’t ever think you can look into a crystal ball and see where it’s going to happen. Otherwise, your capital will be wiped out pretty quickly and your confidence level adversely affected. You will need to do your homework, study the market trends to understand what the market is doing. Some good forex indicators will tell you what the forex financial market is up to. Get a good simple forex trading system that works and follow it closely. Do not ever try to outsmart the market by acting before your forex trading signals tells you to.

3. Over Attach To The Trade

If you have entered a forex trade and is losing you money, get out of it. This is another common mistake of people trading as they become attached to the trade or think it will eventually turn around. If it’s losing, it’s a loser. The best way to do this is to set a stop loss for every trade you enter. If you’re wrong in the trade and got taken out by the stop loss, just move on and focus on the next currency trade.

4. Over Bid

Another major mistake some forex traders make is to chase the price. They entered the market after the currency pair has already made large moves and is prone to price correction. There is no place in the forex trading market for emotional traders. If you allow your emotions to dictate your trading, you’ll end up with an empty account. Getting emotional is something you want to avoid at all costs. If the price is unfavorable, do not trade but wait for the next opportunity. Remember, good traders control risk, inexperienced traders chase gains.

5. Over To You, Coach

The most successful forex traders usually find themselves a good coach or mentor. This can be a friend who has been trading forex for quite some time or a forex trader who is willing to share his knowledge and experience. Learn as much as you can from him. Study his forex trading guide and learn how he trade the forex. Do demo trading on the forex trading strategies taught to test it out. And don’t hesitate to ask him questions.

Forex trading is a long term business and you need to spend time and effort to master it. Successful traders are those who are patient with the market and themselves. Remember, only serious traders can make serious money. Are you serious enough to trade profitably?