The thing is, when rookie option traders first hear of this strategy (perhaps from a late night infomercial or free hotel seminar conducted by slick salesmen touting it as the greatest thing since sliced bread) – very few seem to able to resist the temptation to jump right into trading them head first – with actual real hard earned money on the line – and usually way too much of it.

And it seems that a good percentage of them – if not most of them – promptly wind up getting their groins kicked in, their heads ripped off, their eyes poked out, and getting hurt really, really bad.

Now stop.

I don’t want you to get the wrong idea here. So let me explain something.

I actually LIKE iron condors. I like them ALOT.

I think the iron condor really IS a great trade.

And those claims and stories of ten percent monthly gains and ninety percent probabilities? They are absolutely true.

The big problem is that there is some very important information being left out of those iron condor claims and stories. Information that I’m sure would keep alot of rookie option traders – who frankly just don’t know any better – from blindly making that ‘over-confident’ leap into the iron condor abyss.

See, while it may be true that the iron condor and credit spread strategies can kick off yields of over ten percent monthly and that they favor the trader by offering high probabilities of winning (in some instances as high as 80 and 90 percent) – what isn’t being talked about is the risk to reward ratio of these trades – which can be as high as 10 to 1.

That means that while trading these trades you are putting at risk 10 bucks for the chance to make just 1. Or – in reality, in the instance of say a standard ten lot index iron condor, you are risking ten thousand dollars for the chance to make just one thousand dollars.

And as mammy used to say to us kids – ‘that ain’t nothin but a real awful bad egg’.

Because once you do the math you find that even with those glorious monthly returns with 80 to 90 percent probability of winning – all it takes is just one problem month to come along and cause a loss that will completely obliterate the 8 to 9 wins you’ve managed to rack up – as well as potentially the rest of your entire account!

However…

There is still hope…

As I mentioned earlier – I really do LOVE trading iron condors.

Over the last ten years it’s been extremely profitable for me.

So apparently, even with that atrocious risk to reward quandary, there must be a method to generate consistent income with this trade.

And yes, there certainly is.

It all revolves around how you go about handling the trade.

That risk to reward problem quickly becomes a complete non issue as soon as you educate yourself on the proper way to initially set these trades up and how to correctly manage and adjust them.

You just need to take the time BEFORE jumping into the iron condor pool to equip yourself with this little bit of knowledge. A few simple ‘tricks of the trade’ – so when those problem months DO come along (and they WILL believe me) – you will know exactly what you need to do to immediately squash that threat, easily adjust yourself out of the problem, and experience the iron condor for all it’s ‘really’ cracked up to be.

To learn a much ‘better’ way to trade the Iron Condor spread for monthly income, visit this Iron Condor Adjustments site for simple step-by-step instructions on how to correctly place, manage, and ADJUST iron condor trades.

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Whether or not it is a level playing field for the big and the small, you will have to decide for yourself, because so much scandal has come to light of late about irregularities in other financial markets. However, the Forex is so large that it is difficult to think that it can be manipulated. (Although George Soros is blamed for a run on the GBP in the early nineties).

It is probable that the big players have more access to information that the rest of us. Particularly governments as they make the policies that affect the way a currency moves. Information is the key to profitable Forex trading. Therefore, you have to know the terminology of the Forex market; how to utilize the financial instruments that your broker makes available to you and you have to be up-to-date on the information affecting your target currencies.

Therefore, it stands to reason that you should choose to open an account with a Forex broker that provides the most advanced trading platform, provides the best training and distributes the best, up-to-date news and market analysis.

The best way of selecting an online Forex trading system is to Google “online Forex trading system” and pick six of the most impressive to you and save them into a folder in your ‘Favourites’ list. If you are new to Forex trading, you should read the companies’ training literature. This will give you an impression of how much the broker cares. Try putting some of the doctrines that you learn into practice in a ‘practice account’. The practice account is free, but sometimes you may only use a practice account for a month or so.

You will discover that some online Forex trading systems are easier to use than others. One online Forex trading system might suit you but not suit me, it is a personal preference. Some online Forex trading systems will have all the bells and whistles, but you may like a simpler system. For example, if your computer is slow or your Internet connection is slow, you may want to be able to turn off any elements that you do not need in order to speed your system up.

Another feature that you should pay close attention to when choosing an online Forex trading system, is the system’s functionality for technical analysis. You will need free access to the historical data of the currencies that you are interested in. These data can then be interpreted by graphs, which may be able to help you determine which way a particular currency pair may go. Breaking news is also very important and your broker should provide you with all the latest news stories ‘hot off the wire’.

Owen Jones, the author of this article, writes on many topics, but is now concerned with a currency trading tutorial. If you are interested in dealing with an FX Trading Account, please go to our web site.

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Naturally, any Forex trading training will include learning the terminology, various trading procedures and concepts pertaining to Forex trading. There are basically two reasons why a future Forex trader may need training. The first is if the student wants to take up a professional post with a Forex training company. The second is because someone wishes to make some extra cash in his or her free time by working for him- or herself.

A professional Forex trader will be handling millions of dollars a year and possibly a great deal more than that, so a top-class education is a necessity. This will usually mean a university education and rigorous in-house additional Forex trading training.

This is because the Forex market is the largest market in the world by far and millions of dollars can and do change hands in seconds. This requires nerves and great skill. It also takes wisdom and discernment.

Since the amateur is only trading with his own money, the level of Forex trading training is entirely at the trader’s own discretion. However, the Forex trader of either type will have to learn how to construct charts and also how to read them. Technical analysis is an indispensable part of working out which way a currency will move against another currency in the short or long term

The Forex student will also have to learn about the different kinds of orders, margin, leveraging, rollovers, trading psychology and risk assessment. You will also have to learn some personal skills like how to become disconnected from your purchases so that you deal with your head and not with your heart. Emotion has to be totally detached and you must not take it to heart if your hunch proves unjustified.

You can acquire this training from several sources including day and evening classes, Internet seminars and webinars, correspondence courses and by studying the free literature given by all the best Forex trading companies.

This latter part of Forex trading training is very significant because each Forex broker will have its own software which will carry out essentially the same functions as everyone else’s software, but which will also be slightly different to employ.

The successful Forex trader might want to trade in the very short term – hours, minutes or even seconds – so it is indispensable to know precisely how the Forex trader’s software works or you may miss an opportunity. Forex trading training is crucial if you want to reduce your chances of losing and maximize your chances of making money on the Forex markets.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on many topics, but is presently concerned with how to be a currency trader. If you are interested in dealing with an FX Trading Account, please go to our web site.

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It followed then that the best brokers were those with the most pertinent and up-to-date information. In addition, trading was not cheap, so it was better to trade only several times a year for long term growth in order to keep overheads (fees) to a minimum.

This set-up has been drastically changed by the Internet. These days, most Forex trading platforms have been computerized, so, although charges do differ, they are a lot lower than they used to be because there is less human involvement and there is more competition. The knowledge of the markets that brokers defended zealously from other brokers is now common knowledge for those who want to find out, because all key stories are sent around the world by the press agencies.

The two main strategies in investing of any kind including foreign currencies are fundamental analysis (keeping up with the news) and technical analysis. In combination these two research strategies can be called ‘due diligence’. Due diligence is the investor’s main protection against big losses so it should be learned from the beginning.

Technical analysis involves interpreting charts. There are literally hundreds of different charts which try to forecast a currency’s future movement (up or down) by analysing historical data or what it has done in the past. Some investors swear by charts, others say that past performance can not have any influence on the future events that might influence a currency’s movement.

For instance, the GBP (British Pound) may have been doing very well for months and the trend is up for the long term, but then terrorists explode a series of bombs in London and the GBP nosedives, That could not have been predicted by charts.

Having said that charting is interesting and almost certainly has its uses, not least in forecasting highs and lows. For instance, say the Thai Baht has historically been around 40 B to the USD, say for 15 years and Thailand is a very popular holiday destination. If the Thai Baht (THB) strengthens to 30B / USD, people will stop going there which will harm the THB and tend to bring it back towards 40:1 again. Charts would propose acceptable highs and lows based on historical data.

A common method of predicting these highs and lows is the use of Fibonacci retracements. Do not be concerned about all these charts, they usually come built into any charting software you use, whether you buy it or use the Forex trading company’s free software.

Fundamental analysis is the other component of successful analysis or due diligence. Every week, figures are disseminated to make public some economic detail of a particular country such as non-farm payrolls or unemployment figures that can perhaps have an erratic effect on the Forex markets Sometimes it is wise to stay out of the markets when important announcements are being made.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on many subjects, but is presently involved with Forex dealing. If you are interested in dealing with an FX Trading Account, please go over to our website.

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If you open a Forex account with a good Forex trading account provider – a broker – the company will supply you with reports on what is happening in the international currency markets. Some provide this information free of charge, other companies make a charge. The state of affairs is similar with regard to trading overheads.

Some Forex trading companies charge a fee per trade and others charge a spread or a percentage. You will have to work out which system is best for you. This is equally true of the minimum trading amount. Some firms allow a minimum trade of $100 others $1,000.

You also have to check how long your trade is valid for at minimum. Some companies insist on a 30 day minimum others demand a 48 hour minimum turn-around. If you go with a long trading period, you will not be able to take advantage of very short term swings, which is similar to day trading on the stock exchange. Day trading is not recommended by experts, because it is very risky, although it can provide good short term profits.

You can trade Forex on line or and off line, it makes no significant difference except that on line dealing is usually faster and cheaper. These are benefits, but the technicalities of the trade are basically the same. Being able to trade on line also means that you can trade from anyplace that there is an Internet access point anywhere in the world, which is cheaper than phoning your order through to your broker while you are on holiday.

Most online Forex trading systems or platforms will be ‘execution only’ services. This indicates that they will carry out your instructions, but will not offer any advice whatsoever. You can opt to work with an adviser from the brokerage firm, but that usually costs a great deal more and can slow things down too.

Whether you work with an adviser or not you will have to find a Forex broker that you can trust. If you are taking advice, you have to believe that your adviser knows much more than you do or else there is no advantage. However, the advice you will be given will probably be the Forex industry’s standard point of view. Do not expect it to be revolutionary or trend-bucking. They are not going to go out on a limb for you, in case you take legal action, although they may have put get out clauses in the agreement anyway.

However, even if you are on execution only, you will still want to work with a Forex trading firm that you feel you can trust to carry out your instructions in a timely manner. If you work out and feel that right now is the time to buy the dollar against the pound, you want to trade right now and not in four hours time when the exactly right entry moment has slipped past.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is presently involved with Forex dealing. If you are interested in dealing with an FX Trading Account, please go over to our web site.

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If you want to profit from commodities than futures trading is the best and direct method of getting access to the commodity market. There are several active futures trading exchanges in the US. Three of the world’s largest futures exchanges are located in Chicago.

The largest futures trading exchange in US is Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). A large number of futures contracts get traded on CME that includes commodities, stock index futures, foreign currencies, interest rates, environmental futures and others.

The commodities futures that get traded on CME include cattle, butter, limber, pork bellies, Goldman Sachs Commodities Index, live cattle, milk, lean hogs, feeder and fertilizer. Now as said before, commodities is an important asset class. CME provides you with the opportunity to trade many commodity contracts.

CME provides you with the opportunity to trade futures contracts on these stock indexes as well as their mini versions the E-Minis. Now, one of the ways to trade stock market is to trade stock indexes like the various S&P 500 like the S&P 500 Midcap, Small Cap as well as the Russell 2000 and the NASDAQ 100.

GLOBEX is the Electronic Trading Platform owned by the CME Group that allows the electronic trading of these contracts almost 24 hours a day. So you can easily trade almost all these contracts from the comfort of your home electronically using your computer.

The world premier futures exchange is the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT). The futures contracts that are available on CBOT include agricultural futures like the corn, wheat, soybeans, ethanol, rice and mini contracts on corn, soybeans and wheat.

A mini version of Dow Futures called the E-Mini Dow is also available. You can also trade mini versions of gold and silver futures contract on CBOT. CBOT gives you the opportunity to trade one of the most popular stock indexex the DJIA Dow Jones Industrial Average) in the form of Dow Futures.

Now the best place to trade crude oil, natural gas, gasoline as as well as a host of other energy futures in the NYMEX (New York Mercantile Exchange).This is infact the global hub for energy trading and offers futures contracts on unleaded gasoline, heating oil, electricity, light sweet crude, natural gas, propane and coal.

Futures trading is something that is not difficult to do once you get the hang of it. In the beginning, you should just paper trade these contracts for a few months! NYMEX also provides you with the opportunity to trade precious metals like the gold, silver, platinum as well as palladium. You can also trade metals like copper and aluminum on NYMEX.

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. Know this shocking Dow Futures secret that can make you rich. Download this very simple 1 Minute Forex Trading System FREE that makes money instantly.

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In some cases,a stock gets so much shorted that there are no more shares of that stock left for you or your broker to borrow anymore. Now, you cannot always short a stock instantly. Most of the investors work on rumors. In that case, you simple will have to cross your fingers and see how the other short sellers do on that stock while you search for another stock to short!

Now, shorting is one of the favorite strategies employed by day traders. A day trader may short stock on the mundane reason like its price had been going up for three days and it’s time to come down! Day traders are not fundamental traders. Day traders are simply interested in the daily volatility in the stock. Most even don’t do any financial or fundamental analysis of the companies whose stocks they are trading. Almost all are technicians or what you call technical analysis experts.

You have to be careful about the uptick rule as stock exchanges have rules in place to help maintain an upward bias in the stock market. What this means is that you can only short a stock when the last trade was a move up. In other words, you can’t short a stock that is moving down.

Now you have to be careful when shorting a stock as certain risks are involved. In theory, there is no limit on how high a stock price can go high. So when betting on something going wrong, if you yourself go wrong, the potential loss in case of a stock price going up can be immense.

Now, don’t get caught in the market with short selling when good news spreads about the stock that you had shorted driving its price up. This is known as Short Squeeze. Once that happens, almost all short sellers get desperate to dump their stocks and exit but when they try to buy back the stock, they get more hurt as the prices go even higher and higher on rising demand for the stock in the market.

Now many companies, brokers and investors hate short sellers and try tactics to bust them. Sometimes, they will issue good news or spread rumors of good news to create a squeeze. Other times, they can ask the stock holders collectively to tell their brokers not to loan out their shares. What this means is that short sellers have to buy back the shares and return them to the brokerage firm and close their short positions even if it does not make any sense.

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. Get your FREE COPIES of the HVMM Ultimate Day Trading System and the Universal Risk & Money Management Tool just now!Read this 49 page Quantum Swing Trading FREE Report plus the shocking Profit Button Report that applies no matter what you trade-stocks,forex, futures or options!

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The most market moving reports are the Federal Reserve’s Beige Book, The Consumer and the Producer Price Index, The Gross Domestic Product (GDP). the monthly Employment Reports or what you call the NFP Report, the Institute for Supply Management (ISM). Now as said before if these reports have no surprise for the markets, nothing will happen. But in case if there is a surprise, markets can turn upside down in matter of minutes! Now when these economic reports are released, market compares the expected with the unexpected. The more these reports have the element of the unexpected, the more the markets become nervous. So, if you are a news trader or an economic report trader, you need to watch CNBC and Bloomberg constantly to know what the market is expecting.

Now, you can know the date of release of these economic reports by looking at the Economic Calendar. Each month, most of these reports are released by the different agencies that includes both public as well as private at fixed dates. By looking at the Economic Calendar, you can know these dates as it provides the listing of dates when these reports will be released.

Not all reports are created equal. Some economic reports have more influence on the market than others. The most important reports that tend to move the markets a lot are the employment report, the Producer Price Index (PPI), the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and the Federal Open Market Committee Meeting Minutes.

Now, Non Farm Payroll Report or what you call the NFP Report is the most market moving report in the recent times. This report is released by the US DOL (Department of Labor) and it gives the state of employment in the economy during the last month period. It is released on the first Friday of each month exactly at 8:30 AM EST. There are NFP Report Traders who easily make 150-200 pips at this time within minutes.

Now as said before, the market reaction is dependent on how muc surprise there is in the report. If there is no element of unexpected in the report, the market may react mildly. But if there is a big surprise in the report that the market did not anticipate, markets can be volatile for hours or even days before the importance of the surprise is digested by the market. These types of reports can also start a news trend in the market that might last for quite sometime!

Now, as the economy shifts gear from slow growth to high growth the state of employment figures can become highly important for the economy. This report is used by the traders, investors and Wall Street Analyst to anticipate any interest rate changes in the economy. In the end, it is the interest rates that stand at the center of the financial universe! NFP Report has become important in the last few years keeping in view the slow economic growth.

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. Download this 70+ page Forex-4 Pack Forex Swing Trading Training Kit FREE. Get this 1 Minute Forex Trading System that makes money instantly FREE.

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How to spot the Hanging Man and the Hammer? These candlestick patterns are easy to spot on the chart. When you spot a very small candle body accompanied by a pretty long wick on the bottom, it is a Hanging Man if it appears at the top of the uptrend and it is a Hammer if it appears at the bottom of the downtrend.

In less than ideal cases, you might also find a small wick at the top of the candlestick. When the Hanging Man or the Hammer appears, you need to look for the confirmation on the next day.

Now suppose, you think that you have spotted the Hanging Man in an uptrend. Wait for the confirmation the next day with the opening price. If the opening price on the next day is less than the previous day’s close, you have a true Hanging Man. If not, then that was not a true Hanging Man.

A Hammer should have a very small candle body with a long wick at the bottom. Similarly suppose, you think that you have correctly spotted the Hammer in a downtrend. You should confirm this with the opening price on the next day. If the opening price is higher than the closing price the previous day, you have a true Hammer. If the opening price is not higher than the closing price the last day, it is not a true Hammer!

Whenever, you trade candlestick patterns, first spot them correctly than wait for the confirmation on the following day. The best chart for these candlestick patterns is the daily chart. Once, you get the confirmation, trade these patterns. They can be highly profitable. But in case, you don’t get the confirmation the next day with the price action, simply ignore the pattern as not true.

Spinning Top is a signal that the battle between the bulls and the bears ended in a draw. It will start next day again with ony side giving in. What this means is that an explosive move in the price action can take place the following day. Spinning Top is just like the Hanging Man and the Hammer.

How to identify a SPINNING TOP? A Spinning Top has a very small candle body in the middle with two equal wicks on the top and the bottom. This pattern appears very frequently in the daily charts and can be highly profitable if spotted correctly.

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. Get this 49 page Quantum Swing Trading Report FREE. Master Candlestick Charting with this 82 page PDF FREE Candlestick Guide!

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For this you can do back testing. Back testing is a method that uses historical data to test how well your indicators work in a particular market. You can use back testing software that enables you to look at the past market data and test how well the indicators and your trading system have worked in the past market.

Now, back testing is done with historical data. What this means is that although your trading system might perform very well with back testing, it may not work in the present market. Market conditions keep on changing and what worked in the past may not work in the present. In the same way, what didn’t work in the past may start working now.

In other words, no two trades work out in exact the same way twice. SO you have to be careful when looking at the back testing results and take it with a pinch of salt. However, there are still some advantages of back testing a trading system.

Back testing can give you a feel how a particular market behaves under certain conditions. Back testing can also spot you certain general characteristics of the market like the seasonal trends and market tendencies.

For example, some markets especially the commodities market is highly seasonal and cyclical in nature. Now in other markets, you might not find any seasonal trends. For example, there is very little seasonality in curreny market or the bond market. In case of the stock market, there is much talk of the January Effect. Well, it is there no doubt about it. Some years, it is highly pronounced and others it is not that pronounced. Similarly stock prices tend to rise at the end of each month and the first few days of the new months. The reason for this is that many institutional investors tend to put the new funds to work at the end of the month and the beginning of the new month!

Back testing can also help you establish the amount of time a particular market tends to run in a certain direction. For example, in case of US Dollar Index, its trend lines tend to last for months to years.

There is no substitute for live trading results! To tell you the truth, backtesting can only give you a rough guess about the performance of the trading system under live trading conditions.

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. Download this 1 Minute Forex Trading System FREE that makes money anytime instantly! Read this shocking FREE 40 page PDF FRWC Brutal Truth Report that exposes everything about trading robots!

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