Trading the news: still possible?

Teresa · (#1 (**permalink**))

Hi everybody,

I recently opened a forex account and am thinking of trading the news. But from what I've been reading, I wonder ... is it still possible to trade news spikes? Apparently, brokers and banks don't like a lot of news traders and are making news trading difficult, if not virtually impossible.

How's it going for you news traders? Is it just more difficult ... is news trading still worth the effort?

Best,
Teresa

george soros · (#2 (**permalink**))

Going well for me but then I don't trade spikes and never have done. Depends when to try to get into the market. My tactic is to allow the frenetic activity to happen and then to make my decision. Quite often the market spikes in the wrong medium-term direction anyway just to knock off stops and you wouldn't want to to be in there in the first place. Take a few minutes to decide where the market should be going and if you're in touch with the zeitgeist, there's good money to be made.

Teresa · (#3 (**permalink**))

Interesting, George. I've read a lot about after-the-spike trading, but it looking at the charts it seems the movement happens so quickly that it's often over by the end of one 5-minute bar. You don't even see the spike until the bar has closed. I guess you really need to use 1-minute bars for news trading (?). It's encouraging to know that you are doing well.

khalihgs · (#4 (**permalink**))

I really don't understand what is the difference of the indicator which has a "m/m" with it and a "y/y" with it. What is basically the difference

OzWizard · (#5 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Teresa

Interesting, George. I've read a lot about after-the-spike trading, but it looking at the charts it seems the movement happens so quickly that it's often over by the end of one 5-minute bar. You don't even see the spike until the bar has closed. I guess you really need to use 1-minute bars for news trading (?). It's encouraging to know that you are doing well.

ANYBODY??? (You too Pharoah!!)

Please look at the chart of the 'Pound', CME Futures. It is a 5 min chart showing the price action around 15:30 (afternoon in Sunny Kyiv), the NEWS bar opened at its low of 1.9710 and hit 1.9749 after :

15:30 Unemployment Claims 407 366 366 369

For the next half hour ANYONE could of digested this news and gotten in
for a nice ride (as low as 1.9726) all the way to the 1.9860's!!!

At $6.25 per tick (pip for ya FOREX'ers) thats over $800 bucks and you can contol 1 lot (contract) for as little as $300 with some brokers.

Did I take this trade? NO! I trade early in the day with the Frankfurt and then London openings and by this time I had made my $$ and was in a nice cafe drinking 'pivo & vodka' with 2 very nice 'dyvushkas'!!

O Z in "going to hell when I die 'cuz I am living in HEAVEN now" Land !!

keitsuke · (#6 (**permalink**))

I found the news releases on the trading platform I was using was always delayed by 1-2 sec. I contacted the broker and they obviously denied any tampering of the timing of the releases.
I've since used a trial of "Trade The News" software and found it to be pretty good, but my trades at the moment are too small to warrant a paid monthly subscription.

Pharaoh · (#7 (**permalink**))

Yes Oz, I know the futures market moves similarly to the spot. Of course, the minimum buy in would have lost 800 bucks had it gone the other way. A lot of forex brokers allow trading MUCH smaller amounts.

Quote:

Originally Posted by khalihgs

I really don't understand what is the difference of the indicator which has a "m/m" with it and a "y/y" with it. What is basically the difference

m/m - Month to month
y/y - Year to year

george soros · (#8 (**permalink**))

Made 20 pips on that move using my newly opened account with MB Trading after having been advised to use them by Felix. Still trying to find a decent one-click interface for the platform as the Quote Trader doesn't appear to be working as promised.
I'm looking for something like Button Trader, so if anyone knows of a good trading/charting interface that works with MB I'd like to hear about it.

OzWizard · (#9 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pharaoh

Yes Oz, I know the futures market moves similarly to the spot. Of course, the minimum buy in would have lost 800 bucks had it gone the other way. ......

1) Look again at the chart, you would enter this market AFTER the news,
after YOU digest it and determine..... Of course this includes your RISK level.... why do you say it WOULD be an $800 loss??

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pharaoh

....... A lot of forex brokers allow trading MUCH smaller amounts.

2) I HAVE been preaching this about FOREX since I joined... in my humble opinion it is the only reason to play there....

OZ

Janus · (#10 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Teresa

Interesting, George. I've read a lot about after-the-spike trading, but it looking at the charts it seems the movement happens so quickly that it's often over by the end of one 5-minute bar. You don't even see the spike until the bar has closed. I guess you really need to use 1-minute bars for news trading (?). It's encouraging to know that you are doing well.

Yes, you need a 1-minute chart for trading the news. Did you all here have a very nice NFP-day?