Whether you are a seasoned trader or new to FOREX, without a good money management it will be hard to ever make a dime. Good money management will be out a great trading system any day. Without knowing how to keep losses to a minimum will only jeopardize you’re trading efforts even if you have more winning trades than losing trades.
One of the worst mistakes traders make is trading without sufficient capital. This does not mean a trader has to have a lot of money to trade with, but enough to handle the movement in the market. The trader with limited capital will always be a worried trading looking to minimize losses beyond the point of realistic trading.
A good rule to follow is never risk more than 2% to 5% of your FOREX trading capital. Too many traders open mini accounts and begin trading heavily and end up margining out their accounts in a few months, if not a few weeks. Fore example, if a trader opened a mini account for $5,000, they should never trade more than $1 per pip. This way if a trade goes bad, the trader suffers a minimal loss.
Exercising discipline and following a specific trading plan is one of the most important aspects in FOREX trading. Discipline is also the ability to continue to trade your system even after you have suffered a loss. Emotional and revenge trading can easily wipe out entire accounts. Sometimes it’s good practice to ignore the dollar amount in a FOREX account and interpret the number of trades in pips only.
Think backwards when trading the FOREX market. Instead of trying to make money learn how to protect what you already have. If in the event that a trade does not develop in a reasonable amount of time or the market begins to form an opposite setup, you should employ the strategy of cutting your losses short to protect and preserve your capital.
Always use a stop-loss when trading. This will stop your position when the market moves too far against your position. Save your money to trade another day or on another trading setup. Too often traders are convinced of where they believe the market is going and lose their sense of reality and begin to trade on hope. They remove their stop-loss and hope the market will turn around, only to lose more money.
Trade light and never risk too much per trade. When in doubt of a trade, stay out of the market and wait for the trade to come to you. Use a system and follow the system without breaking the rules. Traders who are consistent and follow a definite plan are the ones that make money in the FOREX.
Tim Rohrer is an established writer and trader. To learn more about Forex trading, visit http://www.forex-investing.us
Written By: Timothy Rohrer
