USD/CAD 15-min trade example

Posted June 25th, 2010 by Rapid Forex 37 Comments »

This is a completed trade example, this trade was originally posted in the LIVE 90 day forex trading member’s area.

June 23rd 2010: I just placed a trade on the USD/CAD 15-min charts. I’ll add more details soon, but want basic trade info to be public for now. Here are the details:

currency: USD/CAD timeframe: 15-min charts

I – 1.0308

II – 1.0457

III – 1.0359

IV – 1.0549

Entry -1.0398 long

Stop -1.0308

Limit – 1.0549

Reward/Risk = 167.87%

Potential Reward = 151 pips

Risk = 90 pips

Here are 2 screen shots:

100% Valid to Stick With Trade

Since this trade met all entry requirements, no adjustments are required. You could stick to the original trade plan, but since the 2nd wave may have failed (we don’t know yet for sure), it’s possible to make an adjustment. I made this adjustment & explain why below.

Trade Update – Stop Adjusted

After nearly 24 hours, I have adjusted the stop on this trade. The stop has now been moved up to the entry price of 1.0398 because a new high had been reached (point IV on picture below): Once the price in this trade reached a point higher than III, the stop can be moved from I to III. In this case I used my entry price as III. This trade is now a “risk free trade” because no loss is possible. I still haven’t changed my limit, but if we approach the most recent high (IV), if the trend turns down again, I will look for an opportunity on the 5-min chart to exit. The most recent movement on the chart looks like a potential candy-cane, so we could still see an upside breakout. We’ll probably be in a consolidation channel until the US market opens tomorrow.

2nd Wave Failure?

If you look at the 15-min USD/CAD chart above, you can see that the second wave after our initial I-II-III wave setup did happen, it was simply collapsed and distorted. This is due to a slowing momentum in the trend. This is also forming a potential double top. In this situation, we have some warning that the price might go down, so raising the stop is a good idea. This is a little more involved of a trade, but a good learning opportunity.

Waiting for a 61.8% Level

The most recent movement is potentially forming a new candy-cane. This would happen if the current price moves down to 1.0414. Once this happens, it could bounce up further. In this case, the price moving down a little bit isn’t bad… Of course the price could continue to go down, so we’ll have to wait & see.

Stopped Out for $0 Loss

Right before the North American market opened on June 25th, this trade hit it’s stop for a $0 loss. The loss was $0 because the stop was adjusted when we entered the second wave. See the picture below for when the stop was hit:

Final Trade Thoughts

This was a good first trade for the LIVE 90 day forex trading bootcamp. It introduced an adjustment strategy that I was planning to share a little later, but have now shared. I’ll be preparing a video to describe this in more depth. Now the forex market is closed, but next week will be even more exciting as I find more trades to share with you. The frequency of trades will increase, this week was kept intentionally slow to allow people time to follow a trade for possibly the first time!

Tags: 90 Day Forex Trading Bootcamp, closed trade, forex surfing, live trade, online forex trading, trade example Posted in trades

37 Responses to “USD/CAD 15-min trade example”

James Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 1:21 pm
Thanks for the trade setup. I was watching the 15M chart and when the trend line broke I exited and took a profit on the trade (looking to re-enter on any strength)so I am happy with the end result. Thanks again.

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:53 pm
@James – that was smart. I was watching the 5-min charts for the same thing because of the 2nd failed wave (new double top), but I lost out because I went out for the night with some friends to have sushi. Luckily, it didn’t hurt me too bad

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Mark Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 2:30 pm
Hi Brian, Please share how to do the proper settings for etoro. ( Risk Level, Amount, Stop Loss, Take profit?) My account is $500. I’ve tried playing with the demo account but I’m still confused. I believe a lot of members would benefit from this tutorial too. Thanks!

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:52 pm
@Mark – I will in the next trade. I forgot to take screenshots, I won’t forget again…

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Anthony Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 2:40 pm
Nice first try. I was in @ 1.03993. I moved my stop after notified but chose to lock in a little profit. Got stopped out at 1.04167 for $32.07. I had $4,920 in my live account and position size was 0.2. My account is 100:1 leverage and I have stayed under 3% risk for any 1 trade and never more than 5% on the table at any time.
Any thoughts on that?

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:51 pm
@Anthony – it’s never a mistake to take a profit. I was seriously tempted to when the second wave failed (the same time I adjusted my stop). I was up near 1.0435 and almost got out, but wanted to risk it anyway because I didn’t have a clear exit signal. In hindsight, a smarter plan would have been to exit half of the trade & lock in a small profit. I’ll never feel bad about a profitable trade (or a breakeven) no matter how big the profit could have been. After all “a bird in the hand is worth 2 in the bush”

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John Lester Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 2:47 pm
Hi Brian,
This was a good first lesson. I demo traded this on Alpari(UK) demo account as was unable to to do live trade on etoro $200 account.
As it was a $0 trade, nothing was missed.
Look forward to when we can startmaking some money on etoro.

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:48 pm
@John – I can’t wait for the market to open. In a few more trades, we’ll be going for profits for sure.

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John Alaska Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 2:49 pm
Brian,

Thanks for sharing the real world of trading with us – and surviving! Your attendance to the stop was well worth watching this trade.There was more:the use of the chart for identifying the trade was instructive and the id of the pattern on the chart … so there was a lot to learn here. I’m glad I followed the trade.Thank you!

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:47 pm
@John – thank you, it was an interesting trade….

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Jeanine Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 3:01 pm
Thank you for this lesson. I added a trailing stop earlier, so I actually made money on this trade.

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:46 pm
@Jeanine – AWESOME! It all depends on how tightly you want to trail your stops. On this trade I kept it looser, but was tempted to take some profit earlier.

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Bill Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 4:01 pm
You wrote: “Once the price in this trade reached a point higher than III, the stop can be moved from I to III. ”

I think you meant to say “reached a point higher than II”, right?

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:45 pm
@Bill – yes, I meant II, that was a good call. It was a typo.

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Amador Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 4:49 pm
This early I can see your method will make me a better trader.
It has now become more clearer and hope more easier to follow.
But sad to say, I don’t think I’ll be in the live side. After some back and fort email and their investigation, etoro is sending back the 500 USD deposit (thru Western Union) to me.
Why? I don’t know. My option then would be to open an account with another broker and follow the trading bootcamp through

My best regards,

Amador

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:45 pm
@Amador – you don’t need an etoro account to trade live. You can see the new registration here.

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Fred Riggins Jr. Says:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:22 pm
Brian,
Better than if the trade had worked as planned. We need to see trades where things sometimes go a little haywire.
I enjoyed your analysis.
Thanks

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 25th, 2010 at 5:44 pm
@Fred – and they will go wrong sometimes Thanks for your comment.

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Kulvadee Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 2:15 am
I was tempt to take a profit too but I thought I already had a stop loss to break even so better let the market decide which way it wanted to go.
Thanks for sharing, it’s an interesting trade to learn.

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mario Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 3:20 am
Brian, im following this blog. Hope to watch your archives videos soon.
I understand you are only using a fibonacci as your best strategy in trading forex. I have read many different strategies and it seems that yours is the best and simple. Is it possible to combine all other strategies? or do we need to stick to fibonacci and master it ?

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 30th, 2010 at 8:52 am
@Mario – there are certainly other ways of trading. I would suggest that you master fibonacci before trying to add other methods.

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Colin Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 3:46 am
Hi Brian,
I did not trade this one because you mentioned it was on a $2000 eToro account, not a $200 account.

Will all your future trades be on the $200 account?
Thanks.

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 30th, 2010 at 8:53 am
@Colin – I just got the $200 account. This was a misunderstanding with etoro that’s now straight. The next trade will be in the $200 account.

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judd Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 4:28 am
hi Brian well done for your first trade but for the life of me i cant understand why you did not take profit when it double toped and did not continue up, that would have been the most obvious place to take the money, are u only tradingwith 1 lot, well lets see what happens next week, good luck Judd.

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 30th, 2010 at 8:54 am
@Judd – that’s a good observation. I was actually camping, so I didn’t see that until it was too late…

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Corinna Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 5:16 am
Hi Brian,
I had made 70% on this first trade.
Thank you.

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John G Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 6:17 am
I entered live trade. Then analized daily charts. Lookedlike umbrella so I started looking for exit and ended up with 51 pip profit.

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 30th, 2010 at 8:55 am
@John – nice!

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Samson Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 7:50 am
Nice Trade.
I am really impressed, with your ingenious use of the stop loss, this particular trade outcome has opened my eyes to understand and appreciate some things better. I am re-reading all you post all over again this weekend from the first lesson and a lot of things are making many more sense. I am ready to take the time out and grab this once in a life time opportunity to learn the skill of trading that will be useful for life! Pls can you check my status on the live boot camp whether I am in , I want to be in as early as possible, do i try using a virtual reloadable credit card to pay the $50 reg fee if the payment inter face will allow, since that should be faster. I don,t know if the wire payment has gotten through to you.
Thanks

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Luis Fernando Luna Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 10:02 am
Hi Brian: I took profits with half of the position in 1.0457, then moved the stop loss to Breakeven. A good result to me and waiting for more trades.

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Richard Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 10:59 am
I liked how you adjusted the stop to eliminate risk as trade did not take off as expected. I wonder if you could update snapshot chart and review it daily so that I can compare what I come up with to what you do. Thanks.

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BEN Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 11:25 am
What would be a clear exit signal by the way?

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steve Aust Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 12:34 pm
Hi Brian,
Ah well, It was an interesting & educational trade.
I actually had this trade on 2 demo accounts. On my Etoro account I followed your directions to the letter & I lost nothing so I’m not complaining. It was a good lesson. On my other account after the Double Top formation I kept an eye on the 15 min chart.I noticed that the price was having trouble breaking through the 1.0438 zone on about 3 different times. So I decided to take the hint & change my Target to 1.0436. How good was that, because not long after that my target was hit the money was in the bank $400. Then the USD/CAD started to fall & is still falling. If you notice falling in a Umbrella fashion on the 15 min charts. I’m looking to forward to the start of next week & seeing what lessons can be learned.

Regards & Mahola Steve Aust

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Rapid Forex Reply:
June 30th, 2010 at 8:56 am
@Steve – good for you! I was actually camping, so I wasn’t sitting there watching. It’s good to monitor the smaller timeframes in that situation.

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mario Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 5:00 pm
Sorry but this maybe my last question. I thought Brian is willing to answer any questions specially to us newbies but he deleted my post

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Rapid Forex Reply:
July 25th, 2010 at 12:33 pm
@Mario – your post was never intentionally deleted. Perhaps you didn’t hit send? I answer as many questions as possible. I’m not able to answer 100% of questions, but I do read them all. Common questions always get answered in the blog posts that I do. Please feel free to ask questions, I will do my best to answer them.

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dj Says:
June 26th, 2010 at 8:27 pm
Brian your explanation is GREAT! you are really Expert to easy and clearly teaching forex

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