Consolidation Trading Trend

Posted on February 17, 2008
Filed Under Forex | Leave a Comment

Forex charting is vital for your success in the foreign exchange market. To fully understand the shifting patterns of market rates, forex charting gives you an overall picture, which will enable you to trade more effectively. If you’re not sure of the benefits of forex charting, read on and prepare to be convinced.

Why is Forex Charting So Important?

Trading on the forex market is a little like playing on the highway. Things move fast and you need to catch the action with a blink of an eye. Being able to spot a new trend can bring you instant financial rewards, while missing some key data can leave you stranded. Forex charting is software that can be used regardless of your trading style or level of expertise. Forex charting develops the larger picture of where the market is going, which then enables you to feel the pulse of the action and anticipate events that will bring about significant changes. Generally, the market, on a day by day basis, can’t reveal long range trends. By using forex charting, you’re able to “connect the dots” from past market changes to predict future occurrences. This will keep you one step ahead of the action, which can amount to financial gains.

Features of Forex Charting

First of all, the software is easy to use and is designed to bring you the latest, real-time data. However, the view is much larger than the daily movement of the market or even particular stocks. Forex charting emphasizes the importance of watching the markets, which really have the ultimate sway over the performance of individual stocks. This will help you see why the best stocks sometimes suffer a decline in a bear market. This charting software maps out the historical data plus the current trends and arranges this information to show you what is happening now, what has happened in the past, and what is likely to happen in the future. Forex charting actually places you on the brink of decision-making, allowing you a golden glimpse into the projected future of the market. The data that is charted also features simplified analyses to help you make the proper market-timing strategy. Forex charting literally puts a wealth of facts and advice at your fingertips. If you plan on being successful in the forex market, this type of charting is vital. The unbiased projections are based on numbers, trends and hard facts, which can translate into a profitable future for you.
More information on Forex at natural gas impact forex points.

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Knowing When to Get Out Just Got Easier

Posted on February 16, 2008
Filed Under Trading Education | Leave a Comment

Learning To Sell

Its funny how CNBC tells you what to buyand when, but they never suggest to you when to get rid of a company? Most traders are left with the big question: how to sell stock

Even Market Edge 360 is guilty of that sometimes. Our rationale for not providing any guidance on when to exit from a specific stock is simple: Each investor has their own unique style of trading and their own unique way of weighing in on their own preference for risk and return. Its always best for the individual investor to decide when to pull the chute and exit from a position, since the selling strategy must match their own trading style. However, unlike all those other guys, we can provide a couple of suggestions that will help you know when to get out.

If you talk to any successful trader, they will tell you that picking a stock is the simple part. Its the selling part that is the toughest. You can spend hours investigating a company, you can spend hours looking for the best time to buy, countless more hours watching as it moves higher or lower. Its not tough to gain an attachment after spending so much time together. Its that attachment that makes knowing when to sell all the more difficult.

Here are some suggestions:

After a Stock Moves Higher

a) Don’t let greed take over. Its easy to start counting your new found wealth before its in your bank account. Protect your profits by having a trailing stop loss in place. By placing a stop loss 5-10% below the current price (you can also use tonight’s closing price if you can’t follow the action during the day), you can lock in a profit (or protect yourself from a larger loss). If the price closes at $10, set your stop loss at $9.00 or $9.50 depending on your risk / reward tolerance. If the price dips below your stop loss, you’re out of the market while others are holding onto a stock that is moving lower. Its always a good idea to lower your stop loss the higher your gain. For example, if you buy a stock at $5, you might place your first stop loss at 10% below that price ($4.50). As the stock moves higher, place another stop loss, but at a lower stop loss, perhaps, say, at 5% if the stock moved to $10 (setting your stop loss at $9.50). This trick will help you to keep more of your money. Remember, 10% of $5 is $0.50, while 10% of $10 is $1.00. Multiply those amounts by the number of shares you’re holding, and you can see why we suggest using a smaller amount for your stop loss.

b) Don’t get greedy. If your stock doubles, sell half your position. This way, you can let your winners run without risking your original capital. That’s what the name of the game is. Keeping the capital and adding to it.

c) Now that the price moved up, if you didn’t already own the stock, would you buy it today? When your answer is no, its time to sell. If you wouldn’t buy it at the current levels, why would someone else?

d) Use technical analysis. When your chart is saying its time to sell, don’t question it, just do it.

After a Stock Moves Lower

This should be the easiest thing to do, yet is the hardest. This is where many investors make mistakes, costly mistakes. Don’t let fear and doubt question what you know is the right thing to do.

After you have spent hours looking over every inch of info a company can produce, and you’ve laid down your hard earned money, there is nothing in the world tougher to admit than to say you were wrong. At the end of the day, the market is right. All of the due diligence doesn’t mean a thing if the majority of people don’t agree with your conclusions. A stop loss will help. If you buy a $5 stock, set your stop loss at $4.50 or $4.75 and keep it there. If you get hit, its better to stop your losses at 5-10% than to let them grow higher. Remember, 50% losses started off as 5% losses. If you get stopped out, take your lumps and go back to the drawing board. You missed something, or the rest of the world missed something. Either way, there are not enough buyers ready to buy your shares for more than you paid for them.

Fear will not allow you to make a rational decision. It can and will paralyze you and make you sell at the bottom or hold when you should sell. Stick to your plan. You wont hit homeruns each time at bat, but if you can keep your losses low, when you finally hit that homerun, you’ll have more money to enjoy it with! Stock market investing is not easy - but it can be profitable.

Food for thought:

If you started with $100 000 dollars, you could make set your stop loss at 10% and make 37 trades before running out of money. Set your stop loss at 5%, and you’ll be at bat 76 times. Set your stop loss at 3% and 128 chances are yours. Needless to say, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that if you can make a profit when you have at least 37 chances, trading is not for you. Not everyone has $100 000 to start off with, so odds are, you’ll have fewer chances. Increase your losses, and you wont be investing after only a few trades.

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Flipping Properties Is Harder Than You Think

Posted on February 11, 2008
Filed Under Real Estate | Leave a Comment

It’s all the rage, isn’t it? During the boom years of real estate, everyone wanted to flip real estate.

TV shows came out like ants to a picnic, everyone claiming to have the answers to the flip that house puzzle. If only it were so easy! fix & flip is harder than one might imagine.

So many people followed their limited guidelines with flipping homes. Most ended up losing their shirts, and even their primary homes because of real estate losses. Because they didn’t know the intracacies of real estate, they just went out with the bare minimum knowledge, wanting to make their life fortunes trying to flip real estate.

Yet there are more pitfalls to flipping properties than you might imagine. First and foremost, if you fail to catch the property at its lowest while the market is on a gradual upswing, you will find that flipping property is not as lucrative as it could be. Secondly, if you are flipping real estate that fell behind schedule while it was being remodeled, you run into the risk of not only catching the tail end of the house flipping boom in any particular neighborhood, but furthermore being forced to assimilate negative cash flow for longer than you bargained for.

You really do need to work with a team of contractors. Otherwise, you’re bound to get tired and frustrated when you try to flip real estate.

You’ll have multiple teams of contractors for each city in which you are flipping homes. Each team should work to a tight schedule that has their work done in no more than a couple of months.

When you spend too much time flipping homes you will end up losing money, which is NOT the reason you are out to flip real estate.

There’s a lot that can go wrong: absent contractors, stalled supply shipments, inclement weather, and of course labor disputes are the bane of existence for anyone engaged in the business of real estate investing, flipping homes and also renting.

Think before you flip - real estate is more complicated than you anticipate! Do not simply look at the obvious pitfalls - those that are the ones most commonly rumored to go wrong - but instead focus on the little problems that the “flip that house” shows on TV do not alert you to: the home inspector who will not let you flip this house until you undo years worth of do-it-yourself home improvements that are not up to code. Similarly, your dream of flipping homes will quickly crumble if the property is located in an area that is known for its flood or fire dangers. Finding buyers becomes harder in the aftermath of events that garner a lot of news coverage, and while the supply of real estate for flipping houses is plentiful in some such areas, the possibilities of realistically flipping properties in a short period of time are very limited.

Of course, when flipping homes you must know the taxable value of the home. Far too often those engaged in flipping properties do not know how much the home sold for the last time it was on the market, and suddenly real estate flipping turns into a study of becoming upside down in an otherwise nice home.

How to flip real estate is a question that takes a backseat to property flipping at all costs. The last thing you want is a bankruptcy on your hands if you have to carry multiple mortgages you can’t afford.

Do yourself a favor. Learn how to flip real estate from people who do it for a living. Don’t waste your time with get rich quick schemes that don’t really work. Check out our real estate investing training courses, especially our 6-month real estate investment training course.

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Financial Planning Tips - The 401k Retirement Plan

Posted on February 8, 2008
Filed Under Retirement | Leave a Comment

The article below is from a series of articles and videos about financial planning …

The 401k retirement plan has taken the corporate world by storm since 1979, primarily because of it’s affordability to employers. While pensions often sucked companies dry, 401k providers charge a small monthly administration fee (usually around $100) and this will give employers and employees many different investment options. After signing a contract, you specify a percentage of your income to be deducted and invested into a special account where it can gain interest over the years and profit with the economy. Sometimes employers agree to match your contributions and your final pay-out could be twice as much as you’ve invested by the time you receive it.

What makes the 401k retirement plan different from other pension benefits is its flexibility and the amount of control you have over it. Some options include: What percentage or flat monthly rate do you want to contribute? Also, where do you want to invest? Your employer will provide you with a list and you can choose between stocks, mutual funds, bonds, money market investments, company stock or any combination of the aforementioned. You may also select a financial adviser to make the choice for you. As with anything in life, there are risks. If your employer goes bankrupt, you may lose a huge portion of your retirement savings, especially if heavily invested in company stocks. You may decide to participate more actively in where your money gets invested because some annuities may be poor performers, while others are winners. Many financial planners will advise you to diversify where your money goes so you don’t “put all your eggs into one basket.”

Check with your company to see which 401k retirement plan you’re under. Either defined benefit or defined contribution. Under a defined benefit plan, your employer controls the final pay-outs, which don’t fluctuate as financial markets do, but instead are based upon your salary history and years employed. With a defined contribution plan, you’ll have more control over how much you contribute and where it’s invested, but less guarantee on how much you get back.

When you leave a company, generally your 401k retirement plan remains active for the rest of your life. If you feel uncomfortable entrusting your savings to the care of your ex-employer, or if your company charges a fee for looking after your account, you may rollover 401 k benefits into an Individual Retirement Account. Look into the rollover 401 k if you’re switching employers too. You’re allowed to draw on your 401k retirement plan after age 59 1/2 and you will then pay taxes on what you take out. Most plans have a minimum distribution requirement you must abide by, meaning that once you reach age 70 1/2, you’ll have to start to withdraw some of your money, unless of course, you’re still working. The only plan that is exempt from the minimum distribution rules is the Roth IRA. You may decide to take a crash course in investing and take a more active role to ensure maximum returns.

For more information on 401k retirement plan options, consult with your employer, local banker or advisers at Fidelity Financial. Remember, the earlier you plan for your retirement, the better you will ensure a secure future.

For more tips and videos on financial matters, visit: Financial Management

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