The Chop Continues! -IFCN Wk 47 – Thu- $1,455.40

One day you're at completely new equity highs, and the next-- you're down more than 10% those highs. Welcome to the world of high volatility!The Eur/Usd shot up strongly early today and then dropped like a rock. Same with silver. And the other forex pairs.Doesn't mean that the moves are done, but it appears we will still have to wait a bit until they get stronger. Indecision is still the

Perversity Rules- New Equity Highs! -IFCN Wk 47 – Wed - $1,667.31

I am surprised but happy that we got filled on all of our trades so quickly. A different wind is blowing in the forex market this week. The wind is up for most currencies.It definitely looks like the dollar top is in. All the self-proclaimed savants 2 ½ months ago were certain that the Euro was unkillable – last week believed the Euro was finished. That is the condition I especially love

We Finally Got a Trade this Week! -IFCN Wk 47 – Tue - $1,438.76

After last week's moves, I wouldn't have been at all surprised to get NO trades this week in FirstStrikePlus. When you vary your buy and sell points due to the previous week's volatility and the previous week was the week from Gehenna, the market has to do a serious move to get a trade the next week.We have one.The Usd/Jpy rallied up to hit our buy price at 97.26. I don't have a lot of size on

One Night Stand trades Successful! -IFCN Wk 47 – Mon - $1,430.86

After this morning's open at 00:00 CST, I exited the 4 surviving OneNightStand trades from Friday. The summary follows-OneNightStand 08/24/08 entries:*eur/usd: Short @1.2728, out at 1.2566 for 162 pips profit*gbp/jpy: Short @152.82, out at 147.20 for 562 pips profit*gbp/usd: Short @1.6029, out at 1.5717 for 312 pips profit*usd/jpy: Short @95.33, out at 93.59 for 174 pips profitTotal ONS Profits:

Historically Profitable Week! -IFCN Wk 46 – Fri - $1,428.36

In 25 years of currency trading, I do not remember a week like this one.Even tempering my risk tremendously this last week--- the IFCN Challenge Account has done extremely well with the straight-line moves in most all of the currency pairs favoring the dollar and yen.It turned out to be a great week to be trading FirstStrike Plus. If we were still trading the original FirstStrike model of 50

Outsized Profits Demand Early Exit! -IFCN Wk 46 – Thu – $1,436.16

Due to an extraordinary decision, at 09:31 CST I exited all of my FirstStrikePlus trades at the market. I still have the single XAG position of 100 units @ $9.50, a Non-FirstStrike trade. This week's FirstStrikePlus trades have gained more than 16% on equity with less than 5% total risk.Early this morning, I had a nagging feeling that there was something that I needed to check. And so I did.I

The Dollar, the Strongest of the Weak..., Today! -IFCN Wk 46 – Wed – $1,402.66

The dollar struck two-year highs against a majority of currencies today as concerns about worsening national economies again challenged investors to pare some more “risky” holdings. Investors are finally understanding that European economies could deteriorate as much as the U.S. economy. Funny how they are actually buying into that “weak” US economy when they sell their currencies and buy the

Go With the Flow! -IFCN Wk 46 – Equity: $1,378.14

This is turning out to be an out-sized (profitable) week for the newly instituted FirstStrikePlus.Because the forex market has presently shown a strong tendency to whip back and forth, simple fixed volatility breakout points are subject to being triggered and being stopped out within minutes. Even so, they do work, because if the market doesn't immediately stop out the position initiated, the

Sometimes the Best Position Is.... -IFCN Wk 46 – Mon – $1,283.01

a small position....
Smaller positions with larger stops are best when markets are this fluid. This was a good week to start trading FirstStrikePlus. After this morning's open (Monday) at 00:00 CST, there were no OneNightStand trades to exit. Just the new entries for FirstStrike Plus. If you haven't

End of Week Recap.... -IFCN Wk 45 – Fri – $1,207.10

This is the last week we will be reporting on regular FirstStrike trades. (Fixed 50 pip breakouts above/below the week's open) Next week we will be using FirstStrike Plus, a volatility-responsive FirstStrike model.Here's last week's Friday recap:The data below is as of Friday's close, Oct. 17, 2008:Start of week equity: $1,205.35 OneNightStand Exit(s) on 10/13/08 :10/10/08 Eur/Usd short @

Silver Attention! -IFCN Wk 45 – Thu – Equity $1,246.21

You might find the following daily XAG chart interesting----

I've talked about diagonal triangles before, and there has rarely been a better example than is now visible in XAG (silver). There was a fast drop again today, with a tap to a slight new low, which touched the support-line created by numerous

It Takes Time....IFCN Wk 45 – Wed- Equity $1,182.72

Markets rarely stop and turn on a dime. After getting soundly pummelled for weeks, oftentimes the best solution is respite. That is the current choice of the most of traders.
We lost another trade today. The FirstStrike long Usd/Jpy @ 101.02 got stopped out at 99.82 for a loss of 120 pips. It was a

The Quiet Before the Storm! -IFCN Wk 45 – Tue – Equity $1,268.56

The dollar seems to be stopped by the global recapitalization plan. Surprised?You shouldn't be. It is the classic working out of the “Buy the news, sell the fact!” principle that works regardless of the side you happen to be on. In this case it was the foreign currencies being traded in for dollars as long as panic reigned, and now that the panic is basically over..., they're not continuing

Rebound at Last! IFCN Wk 45 – Mon – Equity $1,326.12

Last week I revisted the double-edged sword issue of volatility and the benefit to using breakout points which are adaptive to current volatility instead of fixed breakout points. I am releasing a version of FirstStrike that better adapts to market conditions. Bring on the big moves! I will be using this adaptive version from now on in the IFCN Challenge account.

Since I was not able to get

Still Alive! IFCN Wk 44 – Fri – Equity $1,205.35

Volatility concerns have encouraged me to make a change that I had planned to implement after the IFCN celebrated its first anniversary. That change is to introduce a version of FirstStrike that automatically adapts its buy/sell prices to the current volatility of the market. The original version has

Historic Week! IFCN Wk 44 – Fri-

Due to extraordinary time demands caused by trading volatility this last week, I did not complete the week's recap and detail intended information about optional volatility modifications to apply to FirstStrike and ONS.Both should be completed Monday, October 13.I'm glad to help others to potentially reap the opportunities presented by the current market action, but I'm also critically aware of

Another Shoe Falls! - IFCN Wk 44 – Thu- Equity: $1,458.23

These are momentous times. It is nice for those of us who are liquid and in the forex market, taking only the trades where we have an edge, instead of being at the mercy of fund managers who were in grade school when the “crash of '87” took place. These sad creatures have only known bull markets and

The TRUTH: We're the 10th Man!! - IFCN Wk 44 – Wed- Equity: $1,366.54

The following was sent to me thanks to George B. --

Bar Stool Economics Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.The fifth

Higher Volatility – Sword of Damocles! IFCN Wk 44 – Tue- Equity: $1,337.95

Sword of Damocles The recent high volatility has made “normal” a thing that changes hourly. In general, volatility is a good thing for traders, like me, who use volatility-breakout methods. But, you need to be aware of the flip side of the volatility equation too. We saw the real cost of volatility in

The Week's Silver Bullet! IFCN Wk 43 – Fri- Equity: $1,265.62

Quite a week. We had great results with two of our FirstStrike trades, a result which is always welcome. We had extremely negative results in our XAG, or silver trades. That doesn't mean that buying silver is bad, but it means that there is a lot of market action that must be withstood until visible

Not a Quiet Day! IFCN Wk 43 – Thu- Equity: $1,312.67

Wow! Not a day for the faint-hearted in the metals! Today, it seemed to be hard to keep a good metal up. Yesterday, silver showed its typical strength and ran up to 12.96 before backing off somewhat by the end of the

Quiet Day! IFCN Wk 43 – Wed- Equity: $1,492.80

Obviously, everyone is waiting to see if a vote is going to succeed on the Bail-out. As volatile as today was, it was relatively calm compared to those previous.

The market's mood is like the family waiting room in a maximum security prison 1 hour before an execution, everyone agonizing to see if the