Forex rebates on every trade - win or lose!

[12:45 US ECON: Performance of Nonfarm Payroll Estimates] Boston, November 3.
The band of economists estimates on nonfarm payrolls has consistently fallen
over the past 11 months, marked by a pattern of lower highs and lower lows.
Economists seemed reluctant to go below 100k for October, however, and that
range bottom is the same as in September. IFR's estimate (145k) marks the top
of this month's survey range. Without IFR, the median is 130k and the top is
140k.
The range for October has tightened to just 45k separating the high and low,
the tightest range since April (also 45k). In the 15-year history of IFR
surveys, the range has been below that only once, when in June of 2002, the
market expected May payrolls to rise between 50k and 70k. The result was a 41k
increase. From 2002 on, when the IFR survey range is 100k or less, the market
has overestimated actual payrolls 82% of the time and the print has averaged 55k
below the median.
In the last 12 months, the median has overstated actual (as reported) job
growth two thirds of the time. The average miss when the consensus was greater
than the actual was 66k. On the four occasions in the last 12 months when the
actual was greater than consensus, the average miss was only 14k. The absolute
value of all misses in the past year is 49k.
Since 1991, the market has overestimated October payroll growth 53% of the
time and by an average 56k. When the market has underestimated, the average miss
was also 56k. This includes a 177k surprise in the October 2004 payrolls report
when the result (337k) more than twice outstripped the median (160k).
Using the (final) implied market forecast from the CME economic derivatives
auctions, the average miss so far this year is 33k and no more than 87k in
either direction. Using IFR s survey median, the average departure is 36k and
no more than 98k above or below the actual. Meanwhile using IFR s in-house
estimate, the average difference from as-reported job growth is 27k with no more
than a 75k miss.

Wow :))

What time are the NFP's out, Choccie?

:o)

Hmm, closed my short out before the figures so I didn't get stopped out....

Silly me.

edit - that's twice this week I've got the direction, but failed to capitalise on it.

If you made on it, that's great SC - you'd have been stopped out with your stop at entry wouldn't you? So well done you :)

The initial head fake was a bit alarming though.

:o)

True Choccy. I pulled the stop before the figures. Anyway now short again. Will leave a wide stop this time :-0

You're telling me Hils :S
Don't think I'll bother with a bounce ;)

Nice one SC

Lets see that "initial target" of 1.8850 LOL

I can wait til Monday

ISM completes the jigsaw.

[15:01 US ECON: Non-Manufacturing ISM Rebounds to 57.1] Boston, November 3.

you say that...but I am sure there a couple of bits I have lost on the floor
and the dogs chewed them beyond recognition.. LOL

i got asked what i wanted for christmas and thought that a few trading books might be preferable to the usual hankies, socks and undies. so, can anyone recommend any good trading books , especially forex trading books?

hankies , socks and undies still very much appreciated as you can never have too many.

A good article here, showing again why I look at Gold/Bonds/Oil to try and
ascertain the possible direction of Dollar crosses.

Link to article

A few extracts:

Key to the gold's rise is the dollar's demise, especially in an election year.

And the dollar is "more vulnerable than ever," said Ned Schmidt, editor of the
Value View Gold Report, asserting his belief that the "dollar bear market will
accelerate after the U.S. election."

the glut of the dollar debt in central banks around the world is approaching a
critical level," Schmidt said, and central banks are slowing their acquisition of U.S.
debt, which will further weaken the dollar

The greenback is "in dire trouble so investors in gold know the risk is one to the upside
with only short-term fund traders taking gold lower for additional opportunities to add at discounted levels

"The strongest reason to own gold right now is the fact that we have three
U.S. aircraft carriers with task forces parked opposite Iranian shores
Saudi Arabia has put its entire navy and special forces units in defensive
position around the world's largest oil terminal, Ras Tanura, said Preston. News
reports last week said there were threats of a possible al-Qaida attack on Persian Gulf oil terminals.
"This is an unusually high concentration of military build up on the part of the
United States in the Persian Gulf,

The Bold highlighting is mine.

The problem I have here, though, is can everyone be positioned the same way
and all make the same profits?

Most folk seem to be reading the same stuff, drawing the same conclusions, and
putting on the same positions.
We can't all be right, can we?

Do Forex trades mimic the action of Indice trading, where you get a head fake in
the opposite direction first, whip out folks stops, and then go the right way
whilst the speculators are out of the trade, licking their wounds and wondering what
just happened?

Something a little different here, from the usual Cable chart.
It's a comparison between:
Red Dollar Index (Dollar against a basket)
Blue /$
Green /$

As can be seen, the Green /$ faithfully follows the herd and is almost a mirror
image of the Dollar index. So it cannot really be said the the is a weak currency,
seeing as it stays with the mean of $ FX crosses.

However, the Blue /$ (Cable) is outperforming significantly to the upside. This is
suggesting that Sterling is a stronger currency than the mean. Or that there is
more speculative money Long Sterling against the Dollar than the other currencies.

I don't really see why Sterling should be regarded as a strong currency versus other
currencies. (Perhaps someone else can and can post a few reasons?)

Therefore if you believe that stuff reverts to the mean, and you reckon that the
Dollar will strengthen, then the cross to short is Cable (/$). If you reckon that
the Dollar will weaken from here, then the trade to take,(atm), is a Long on /$
as there should be more upside than Cable as Cable comes back relative to the
mean even though it is appreciating against the Dollar.
Of course, if you believe that Sterling should trade at a premium to the mean,
then you ignore all the above. :-)))
If so, let's hear your reasons.

Another possible trade out of this scenario is a long /, as Sterling reverts to
the mean, and, as the chart shows, the Euro tracks the mean.
I'll try and bang on a chart after the comparison chart showing / at the bottom
of a channel.

I'm still getting to grips with Forex, so please take all this as just floating a few
ideas.

Just noticed that in the chatty bit near the bottom of the previous post,
that I inadvertantly put /$ instead of /, even though I had made it
obvious that I was talking about /.

So to be absolutely sure, the bottom chart is Euro/Sterling.

I've amended the error in the previous post. Sorry. :-(

Really enjoying this Mels. Just don't have any time at the moment, as I'm more out than in :S

General comment re cable right now is that I switched long just below 1.8990 on Friday. The drop was pretty drastic, but it didn't follow through and it may have bounced, albeit from a little higher than I was initially looking for. So a retrace down to the 60s is acceptable for me, on my chart anyway - that's where my previous rising resistance thingie was breached. Drastic change this weekend too, so I'll decide later tonight if I'll carry on this week.

Thanks for your comment, Chocco, glad it's of interest and taken your
mind off other stuff, albeit, just for a little while. Obviously, from your
posts ref your Mum, you have far more important stuff to occupy you
atm.

Hope things go better for you.

Thanks Mels. Things change from one day to the next at the moment.

I really am rubbish. I meant falling resistance thingie in my previous post. And 40s, not 60s. Blimey I'll get there in the end.

Gone back to some rising lines I was using in the summer. I can see Hils's 1.8850 if cable does decide to bumble on down (ref the lowest supporty thing) and if it hangs about long enough (MPC maybe) then cable won't breach what I'm now hoping is support (the upper sloping down jobbie). Although I'd much prefer it to carry on up now :)



And just like a girlie, I haven't decided yet :)

Still short here :-)

Mel,

You've put a lot of effort into those posts - thanks. I do have a couple of opinions about them, but it's a bit early in the morning and I can't really think of a way of putting into words those thoughts.

Choccie,

Just caught the tail end of something being wrong with your mum. Sorry to hear that and hope everything's OK.

Bosley,

I've never read any books either on trading or on forex, nor do I intend to. I feel now that it would serve simply to confuse me. The only two remotely related books that I've read have been The Zulu Principle (fantastic - I read it just at the end of the bull market in Y2K and subsequently shorted every overvalued pile of trash in sight) and Where are the Customer's Yachts (serves to make you understand exactly how rigged the whole thing is). I was fortunate when I started FX trading in that a friend introduced me at a football match to the head of FX for a large US investment bank. He pointed me in the right direction and I just went from there. There's nothing that he told me that hasn't already been said many times on this thread.

Fwiw, I'm still short cable and staying that way for the time being.