Forex Robot Trading Performance March 2011

How was last month? Is it safe to trade today?
A client asked me that question today and the thought kept coming back the rest of the day.
Well, I would not choose last month as my favorite month ever,
Apart from the non-stop human tragedies and the completely overwhelming grief one feels with the loss of so many lives - as a trader a month such as this last one really puts you to the test.
Earthquakes, revolutions, air strikes, nuclear threats - it seemed as if the term "geo-political events" wasn't even fit to describe what was going on worldwide this month.

We are fine in general - what started out as a promising month has seen some set-backs, but we are still ahead for the month and I find that to be no small achievement.
The robots were performing fantastically and were actually doing quite well - we may have inadvertently been too cautious and decided on a few non-scheduled no-trade-days being swept away by the contagious panic trading in Wall Street. Always a bad idea. If in doubt  - leave them to trade.

Once again we had the feeling that our robots perform just fine during tumultuous times - that's why we have volatility filters - to rule out unfavorable markets.

The USD/JPY was of course the currency most affected and there were truly a few free-falling days - now of course it is more stable than ever - with the world watching its every hiccup.

So, hopefully you have traded through this month successfully as well and have come out ahead in the end.
Let me know how you did....

Forex as a Retirement Investment?

Forex is usually not the first thing that comes to mind when the topic "Retirement Planning" comes up. Why? Because Forex still has the stigma of "no-holds gambling away - crazy trading" with risk that is uncontrollable and a chance to lose all the money at any moment. But is this perception deserved and even true?

I think we are still in what will be considered "Forex infancy" in years to come. Let's not forget that stock investing was considered risky and not a safe choice by those promoting real estate as the only safe investment choice just a few decades ago.
Trading always is only as good as the strategy behind it. There will always be traders who trade "by the seat of their pants" - in Forex right now they are still the majority - but soon they will be weeded out by the natural selection of trading - they will simply run out of funds.

When you have a sound Forex trading strategy and a system to implement it - preferably an automated Forex trading system to rule out human error and emotion - profits will follow - in all trading setups - Forex just being another investment venue. The advantage that Forex has over other investments is leverage - you can with little money  control large capital - that leads to faster paced growth but does not mean we have to deal with larger risk.

How to control risk in Forex:

1. You leave trading to a Forex automated system - no mistakes - 100% execution of your Forex trading strategy
2. You use a robot with automated money management and you trade with low risk. Your account will grow slowly and steadily - and on its own
3. You apply common sense - you avoid insanely risky days  - no-trade days - you read the news and observe the market behavior - ideally your robot uses volatlity filters to rule out much of the insanity on its own.