Old and defunct Holy Graily Bob

[John3344]

Gertje,

One trade killed my account today, a buy on GBPCHF.

Thanks for sharing your experience. I know how a blown account hurts and it sucks that SNB would pull such a
move that would devastate so many traders.

It appears that having a stop loss in place does not save a traders account from disasters such as this. Not having a SL in place would have yielded the same result I suppose.

Sorry to hear you were one of those negatively impacted by this event.

John

[John3344]

fchaman,

I was so lucky to remove all CHF crosses in my trading pairs last week, except USDCHF...that pair alone cost my balance 25% loss today..

Sorry to hear about your trading loss. 25% account balance loss is devastating. Did you have a Stop Loss in place that saved you from losing your entire account?

I'm at a personal decision point. Even though I trade with stop loss orders in place, if there's a chance of blowing my account due to a move like the SNB, I thinking seriously about continuing to trade forex. I have spent a lot of screen time over the years and had very profitable 2014. If there's a chance my account can be devastated within seconds even though I trade with Stop Loss Orders in place, then I really need to reconsider continuing to trade forex.

John

[SteveHopwood]

fchaman,

Sorry to hear about your trading loss. 25% account balance loss is devastating. Did you have a Stop Loss in place that saved you from losing your entire account?

I'm at a personal decision point. Even though I trade with stop loss orders in place, if there's a chance of blowing my account due to a move like the SNB, I thinking seriously about continuing to trade forex. I have spent a lot of screen time over the years and had very profitable 2014. If there's a chance my account can be devastated within seconds even though I trade with Stop Loss Orders in place, then I really need to reconsider continuing to trade forex.

John

John, trading Forex requires BOS - Balls Of Steel. This has been hidden from SHF members for a while as we sheltered behind relatively benign markets and systems such as those developed here.

Thursday was a timely reminder to us old stagers that we still need BOS. Yes, sorry to keep banging on about the Old Stagers thingy, but the fact is we have OS all been here before and seen it all before. I for one, had become a tad complacent.

So, if you lack the required BOS in Forex terms (not any other - you may be a member of the SAS for all I know and no implied criticism, I promise) then yes, you should quite trading Forex.

I repeat the oft said mantra. Never trade with funds you cannot afford to lose. This is different to not wanting to lose them - none of us want to do that.

So guys, if you do trade, do so with tiny funds unless you are filthy stinking rich - in which case what are you doing here? Double your start balance then withdraw the profit. From there, you are trading with 'house money' and can play to your hearts' content.

[rocketman99]

Just reading the posts on SHF over the last couple of days regarding the CHF debacle I am shocked at how little people know about how financial markets work and forex in general.

Poeple have no idea about leverage and how it works
No clue about stop losses. Seriously people, SL's are not guaranteed. If a broker tells you otherwise they will probably go out of business
Gapping of markets is a total foreign concept
And throw in some huge spread during a gapping market and you are toast. See point two
That you can loose more than your account - see point one
That there actually needs to be a willing buyer and seller for a trade to go through
That the totally unexpected will happen, and probably tomorrow
That you should not ever trade with money you cannot afford to loose
That you must not trade with a broker offering insane leverage - they will do dodgy stuff
That if you trade with more than 1:100 leverage you should consider not trading forex unless you fully understand all the above. I trade 1:50 and am considering changing to 1:25


Look I am on a 13% DD but so what. Shit happens and it's time to re-evaluate and move on.

[oliverjp]

Also of interest might be one of the Guaranteed Stop options available from some brokers. I have in the past noticed this being offered by some UK-based spreadbet brokers - certainly IG Index were offering it when I traded with them a couple of years ago. They charge a bit of extra spread for it and you can't get as close to PriceAction as you can with a normal stop, but it is a guaranteed stop. Also not sure if it is offered with Empty4 or just proprietary platforms.

It will be interesting to see if this option becomes more prevalently marketed after the recent CHF upheaval... or indeed disappears altogether as brokers de-risk so they don't get caught in the middle again!

All the best for a healthy account recovery!

Jeff

fchaman,

Sorry to hear about your trading loss. 25% account balance loss is devastating. Did you have a Stop Loss in place that saved you from losing your entire account?

I'm at a personal decision point. Even though I trade with stop loss orders in place, if there's a chance of blowing my account due to a move like the SNB, I thinking seriously about continuing to trade forex. I have spent a lot of screen time over the years and had very profitable 2014. If there's a chance my account can be devastated within seconds even though I trade with Stop Loss Orders in place, then I really need to reconsider continuing to trade forex.

John

John, trading Forex requires BOS - Balls Of Steel. This has been hidden from SHF members for a while as we sheltered behind relatively benign markets and systems such as those developed here.

Thursday was a timely reminder to us old stagers that we still need BOS. Yes, sorry to keep banging on about the Old Stagers thingy, but the fact is we have OS all been here before and seen it all before. I for one, had become a tad complacent.

So, if you lack the required BOS in Forex terms (not any other - you may be a member of the SAS for all I know and no implied criticism, I promise) then yes, you should quite trading Forex.

I repeat the oft said mantra. Never trade with funds you cannot afford to lose. This is different to not wanting to lose them - none of us want to do that.

So guys, if you do trade, do so with tiny funds unless you are filthy stinking rich - in which case what are you doing here? Double your start balance then withdraw the profit. From there, you are trading with 'house money' and can play to your hearts' content.

[tonyharmony]

Just reading the posts on SHF over the last couple of days regarding the CHF debacle I am shocked at how little people know about how financial markets work and forex in general.

Poeple have no idea about leverage and how it works
No clue about stop losses. Seriously people, SL's are not guaranteed. If a broker tells you otherwise they will probably go out of business
Gapping of markets is a total foreign concept
And throw in some huge spread during a gapping market and you are toast. See point two
That you can loose more than your account - see point one
That there actually needs to be a willing buyer and seller for a trade to go through
That the totally unexpected will happen, and probably tomorrow
That you should not ever trade with money you cannot afford to loose
That you must not trade with a broker offering insane leverage - they will do dodgy stuff
That if you trade with more than 1:100 leverage you should consider not trading forex unless you fully understand all the above. I trade 1:50 and am considering changing to 1:25


Look I am on a 13% DD but so what. Shit happens and it's time to re-evaluate and move on.

Well said rocketman99...

I have always traded 1:100, but I am now considering 1:50

I look upon the recent Swiss event as a reset. Time to bring everyone down to earth again.
The market can be a fickle bitch, and not to be taken for granted or abused, or it will cripple and destroy you!

Steve has it in a nutshell! Double your investment, then then withdraw 50%. That way you can only lose your original investment that you can afford to lose....

Cheers

[sponn]

Steve has it in a nutshell! Double your investment, then then withdraw 50%. That way you can only lose your original investment that you can afford to lose....

Cheers

Easy to say, not easy to do*

*it was without HGI, now it is much easier

[tonyharmony]

Steve has it in a nutshell! Double your investment, then then withdraw 50%. That way you can only lose your original investment that you can afford to lose....

Cheers

Easy to say, not easy to do*

*it was without HGI, now it is much easier

How true, but that's the plan...

[SteveHopwood]

V 2p is in post 1. You do not need this update if 2o has been sending the correct tp's with your pending trades.

Basically, ignore it. I publish it only for those just-in-case scenarios.

[Sandovich]

I am still in recovery after last weeks CHF surprise . The funny thing is a similar experience happened to me when BOB first introduced his 10.0 system . I was doing well and making money then their was a similar bank intervention , also CHF , but on a smaller scale and my account was cleared out within 2 hrs .

This time round it was a bigger intervention , but somehow I survived it , my account was 50% down for the week .

What saved me was
1) I traded multiple currencies , it was the other trades on other currencies that held my head above water ie. spreading the risk .

2) Stop Loss of 100 pips , for unforeseen events such as this . I was stopped out , more than the 100 pips but avoided the full impact and lived to trade another day . I also trade risk percent so a stop loss is necessary.

3) I also limited how many positions I had open at the same time , the multiple trades are great when its moving in your favor but when the random forex moves against you it can clear your account .It really is just a matter of time before something like this comes along and clears your account . I limit my multitrades to 0 .

Alot of the above is common sense to most traders . I am out of any CHF trade this week , waiting for it to find its feet before I trade her again .