{"id":14637,"date":"2010-11-01T04:00:39","date_gmt":"2010-11-01T08:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/fx\/?p=14637"},"modified":"2010-11-01T04:00:39","modified_gmt":"2010-11-01T08:00:39","slug":"step-by-step-money-management-in-forex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/2010\/11\/01\/step-by-step-money-management-in-forex\/","title":{"rendered":"Step-by-Step Money Management in Forex"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Danielle Franklin<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>We all know that money management is crucial in live trading. In case  of a fatal mistake, money management can literally save your account  from being wiped out clean. What is the right way to control your  assets? How should you trade in order to minimize the possible losses?  Are mini accounts helping beginners, or in fact are actually  discouraging and more risky?<\/p>\n<p>In order to survive forex market and create profits, let&#8217;s consider the following:<\/p>\n<p>1. Understand leverage and risk levels<\/p>\n<p>Although some professional traders might suggest that risking no more  than 10% is about right, I personally wouldn&#8217;t suggest going anywhere  higher than 2% of your trading account balance on each trade.<\/p>\n<p>Why to keep such a low profile? Risking only 2% of your funds gives you  an ability to endure the market volatility. In case the trade goes the  wrong way, you will be able to get out of the trade yourself and try  again, instead of getting a margin call when your funds hit zero.<\/p>\n<p>Losing is part of the game &#8211; there are good days and bad days. Be  prepared that you won&#8217;t be winning profits every single day. Your goal  is to protect your money and make your winnings larger than losses  within an extensive period of time. If you can do so &#8211; you can call  yourself a professional forex trader!<\/p>\n<p>2. Write down your gains and losses<\/p>\n<p>Keep a journal of your gains and losses (you can type it in excel  document or write down by hand &#8211; whatever works better for you). It is  important to analyze the results &#8211; in case you are losing more than  winning, it is time to rethink your trading strategy.<\/p>\n<p>3. Practice with demo account<\/p>\n<p>Some traders say that demo accounts are waste of time, because you are  not really trading the real money, so you are not exposed to fear, greed  and other emotional obstacles that need to be locked away!<\/p>\n<p>I personally think that it is necessary to practice with demo account  and go over your strategy before jumping into the deep water of real  money forex trading. Today almost all forex brokers offer free demo  accounts with all the features of the live trading account. Even if you  don&#8217;t experience the emotional traumas only possible with live trading,  practice has never been useless!<\/p>\n<p>4. Have sufficient capital to trade<\/p>\n<p>The worst thing you can do to yourself is attempting to trade without  enough money in your account. A trader with limited capital is not only a  stressed out trader, but also a trader that will hit margin call and  will be taken out of the trade so frequently, that he or she won&#8217;t be  able to understand trading at all!<\/p>\n<p>So what about mini accounts with low minimum deposit requirements? I  mean, one of the reasons why forex is so attractive to beginners is the  small accounts. However, these small accounts are exactly the types of  the accounts that get wiped out almost instantly, leaving the beginner  with the sense of low self esteem and probably a complete  disappointment.<\/p>\n<p>5. Find your comfort zone<\/p>\n<p>Before entering a trade, decide how much money are you ready to lose and  whether it affects your daily live in any way. Never trade the amount  you cannot lose &#8211; forex is not the wheel of fortune. You are not going  to become a millionaire by magically entering a trade, guessing the  direction and hoping for the best.<\/p>\n<p>6. Take parts of profits out<\/p>\n<p>Once you start making profits, it doesn&#8217;t mean you should be risking all  that money in one go. Don&#8217;t put all your eggs in one basket! If you are  doing great and increase the position size, the amount of loss  increases as well. Meaning that, at some point you might be risking a  trip to Hawaii, a house or even a retirement at the age of 30! Don&#8217;t put  so much pressure on yourself, because that can only lead to wrong  decisions based on emotions.<\/p>\n<p>The best way to deal with this kind of situation is to take some of that  profit out on a weekly, monthly or even yearly basis. The trick is to  do it systematically, instead of creating a pile of enormous amount of  money in one trading account.<\/p>\n<h3>About the Author<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.forexexplore.com\/\">Forex Trading Brokers<\/a> &#8211; Forex brokers reviews and rating, comprehensive forex tutorials and articles, latest forex news and forex blog.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.forexvote.com\/\">Online Forex Brokers<\/a> &#8211; Top forex brokers reviews, latest bonuses and promotions, free forex tutorial and more.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.seoforexdirectory.com\/\">Forex Links<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We all know that money management is crucial in live trading. In case of a fatal mistake, money management can literally save your account from being wiped out clean. What is the right way to control your assets?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14637\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}