{"id":18730,"date":"2011-01-31T04:04:13","date_gmt":"2011-01-31T09:04:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/fx\/?p=18730"},"modified":"2011-01-31T04:04:13","modified_gmt":"2011-01-31T09:04:13","slug":"how-i-am-learning-to-trade-forex-using-testing-software","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/2011\/01\/31\/how-i-am-learning-to-trade-forex-using-testing-software\/","title":{"rendered":"How I Am Learning To Trade Forex Using Testing Software"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Mark Bond<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>My first few forex trades were horrible. I jumped into the market on a  whim and of course I lost money immediately. I was very discouraged,  but I was determined to be successful at this vocation, no matter what!<\/p>\n<p>I  have been working at the same dead end job for the past 7 years, only  making enough to pay the bills. I came across the TradingHeroes.com  website and got inspired to look into learning forex trading. The  lifestyle that these traders have is awesome!<\/p>\n<p>At first it was  kind of confusing, like with most endeavors. The thing that confused me  the most was trying to figure out when a currency pair would go up or  down according to fundamental news. After a few months of fiddling  around and getting nowhere, I decided to find at least one inexpensive  course to at least learn the basics. I bought it and it was great!<\/p>\n<p>I was trading (and still am) a practice account, but I was still losing money. At least I was losing money at a slower rate.<\/p>\n<p><strong>After reading blogs and forums, I heard a lot of people talking about backtesting software.<\/strong> What the heck is that?!<\/p>\n<p>Further  research led me to such software programs as Metatrader and  Tradestation. These were great programs with one small problem. They  allowed me to test automated forex trading systems, NOT discretionary  systems. <strong>What I needed was a forex software simulation program that let me practice executing trades candle by candle. <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>This  would allow me to try out different technical analysis indicators in  &#8220;real time&#8221; and actually judge how I would probably react in certain  market conditions. <strong>I couldn&#8217;t find anything searching on Google at  the time, but while reading the TradingHeroes.com blog one day, I heard  about this great forex simulation practice software.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>I checked the website and it was very inexpensive so I downloaded it immediately. <strong>It is a great piece of software and they even have free data that you can download from the website to import into the program.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>After that, I became a forex strategy simulator machine!<\/strong> One thing I discovered was that I had a tendency to trade during  illiquid hours and was getting stopped out in large moves. I have found  that the best times to trade are during the London and New York  sessions.<\/p>\n<p>The latest strategies that I have been testing are  moving average crossovers and &#8220;box trades.&#8221; Box trades are technical  signals where if price breaks out of a box, I would enter the pair in  the direction of the break.<\/p>\n<p>I am always looking for new  strategies to test. One good place to look for new strategies to test  are the forums at Forex Factory.<\/p>\n<p><strong>I&#8217;m not a professional yet,  but being able to test technical analysis indicators has helped me  progress tremendously. I can practice forex trading anywhere that I have  my laptop. I can test any forex trading strategy or system that I can  come up with.<\/strong> The best part is that I will never lose any real money.<\/p>\n<p>I  am still learning and I will pass on more useful tips as I come across  them. This was the biggest discovery for me thus far! Thanks for  reading!<\/p>\n<h3>About the Author<\/h3>\n<p>Mark Bond is an aspiring professional forex trader. He has been greatly inspired by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hbhawaii.com\/hectortrader\" target=\"_new\">Hector Trader<\/a> and the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.tradingheroes.com\/market-analysis\/forex-testing-software\" target=\"_new\">Trading Heroes<\/a> website. He would like to share his experiences with others and further his education to reach his goal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What I needed was a forex software simulation program that let me practice executing trades candle by candle. This would allow me to try out different technical analysis indicators in &#8220;real time&#8221; and actually judge how I would probably react in certain market conditions.<\/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-18730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18730","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=18730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18730\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}