What Happens When You Buy A Stock

By Michael Swanson

So you want another way to invest in stocks, but you're not really sure if it's a good idea or not? One thing that is good about investing in stocks is that in past years they seem to be the best way to earn more money when investing.

When you invest in stocks you are supplying money to a company and in turn you will have partial ownership in this company. Common stocks are what most people will deal with when they become involved in the stock market. These are the stocks that no restrictions are placed on and any one is able to buy.

You will become what is known as a shareholder in a company. Meaning you own part of the company for the money you have placed into this stock. When the business succeeds and earns more money the price for the stock will increase, and you will earn money.

When the board of directors votes as a shareholder you get a say in the voting too. This means that new developments will need to be approved by the board. Becoming a part owner in a company is a big decision so you still need to choose your stock wisely.

Though you will not always see the pluses when it comes to investing in stocks. If the company hits a rough time or goes out of business you will lose money. At times you may even lose everything you've invested in those stocks.

Different types of stock are available. As an example we will talk about a family owned company. If they may want to bring in extra funds they will create another class of stock. These stocks may only entitle the holder to one vote, while the class of stock the family holds will be worth 10 votes. However, they have found a way in which more money can come into the business. - 23208

About the Author:

For more on stock investing with specific stock picks go to WallStreetWindow.com.

Some Tips for Successful Forex Trading

By Bart Icles

New to the world of currency trading? If you are, you might be wondering what makes a successful foreign exchange trader. To become successful in forex trading, it helps to know the qualities of a successful trader and check if you have these traits. As you learn more about these qualities, you will realize that some traders possess these traits, and some fall short of these characteristics. This is where the difference between successful and not-so-successful traders comes in.

Aside taking enough time to learn as much as you can about the currency market, being able to accept responsibility is also vital in forex trading. You must learn to be responsible from the moment you learn your first forex basics up to the point that you decide to discontinue engaging in this unpredictable market. You should not only learn the salient details in currency trading, you must also understand them. You will need to understand how the currency market works and why it works in certain ways different from and similar to other trading markets. You will then need to take these pieces of information and apply them to your own forex market experience.

You might wonder, why is it that there are forex traders who do not do so? One main reason is: they believe that following news stories on the market and talking to the brokers they have hired are enough to bring them success. More often than not, they fall short of their objectives. What they do not know is that leaving things totally to what we refer to as experts is a simple recipe for failure. As a forex trader, you should be able to take responsibility and place things in your own hands. Understanding and having control of your forex trading plan works best in this volatile market.

Before you can actually apply the strategies you have developed into the profitable world of the currency market, you will need to have the confidence required in trading. If you merely follow someone else's footsteps, you will find it difficult to have the kind of confidence needed to get you started in forex trading. You will also need to have enough confidence to trade even when times are bad. You must be able to understand your trading plan and look farther into the future so you can stick with your strategies and be confident on why it has the promise of bringing you trading success.

One important thing you will need to understand about forex trading is losing. Other than being confident and responsible, you must be able to accept losing and why it happens. It can be pretty easy to put the blame on someone or something else when the odds turn up against you. When you are on a losing streak, you just cannot blame anyone or anything. Accept the fact that you have lost and try to review what you have done and what decisions you have made that led you to this unfavorable result. As you become more experienced in forex trading, you will learn that discipline stems from the ability to accept defeat and there is no one or nothing else to blame but yourself. But remember, forex trading does not stop at losing; you will need to get back up and continue with your trading strategy - success does not come to those who do not trade. - 23208

About the Author:

A forex tutorial starts with a desire to learn and a drive to become a great trader. Learning with a forex trading tutorial takes dedication and a good teacher. But once you learn how to trade and do so successfully your life will change and you have options and financial resources you never had before.

High Probability Forex Trading Using Engulfing Patterns

By Tim Barnby

Few things are more satisfying to me that bare chart trading. Ive seen traders with so many indicators on their screen that I could not even see the price of the currency pair. What do any of these indicators tell you anyway? Do I need a MACD or a CCI? I can see which direction the trend is moving without them. How about a stochastic? I can see where candles are closing relative to the high or low. Other than some horizontal lines at key support and resistance levels, some Fibonacci retracements, and trend lines I often have nothing on my charts at all. All of these are topics for future articles.

A bullish engulfing pattern is characterized by having a real body which completely engulfs the real body of the preceding candle. A simpler way of describing this is that the bullish engulfing candle has a higher open and a lower close than the preceding candle. A bearish engulfing candle has a lower open and a higher close than the bar immediately preceding it.

The bullish and bearish engulfing patterns are powerful indicators of a trend reversal. Engulfing patterns must appear after a significant run up or down in price to be considered valid. When the engulfing pattern presents itself at a probable price reversal zone, or a confluence of support or resistance it is even more reliable. My experience has shown these patterns to be over 75% reliable, and normally offer at least a two to one reward to risk ratio when traded on the one hour or four hour charts. They are even more reliable on the daily and weekly charts.

There are a couple of valid methods for trading engulfing patterns. The first is pretty basic. You place a market order at the close of the candle. Your stop loss order goes a few pips past the opposite side of the engulfing candle, and the target goes somewhere at least twice the distance of the stop loss. Using this method, if the engulfing candle has a 50 pip range, your stop loss would be about 55 pips and your target would be about 110 pips away from your entry. The more advanced method involves pulling a Fibonacci retracement tool on the engulfing candle. Place your entry order at the 38.2%, 50% or 61.8% Fibonacci level of the candle, and place the stop loss in the same position as the first method. This method gives you a smaller stop loss, which offers you a much high per pip value, and a bigger target. It has a lower rate of successful fills, so youll have fewer trades using this entry method.

No matter what your method of entry is, you will profit from trading these powerful reversal indicators. Youll also save yourself the stress of conflicting technical indicators and cluttered screens. Trade this pattern for a week and see if I am wrong. - 23208

About the Author:

For more information on Forex Trading, please come to the Market Mover Edge and look at our mentoring programs and live trading rooms. You can join my FREE forex signals list at Forex Master-Mind Newsletter

Investing With Confidence Using Trend Following Strategies

By Bob LeBrun

I'm not what anyone would call an active trader in the stock market. I generally rely on my broker's advice and invest in low risk stocks and mutual funds. This strategy worked for me until the latest recession. I lost money on some investments and my return on most of my investments was poor. I decided I would have to take a more active role in managing my money.

I had heard about trend following and how investors could make money by taking advantage of trends in the market. I started researching the strategy and I came across TrendFollowingStrategies.com. This website had a new approach to trend following and only dealt with ETFs (exchange traded funds) which are a fairly low risk investment. I was definitely interested.

I reviewed the information on the site and did a little more investigating. I liked the fact that they send members email alerts on which ETFs are good investments along with advice on when to buy and sell specific ETFs. They claimed that their members could make money regardless of the overall market trend.

That was eighteen months ago and my investments are doing better than I would have thought possible. I don't have to constantly follow the market and worry about when to make trades, TrendFollowingStrategies.com sends me alerts in my email to let me know the best investments, when to buy and when to sell. They give me the information I need to decide how much I should invest in each trade.

One nice thing about TrendFollowingStrategies.com is that I don't have to spend all my time worrying about the market. I made around 10 trades last year and still made a 20% return. How great is that? With this technique you don't have to watch the daily market fluctuations, thats all taken care of and all you need to do is check your email.

I'm more comfortable using this method of trading, because of the low risk factor. I don't want to have to worry about my investments all the time. Since the site only deals with EFTs, you have a minimal risk involved. EFTs are a little like mutual funds, and are fairly stable. I had investments in EFTs before the recession and I didn't lose much on those. This way I can maximize my return on these investments.

If you're like me, a conservative investor, you'll really appreciate the advantages of trading with TrendFollowingStrategies.com. The system works whether the market is up or down. The EFTs that they recommend are always in an upward trend. If the trend changes, you'll be notified so you can sell. It's just easy.

I would recommend membership in this site to anyone who wants to make money in the market without investing a lot of time and effort. They do most of the work for you and you just have to make the decision on when and how much to invest in the trade. You can maximize your return on your investment with a minimum of work. If you aren't a member of TrendFollowingStrategies.com, you should be. - 23208

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Find more on trend following trading and trend following index.

Money Management in Forex Trading (Part III)

By Ahmad Hassam

Live to trade another day is perhaps the best advice that you will receive in your trading career. Forex markets are brutal and unforgiving. You need to learn to survive in the markets.

The single most common factor that causes many traders to blow up their accounts is greed. When you get greedy, you start taking unnecessary risks. You will spend countless hours trying to discover the Holy Grail technical indictor or a forex robot that will make you rich. You believe that by discovering that secret of investing, you will become rich without losing a single trade.

Unfortunately there is no Holy Grail in trading. You must learn not to risk more than 2% of your account on a single trade. Incrementally grow your account over time and never ever be tempted to risk big making one single winning trade that can make you rich.

You should know how much you are willing to risk in a single trade. I said 2%. But if you want to be aggressive you can go up to 5% but stay between 2-5%. Dont exceed it. If you are conservative, on the other hand, you should consider risking between 1-2% only.

Once you have decided on the risk you are willing to take, knowing the rest is simple. Suppose you have a $50,000 account and you decide on a risk of 2%. How much you can risk on a single trade? You can only risk (50,000) (0.02) =$1,000. This is the maximum you should risk on a single trade.

However, if you are in more than one trade at the same time, the amount may be higher. Suppose, you are in 3 trades and you risk only $1,000 per trade. So the total amount at risk will be $3,000. Once you have determined your risk level, you are ready to determine the trade size.

Trade size is the number of currency pair contracts you purchase in any one single trade. You need to first determine where you want to put your stop loss in order to determine the trade size. Lets use a simple example to make it clear and suppose you are willing to risk $1000 on trading EUR/USD pair. You decide on a stop loss of 50 pips. Each pip on EUR/USD pair is equal to $10, so the number of contracts that you can trade are 2= (1,000)/ (50) (10).

You have taken the guesswork out of your trading once you have determined your risk level and calculated the trade size. You can sleep well now knowing how much of your money is at risk. You are going to be able to trade tomorrow, no matter what happens today.

Using these common and simple money management rules will help you avoid the pitfall of losing almost all the money in your account. Never ever take more than 2-5% risk in any single trade. Learning to survive the markets and trading another day is the essence of trading. This can help take your trading to the next level of profitability. - 23208

About the Author:

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. He is interested in day trading and swing trading stocks and currencies. Trade Dow Futures. Learn Forex Trading.