Canadian Retail Sales - part 2
By Laetitia Vaval | September 21, 2007
So the Canadian Retail Sales numbers came out, and I was completely wrong since they came out worse than expected (-0.8% vs. 0.0% expected). Of course, the USD shot up about 30pips and now I’m down about 25pips. That’ll teach me NOT to make my own assumptions about economic data!
Tags: dow, economic release, forex market, pips, retail sales, wall street warriors
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Trading when economic data is released
By Laetitia Vaval | September 13, 2007
Today, I’m going to write a little bit about having a position open when major economic data is released. As I wrote on my previous thread, I opened a long position in the GBPUSD yesterday and decided to keep my position overnight. By doing so I made a major mistake: I didn’t check the economic calendar on DailyFx and therefore was not aware that the UK was releasing its RICS House Price Balance for the month of August at 23:01GMT. This indicator measures the costs of homes in the U.K. and was estimated to come out at 10.0%. A rise in house prices usually reflects an overall strong housing market and strong economy. However, this number came out at -1.8% much below expectations and even showed a decrease in the cost of homes — an indicator of an overall weak economy.
Of course the GBPUSD reacted to this disapointing news and dipped about 30pips below the level it was trading at before the release. Having placed my stop at 2.027, I was stopped out at 19:34 EST. The fact that I was not aware of this important overnight news release didn’t allow me to adjust my stop price since I should have foreshadowed that the GBPUSD would be fluctuating greatly following the release. So as I wrote earlier, I was stopped out at 2.027 — a 46pip loss. Of course, the pound traded back up slowly and peaked at 2.03440 mid-day today.
This mistake is in some way very valuable because it taught me to check which indicators will be released overnight, the consequences they may have on the positions I am holding and how to make the necessary adjustements to avoid big losses.
Today, I am trading the EURUSD and the USDJPY, and have to take into consideration that major economic releases will be coming out tonight regarding both the US and Japan. At 8:30 EST tomorrow morning, Advance Retail Sales - a major market moving indicator — will be released and could trigger a rather large move for the EURUSD if not in line with the 0.5% expectations for August. Japan will also be releasing some relatively important data overnight regarding Industrial Production — which could have a market moving impact on the USDJPY.
I’m going to hold my EURUSD position overnight, as I am looking to keep it for a longer period of time. I’m going to make sure I place a large enough stop, so that I do not get stopped out of my position if the US economic numbers come out better than expected. I’m going to place my stop at 1.3777 which was a good support level on 09/10/07.
Tags: dailyfx, dow, economic release, eurusd, gbp, housing market, pips, retail sales, wall street warriors
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