Welcome to my About page, where I will tell something about myself and my background. I make no excuses for taking a trip down memory lane and telling you how it was 'back then'.
How it is right now, is that we are looking at execution speeds measured in milliseconds, where HFT traders, the newest kids on the FX block co-locate their servers next door to some of the biggest banks who make the market and who go several years without a losing day.
In order to obtain results like that, the investment those HFT companies are making is of course phenomenally high as you can imagine.
Automation, especially following all the FX scandals and various rigging cases which have come to light, is now very much on the cards across the industry. better to get a computer to trade than a trader who could be liable to cause you trouble.
Did you know that UBS has automated nearly 90% of its trading and a figured of around 65% market wide is now the norm.
I hope you enjoy this short overview.
EXACT TRADING PRICE ACTION TRADERS - Here's How It Started
As a Price action Forex Trader who placed his first trade over thirty four years ago, I have seen a lot of ideas, methods, people and money come and go.
Having worked in the Finance Industry for most of my life I started way back during the days of the ‘Big Bang’ in London, in the 1980's when the Financial Markets were liberalized and set free by the Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher.
I freely admit, that in those days, it was all very 'Public school' as there still some people who came to work in a ‘Bowler Hat’ but the real money came in wearing a ‘Topper'. Not long after I started though those people took their place as part of the historical past of the city and vanished almost overnight.
To give you an idea of how things have changed, when the BOE (Bank Of England) wanted to borrow ‘ten’ in those days – they meant ten million.
More recently, we have all had to undergo a huge technological revolution in which some people have come out winners and others losers and as a result, volumes traded and the speed of execution is such that the trillions traded per day is almost enough to make your eyes water.
Most recent studies point to a daily FX turnover of around 5 trillion per day globally, this figure can of course only increase and I wonder how long it will before we hit 7 trillion and ultimately 10 trillion.
Way in the days when I started , liveried doormen were the order of the day, on the front door of some of the larger houses and if your suit was for example brown you were not allowed in to work. How things have changed, now most of us don't even wear a suit
So let's have a look at how am I qualified to give you advice on the Forex industry and trading the markets?
Take A Look At My UK and European Banking Experience
I have worked for some major UK and European banks including Barclays, Lloyds, KBC, Fortis/BNP Paribas along with some smaller trading houses and have unparalleled experience in the understanding the approach to both proprietary trading and hedging methods they use during their daily business.
I have spent years testing both proprietary trading systems and their front office trading asset management applications.
And have written and developed trading systems and helped them to create profitable systems.
And here is the kicker, I am one of the very few price action experts in the world who actually trades on a day to day basis, additionally I am possibly(because I can't check and I don't know everyone) the only Price Action trader who specializes in FX bid/ask analysis.
I also have published industry articles and interviews to back all of this up.
Even if you leave this page and website in the next few seconds or minutes take just one thing with you, the whole story is about price, momentum and bid/ask, nothing else. Understand that and you will make money.
The Retail Forex Bandwagon
Some years back now, the explosion and interest in 'Retail Forex' gathered pace. Much of the information relating to Forex trading, which is freely available on the net is designed to ‘woo’ the public or private investors, who feed the front end brokerage side of industry.
The promise is one of 'rich pickings' for the retail client and quick pickings as well: with no effort at all.
Ask yourself a serious question, do you honestly know of a profession or occupation in which you can ‘get rich quick’ like the banner ads tell you. No neither do I.
So let's get real and get some perspective on issues, I don’t know about you, but I was always taught that success stems of a combination of raw talent and hard work.
Nothing I have seen over years, excepting downright fraud and underhand dealing by the banks some of whom I have worked for has changed my mind or philosophy on this opinion.
It's a crazy world, but here's the thing, the harder I work, the more I study the more people I talk to, the more students I help, the more charts I pour over late into the night, the more major market turning points I analyze, the more money I make..........and the better my trading becomes.
Look No Indicators !!!
I am unique in the way that I trade no indicators and no predictions - I TRADE PRICE when it moves
Trust me, trading FX without the cacophony of price predictions or the myriad of FIB/Trend, Elliot Wave lines most people litter all over their chart is like eating bread baked by a master baker as opposed to eating some preprocessed factory made supermarket alternative.
I only use price and do the opposite of what most people do, but I DO NOT CATCH KNIVES.
This takes education and rewiring of your natural emotions, it means being on the right side of the professional or smart money – with them not against them, the trouble is most people do not know where they are.
OK So How To Get Profitable?
There are as many trading styles, as there are tastes in women and clothes, my own trading style is one which uses a clean uncluttered candlestick charts, assessment of the immediate price action and recently passed supply/demand.
I use no indicators at all, I trade like this because this is what I have been taught myself and this is how most of the large banks trade.
No lag, no indicators just price with bank trading levels.
Remember, the potential for changing your own situation and embracing market success comes from within, from you, not from an indicator and the acceptance of methods which reads the market rather than simply reacts to it. if you can read a book you can read a market.
The understanding and the work must come from your side however. You have to want success and want it badly as it takes time and you'll need to undo some of the ideas and methods pushed at you by the majority of brokers and internet forums.
For the uninitiated and beginning trader, there are many pitfalls waiting for you in the university of trading – do yourself a favour, firstly under trade, then under trade and finally under trade, until you are consistently profitable and then grow slowly.
If you can adhere to this one rule you’ll be way ahead of the majority of traders, who blow accounts and get themselves into all sorts of difficulties.
Do yourself another favour and check out the guides and courses I list on this site. In my introductory course to Price Action, I show you the way professional price action traders use price to trade off determined price points. I also teach you to understand how and where the banks are most likely to turn the markets, in the London and New York sessions our accuracy in taking trades the reversal trades there is above 70%.
I offer a second more in depth course where we take the understanding of supply/demand to a very detailed level.
A prerequisite for this is course is having completed the Price Action course. Also check out my daily videos where I preview and recap the EURO/USD and sometimes also the GBP/USD markets.
Just sign up here and you will receive them daily for no charge. First gain confidence in and if you like what I am doing, then step up and purchase the course.
If you need help, please contact me at paul at exacttrading.com and please check out my YouTube Channel.