Excessive Leverage forex

 Excessive Leverage

Depending on your experience level, trade leverage can be a powerful tool to help you maximize returns, or it can be the cause of your downfall. It is not something to be taken lightly and if you do not understand how it works, don’t trade until you do understand.

Holding Too Many Open Trades

Fighter pilots call it “helmet fire” and it happens when too much is happening around you too quickly for you to react. In the cockpit of a jet fighter, it can get you killed – as a forex trader, you may not end up dead but you will probably end up broke.

Holding Losing Positions Too Long

One of the things that really separates seasoned forex traders from those just starting out is their ability to determine when a losing trade is not going to reverse the trend. Rather than “hold and hope”, disciplined traders will take the loss and get out much more quickly.

This is another reason to set protective stops on all your trades; if you include effective stops when you submit a new trade, you can at least limit your losses without having to spend too much time “babysitting” the order. If the trade hits the stop, you will lose the amount committed but you also protect the bulk of your capital, leaving you with funds to move into something else that, hopefully, will be more profitable.

Sometimes, you just have to treat these things as life lessons – learn and move on.