At about 4pm on 11 June, I noticed some activity in the GBPUSD after London opened. I decided to play my hunch and Long GBPUSD at 1.6785, stop loss at 1.6770.
For the next hour, it didn’t do anything and finally I squared the position at 1.6795 for a trading profit of 20bps prior to leaving the home.
On June 11th, my Ichimoku and Stochastics suggested that the GBPUSD may go up. So I decided to buy a call option with a strike at 1.6755, premium of 31bps and a breakeven of 1.6786.
I squared the position on 13 June during London hours at 1.6974 for a trading profit of 188bps.
Not bad for a two day wait and one of the few good trades.
My Ichimoku suggested that the EURUSD was bottoming out on 22 July, so I decided to do a two week call option on the EURUSD at the strike of 1.3485, with a premium of 65bps and a breakeven of 1.3550 expiring on 8 August.
Let’s see how things pan out.
Prior to the announcement of the MPC votes at 4:30pm, GBPUSD started moving from 1.7060 all the way up to 1.79095.
Votes came out as expected and BBA mortgage approvals also came out as forecasted.
GBPUSD began to softened thereafter. I decided to short the GBPUSD at 1.7070 and squared the trade at 1.7035 for a trading profit of 35bps.
Apologies to all for not updating my trading blogsite for the past few months, it has been hectic with family issues. I will endeavor to put in all the past trades and also keep up to date.
After looking through my technicals, including Ichimoku, MA, Bollinger bands, and stochastics, I decided that there were two potential trades: –
1) Long AUDUSD; stop if offered at 0.9256 (Spot 0.9236) and SL at 0.9230
2) Long Gold, stop if offered at 1,295.00 (spot 1,283) SL at 1,275
By the following morning Singapore time, nothing happened in the AUD, so I took out the order. Guess what, my NY session, the AUD was at 0.9280!
My Gold order was triggered and it was LIVE, I followed the market till the NY session when it reached $1,305 and I decided to take profit at $1,303 for a trading profit of $8.
I felt that the GBPUSD was bottoming, based on Fibonacci; the recent high was 1.6795 and the recent low was 1.6273 with the spot of 1.6560 hovering just above the 50% retracement level. Again coming up from a lower level a few days ago at the near 38% level.
The uptick seemed somewhat convincing and I also felt that the retail sales numbers today would come in better, so I placed a Long GBPUSD, stop if offered at 1.6580 when the spot was at 1.6560 with a SL at 1.6550.
As it turned out the retail sales came in firmer at 1.7% versus expectations of 0.5%, and the GBP firmed up passsed 1.66.
I squared the position at 1.6620 for a trading profit of 40bps.
On March 24th at about 4:45pm, I decided to short the EURUSD at 1.3795 with a SL at 1.3815 with a view that the Euro would weaken based on my techincals.
However, when the US session opened, it appeared that the Euro wasn’t going to soften that much so I decided to square the position at 1.3775 for a small trading profit of 20bps.
Last night at about the same time I placed the AUDUSD order, I also placed a short EURUSD stop if bid order at 1.3920 and SL at 1.3950.
As it turned out this morning, the level was not reached, so I decided to take out the order.
Now during NY trading session, the EURUSD has strengthened unexpectedly despite stronger US data.
I am so glad I took out the order this morning.
Last night, I felt that there was a high probability that the RBNZ will hike rates this morning and if they did, the AUD would strengthened in unison.
So at about midnight, when the AUDUSD spot was at 0.8972, I placed a stop if offered spot order at 0.9000, good till 9am Singapore time the following day.
As it happened, RBNZ hiked rates from 2.50% to 2.75% at 4am Singapore time, my order was triggered early this morning at about 7:55am Singapore time.
I have been holding this spot position all day, wondering whether I should sell a AUD call to set a take profit level since I am already in the money.
I decided a few moments ago to square off the position at 0.9094 for a trading profit of 94 bps.
The carnage on the USD started last Thursday and the three currencies that battered the USD the most was the GBP, EUR and the AUD.
The question is whether it was warranted or not, or was it simply a case of fund flows? Or did the market move against the USD because the BOE, ECB and RBA moved from an accommodating stance to a neutral stance? Is that enough to move the market so significantly? I do not believe so.
Personally, I expected the other central banks to move to a neutral stance, given that the Federal Reserve has already begun cutting back QE by two tranches of $10Bn each from $85Bn to now $65Bn.
Is there an opportunity for the USD to take back some ground from the majors? Yes, I believe so, and it has started today with the GBP giving back about 60bps so far. I should have captured this opportunity since I felt so strongly about it.
Unfortunately, I was taken away to focus on my private equity business in a company I invested that is involved in the tocotrienol business.
I am born in the Year of the Tiger.
The Panthenon Investment Group 