21 posts from November 2008

The review below was found the most useful by the most people.

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A pioneer in currency trading highlights how certain options strategies can be profitably employed in today's forex market

The Forex Options Course is a practical, hands-on guide to mastering forex options. This book focuses on spot forex options, but also covers more traditional exchange-traded options. Organized as a course, this reliable resource is designed to build a trader's knowledge base in a step-by-step manner--with each major section followed by review questions and assignments. The author discusses how to use forex options to profit from long-term fundamental trends and sudden geo-political events that usually disrupt markets. The book also provides a unique introduction to binary options and how to use them to enhance forex trading success.

Abe Cofnas (Orlando, FL) has been the forex trading columnist for Futures magazine since 2001. He formed Learn4x.com in 2001 and manages a global forex trading team and call room at www.fxdimensions.com.

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The review below was found the most useful by the most people.

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The foreign-exchange market is often referred to as the Slaughterhouse where novice traders go to get 'chopped up'. It is one of egos and money, where millions of dollars are won and lost every day and phones are routinely thrown across hectic trading desks. This palpable excitement has led to the explosion of the retail FX market, which has unfortunately spawned a new breed of authors and gurus more than happy to provide misleading and often downright fraudulent information by promising traders riches while making forex trading 'easy'.

Well I'll let you in on a little secret: there is nothing easy about trading currencies. If you don't believe me then stop by Warren Buffet's office and ask him how he could lose $850m betting on the dollar or ask George Soros why his short yen bets cost him $600m not once but twice in 1994. What's wrong with these guys, don't they read FX books?

In reality, the average client's trading approach combined with the unscrupulous practices of some brokers make spot FX trading more akin to the games found on the Vegas strip than to anything seen on Wall St. The FX market is littered with the remains of day traders and genius 'systems,' and to survive in the long-run traders have to realize that they are playing a game where the cards are clearly stacked against them.

Have you ever had your stop hit at a price that turned out to be the low/high for the day? Bad luck perhaps? Maybe. What if it happens more than once? Do you ever feel like the market is out to get you? Well guess what, in this Zero Sum game it absolutely is.

Covering the day-to-day mechanics of the FX market and the unsavoury dealings going on, Beat the Forex Dealer offers traders the market-proven trading techniques needed to side-step dealer traps and develop winning trading methods. Learn from an industry insider the truth behind dirty dealer practices including: stop-hunting, price shading, trading against clients and 'no dealing desk' realities.

Detailing the dealer-inspired trading techniques developed by MIGFX Inc, consistently ranked among the world's leading currency trading firms, the book helps turn average traders into winning traders; and in a market with a 90% loss rate winning traders are in fact quite rare! More than just a simple manual, Beat the Forex Dealer brings to life the excitement of the FX market by delivering insights into some of the greatest trading triumphs and highlighting legendary disasters; all written in an easy to read style.

Make no mistake about it there is a lot of money to be made in currency trading, you just have to know where to look. Sidestepping simple dealer traps is one way of improving your daily p&l, but it is surely not the only one. Successful trading comes down to taking care of the details, which means skipping the theoretical stuff and providing only up-to-date, real-life examples while sharing the FX trading tips that have proved so profitable over the years. By stripping away the theory and getting down to the core of trading, you too will find yourself on the way to beating the forex dealer!

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The review below was found the most useful by the most people.

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In 1940 few Americans had heard of mutual funds. Today U.S. mutual funds are the largest financial industry in the world, with over 88 million shareholders and over $11 trillion in assets. The Rise of Mutual Funds describes the developments that have produced mutual funds' long history of success. Among these developments are:
* formation of the first mutual funds in the roaring 20s
* how the 1929 stock market crash, a disaster for most financial institutions, spurred the growth of mutual funds
* establishment in 1934, over FDR's objection, of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, the federal agency that regulates mutual funds
* enactment of the Revenue Act of 1936, the tax law that saved mutual funds from extinction
* passage of the Investment Company Act of 1940, the "constitution" of the mutual fund industry
* the creation in 1972 of money market funds, which totally changed the mutual fund industry and the entire U.S. financial system
*enactment of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, which created Individual Retirement Accounts
* the accidental development of 401(k) plans, which have revolutionized the way Americans save for retirement
* the 2003 trading abuses, the greatest scandal ever in the history of the mutual fund industry
Many events have never been discussed in detail; others have been discussed in works on other subjects. This is the first book that pulls together the many strands of mutual funds' unique history, written by an expert who draws on forty years of personal experience in the fund industry.

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