Chart Patterns Schmatterns

By now you have an arsenal of weapons to use when you battle the market. In this lesson, you will add yet another weapon: CHART PATTERNS!

Think of chart patterns as a land mine detector because, once you finish this lesson, you will be able to spot "explosions" on the charts before they even happen, potentially making you a lot of money in the process.

Chart patterns are like that funny feeling you get in your tummy right before you let a fart explode.

Don't you wish had a chart to detect this explosion?

In this lesson, we will teach you basic chart patterns and formations. When correctly identified, it usually leads to an explosive breakout, so watch out!

Remember, our goal is to spot big movements before they happen so that we can ride them out and rake in the cash. After all, who doesn't want to have a pool of cash to swim in like Richie Rich?

Chart formations will greatly help us spot conditions where the market is ready to break out. They can also indicate whether the price will continue in its current direction or reverse so we'll also be devising some nifty trade strategies for these patterns.

Don't worry, we'll give you a neat little cheat sheet to help you remember all these cool patterns and strategies!

Here's the list of patterns that we're going to cover:

• Double Top and Double Bottom
• Head and Shoulders and Inverse Head and Shoulders
• Rising and Falling Wedges
• Bullish and Bearish Rectangles
• Bearish and Bullish Pennants
• Triangles (Symmetrical, Ascending, and Descending)

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Leading vs. Lagging Indicators

We've already covered a lot of tools that can help you analyze potential trending and range bound trade opportunities. Still doing great so far? Awesome! Let's move on.

In this lesson, we're going to streamline your use of these chart indicators.

We want you to fully understand the strengths and weaknesses of each tool, so you'll be able to determine which ones work for you and which ones don't.

Let's discuss some concepts first. There are two types of indicators: leading and lagging.

A leading indicator gives a signal before the new trend or reversal occurs.

A lagging indicator gives a signal after the trend has started and basically informs you "Hey buddy, pay attention, the trend has started and you're missing the boat."

You're probably thinking, "Ooooh, I'm going to get rich with leading indicators!" since you would be able to profit from a new trend right at the start.

You're right.

You would "catch" the entire trend every single time, IF the leading indicator was correct every single time. But it won't be.

When you use leading indicators, you will experience a lot of fakeouts. Leading indicators are notorious for giving bogus signals which could "mislead" you.

Get it? Leading indicators that "mislead" you?

Haha. Man we're so funny we even crack ourselves up.

The other option is to use lagging indicators, which aren't as prone to bogus signals.

Lagging indicators only give signals after the price change is clearly forming a trend. The downside is that you'd be a little late in entering a position.

Often the biggest gains of a trend occur in the first few bars, so by using a lagging indicator you could potentially miss out on much of the profit. And that sucks.

It's kinda like wearing bell-bottoms in the 1980s and thinking you're so cool and hip with fashion....

For the purpose of this lesson, let's broadly categorize all of our technical indicators into one of two categories:

1. Leading indicators or oscillators
2. Lagging, trend-following, or momentum indicators

While the two can be supportive of each other, they're more likely to conflict with each other. We're not saying that one or the other should be used exclusively, but you must understand the potential pitfalls of each.

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Bollinger Bands

Congratulations on making it to the 5th grade! Each time you make it to the next grade you continue to add more and more tools to your trader's toolbox.

"What's a trader's toolbox?" you ask.

Simple!

Let's compare trading to building a house. You wouldn't use a hammer on a screw, right? Nor would you use a buzz saw to drive in nails. There's a proper tool for each situation.

Just like in trading, some trading tools and indicators are best used in particular environments or situations. So, the more tools you have, the better you can adapt to the ever changing market environment.

Or if you want to focus on a few specific trading environments or tools, that's cool too. It's good to have a specialist when installing your electricity or plumbing in a house, just like it's cool to be a Bollinger band or Moving Average expert.

There are a million different ways to grab some pips!

For this lesson, as you learn about these indicators, think of each as a new tool that you can add to that toolbox of yours.

You might not necessarily use all of these tools, but it's always nice to have plenty of options, right? You might even find one that you understand and comfortable enough to master on its own. Now, enough about tools already!

Let's get started!

Bollinger Bands

Bollinger bands are used to measure a market's volatility.

Basically, this little tool tells us whether the market is quiet or whether the market is LOUD! When the market is quiet, the bands contract and when the market is LOUD, the bands expand.

Notice on the chart below that when price is quiet, the bands are close together. When price moves up, the bands spread apart.

That's all there is to it. Yes, we could go on and bore you by going into the history of the Bollinger band, how it is calculated, the mathematical formulas behind it, and so on and so forth, but we really didn't feel like typing it all out.

In all honesty, you don't need to know any of that junk. We think it's more important that we show you some ways you can apply the Bollinger bands to your trading.

Note: If you really want to learn about the calculations of a Bollinger band, then you can go to www.bollingerbands.com.

The Bollinger Bounce

One thing you should know about Bollinger bands is that price tends to return to the middle of the bands. That is the whole idea behind the Bollinger bounce. By looking at the chart below, can you tell us where the price might go next?

If you said down, then you are correct! As you can see, the price settled back down towards the middle area of the bands.

What you just saw was a classic Bollinger bounce. The reason these bounces occur is because Bollinger bands act like dynamic support and resistance levels.

The longer the time frame you are in, the stronger these bands tend to be. Many traders have developed systems that thrive on these bounces and this strategy is best used when the market is ranging and there is no clear trend.

Now let's look at a way to use Bollinger bands when the market does trend.

Bollinger Squeeze

The Bollinger squeeze is pretty self-explanatory. When the bands squeeze together, it usually means that a breakout is getting ready to happen.

If the candles start to break out above the top band, then the move will usually continue to go up. If the candles start to break out below the lower band, then price will usually continue to go down.

Looking at the chart above, you can see the bands squeezing together. The price has just started to break out of the top band. Based on this information, where do you think the price will go?

If you said up, you are correct again!

This is how a typical Bollinger squeeze works.

This strategy is designed for you to catch a move as early as possible. Setups like these don't occur every day, but you can probably spot them a few times a week if you are looking at a 15-minute chart.

There are many other things you can do with Bollinger bands, but these are the 2 most common strategies associated with them. It's time to put this in your trader's toolbox before we move on to the next indicator.

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Silky Smooth Moving Averages

A moving average is simply a way to smooth out price action over time. By "moving average", we mean that you are taking the average closing price of a currency pair for the last 'X' number of periods. On a chart, it would look like this:

Like every indicator, a moving average indicator is used to help us forecast future prices. By looking at the slope of the moving average, you can better determine the potential direction of market prices.

As we said, moving averages smooth out price action.

There are different types of moving averages and each of them has their own level of "smoothness".

Generally, the smoother the moving average, the slower it is to react to the price movement.

The choppier the moving average, the quicker it is to react to the price movement. To make a moving average smoother, you should get the average closing prices over a longer time period.

Now, you're probably thinking, "C'mon, let's get to the good stuff. How can I use this to trade?"

In this section, we first need to explain to you the two major types of moving averages:

1. Simple
2. Exponential

We'll also teach you how to calculate them and give the pros and cons of each. Just like in every other lesson in the BabyPips.com School of Pipsology, you need to know the basics first!

After you've got that on lockdown like Argentinian soccer player Lionel Messi's ball-handling skills, we'll teach you the different ways to use moving averages and how to incorporate them into your trading strategy.

By the end of this lesson, you'll be just as smooth as Messi's!

Are you ready?

If you are, give us a "Heck yeah!"

If not, go back and reread the intro.

Once you're pumped and ready to go, head to the next page.

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Fibonacci Who?

We will be using Fibonacci ratios a lot in our trading so you better learn it and love it like your mother's home cooking. Fibonacci is a huge subject and there are many different Fibonacci studies with weird-sounding names but we're going to stick to two: retracement and extension.

Let us first start by introducing you to the Fib man himself...Leonardo Fibonacci.

No, Leonardo Fibonacci isn't some famous chef. Actually, he was a famous Italian mathematician, also known as a super duper uber ultra geek.

He had an "Aha!" moment when he discovered a simple series of numbers that created ratios describing the natural proportions of things in the universe.

The ratios arise from the following number series: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144...

This series of numbers is derived by starting with 1 followed by 2 and then adding 1 + 2 to get 3, the third number. Then, adding 2 + 3 to get 5, the fourth number, and so on.

After the first few numbers in the sequence, if you measure the ratio of any number to the succeeding higher number, you get .618. For example, 34 divided by 55 equals .618.

If you measure the ratio between alternate numbers you get .382. For example, 34 divided by 89 = 0.382 and that's as far as into the explanation as we'll go.

These ratios are called the "golden mean". Okay that's enough mumbo jumbo. With all those numbers, you could put an elephant to sleep. We'll just cut to the chase; these are the ratios you HAVE to know:

Fibonacci Retracement Levels
0.236, 0.382, 0.500, 0.618, 0.764

Fibonacci Extension Levels
0, 0.382, 0.618, 1.000, 1.382, 1.618

You won't really need to know how to calculate all of this. Your charting software will do all the work for you. Besides, we've got a nice Fibonacci calculator that can magically calculate those levels for you. However, it's always good to be familiar with the basic theory behind the indicator so you'll have the knowledge to impress your date.

Traders use the Fibonacci retracement levels as potential support and resistance areas. Since so many traders watch these same levels and place buy and sell orders on them to enter trades or place stops, the support and resistance levels tend to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Traders use the Fibonacci extension levels as profit taking levels. Again, since so many traders are watching these levels to place buy and sell orders to take profits, this tool tends to work more often than not due to self-fulfilling expectations.

Most charting software includes both Fibonacci retracement levels and extension level tools. In order to apply Fibonacci levels to your charts, you'll need to identify Swing High and Swing Low points.

A Swing High is a candlestick with at least two lower highs on both the left and right of itself.

A Swing Low is a candlestick with at least two higher lows on both the left and right of itself.

You got all that? Don't worry, we'll explain retracements, extensions, and most importantly, how to grab some pips using the Fib tool in the following sections.

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What is a Japanese Candlestick?

What is a Japanese Candlestick?

While we briefly covered candlestick charting analysis in the previous lesson, we'll now dig in a little and discuss them more in detail. Let's do a quick review first.

What is Candlestick Trading?

Back in the day when Godzilla was still a cute little lizard, the Japanese created their own old school version of technical analysis to trade rice. That's right, rice.

A westerner by the name of Steve Nison "discovered" this secret technique called "Japanese candlesticks", learning it from a fellow Japanese broker. Steve researched, studied, lived, breathed, ate candlesticks, and began to write about it. Slowly, this secret technique grew in popularity in the 90s. To make a long story short, without Steve Nison, candlestick charts might have remained a buried secret. Steve Nison is Mr. Candlestick.

Okay, so what the heck are forex candlesticks?

The best way to explain is by using a picture:

Candlesticks can be used for any time frame, whether it be one day, one hour, 30-minutes - whatever you want! Candlesticks are used to describe the price action during the given time frame.

Candlesticks are formed using the open, high, low, and close of the chosen time period.

• If the close is above the open, then a hollow candlestick (usually displayed as white) is drawn.
• If the close is below the open, then a filled candlestick (usually displayed as black) is drawn.
• The hollow or filled section of the candlestick is called the "real body" or body.
• The thin lines poking above and below the body display the high/low range and are called shadows.
• The top of the upper shadow is the "high".
• The bottom of the lower shadow is the "low".

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Support and Resistance

Support and resistance is one of the most widely used concepts in trading. Strangely enough, everyone seems to have their own idea on how you should measure support and resistance.

Let's take a look at the basics first.

Look at the diagram above. As you can see, this zigzag pattern is making its way up (bull market). When the market moves up and then pulls back, the highest point reached before it pulled back is now resistance.

As the market continues up again, the lowest point reached before it started back is now support. In this way resistance and support are continually formed as the market oscillates over time. The reverse is true for the downtrend.

Plotting Support and Resistance

One thing to remember is that support and resistance levels are not exact numbers.

Often times you will see a support or resistance level that appears broken, but soon after find out that the market was just testing it. With candlestick charts, these "tests" of support and resistance are usually represented by the candlestick shadows.

Notice how the shadows of the candles tested the 1.4700 support level. At those times it seemed like the market was "breaking" support. In hindsight we can see that the market was merely testing that level.

So how do we truly know if support and resistance was broken?

There is no definite answer to this question. Some argue that a support or resistance level is broken if the market can actually close past that level. However, you will find that this is not always the case.

Let's take our same example from above and see what happened when the price actually closed past the 1.4700 support level.

In this case, price had closed below the 1.4700 support level but ended up rising back up above it.

If you had believed that this was a real breakout and sold this pair, you would've been seriously hurtin'!

Looking at the chart now, you can visually see and come to the conclusion that the support was not actually broken; it is still very much intact and now even stronger.

To help you filter out these false breakouts, you should think of support and resistance more of as "zones" rather than concrete numbers.

One way to help you find these zones is to plot support and resistance on a line chart rather than a candlestick chart. The reason is that line charts only show you the closing price while candlesticks add the extreme highs and lows to the picture.

These highs and lows can be misleading because often times they are just the "knee-jerk" reactions of the market. It's like when someone is doing something really strange, but when asked about it, he or she simply replies, "Sorry, it's just a reflex."

When plotting support and resistance, you don't want the reflexes of the market. You only want to plot its intentional movements.

Looking at the line chart, you want to plot your support and resistance lines around areas where you can see the price forming several peaks or valleys.

Other interesting tidbits about support and resistance:

• When the price passes through resistance, that resistance could potentially become support.
• The more often price tests a level of resistance or support without breaking it, the stronger the area of resistance or support is.
• When a support or resistance level breaks, the strength of the follow-through move depends on how strongly the broken support or resistance had been holding.

With a little practice, you'll be able to spot potential support and resistance areas easily. In the next lesson, we'll teach you how to trade diagonal support and resistance lines, otherwise known as trend lines.

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