Archive for the ‘Forex Money Managers’ Category

A Guide to Choosing a Profitable Forex Managed Account

Thursday, July 28th, 2011

A Guide to Choosing a Profitable Forex Managed Account

A forex managed account is gaining its popularity and wide acceptability to wise and decent investors in every place all over the world.  It has gained its position in the financial market as a wise investment with controllable and calculated risks.  Just like any other investments, investing in foreign exchange requires a regular monitoring in order to have full control relative to the activities of your funds.

While forex managed account has been considered as a low risk investment, still one has to be aware that the risks if not properly managed will put you at the losing end.  We know very well that in forex managed account there is a risk wherein a managed forex firm that you are dealing with may not return your funds.  This sometimes happen especially for those investors who have not regularly monitoring the financial market activities.  This type of forex firms pretend that they are trading your funds by just giving you trade reports, but in fact the funds are just in their firm and worst, they are just using your funds to sustain their operation.  With this type of dealings you will end up entirely out of control and totally lost your money.

There are many ways to avoid getting into this uncertain event in your life. Here are some helpful tips for choosing profitable forex managed account.

  • Knowing the person or the firm that you are going to deal with is the first and foremost thing to do.  Doing due diligence will help you lower the risk of getting into a situation of losing your money.  It is very important that you choose the forex managed firm where you could really entrust your fund.
  • It is essential to see the track record of the firm you are going to engage your transaction.  Check if the income comes in regularly.  A sign of profitable investment is getting a regular yield over it.
  • Check if the account provides capital growth in longer term.
  • Get reports from an independent party and find out if there is no large amount of drawdown.
  • Find out how many accounts are being handled by the broker firm and how long do the account have been existing. This is a test of stability and reliability.  The more accounts a firm may have the more people are trusting the company and the more are being satisfied with the returns.

Getting fair returns on your fx managed account could be enough, although getting a higher one could be better.  But then again, one has to consider the entire flow in the world market.  The returns should coincide with the financial activities in the foreign market.

What are the Risks Involved in Investing in a Managed Forex Account?

Saturday, July 23rd, 2011

What are the Risks Involved in Investing in a Managed Forex Account?

A managed forex account has been popularly emerging in the financial market everywhere in the world today. It is considered as the best alternative investment against traditional investing in real estates and alike. In this type of investment you just put on your own currency portfolio through a broker and your funds will be managed by professional money traders. These professional money traders will handle the trading transaction based on the calculated risk and ultimate goal of gaining returns that have been closely discussed during the initial stage of your dealing with your broker firm.

It is best to engage in a managed forex account. Many investors all over the place in this world are buying into the idea of putting their funds in a managed forex account and started to get involved in the foreign exchange market activities. The foreign currencies exchange broker firm should be highly reputable and must have a license to operate and join the trading activity. Broker firms should be highly regulated in implementing and following various terms and conditions as well as rules and regulations in the strictest sense in order to get involved in a trading activity in the foreign market.

There are many advantages of putting your funds in a managed fx investment account. People involved in handling account are well experienced in dealing on day to day activities of foreign currencies. They have the ability to forecast and manage your forex properly. They are packed with tactics and strategies to trade your investment.

However there are also some managed forex risks involved, although still controllable and manageable. As investors, you really have to conduct due diligence on the broker firm that you opt to put your funds on. There is a risk that you might end up with a broker firm that has very weak control procedures. Another risk that you may face is that you might engage in a firm that has undesirable, abnormal as well as anomalous transactions.

While it is true that professional money managers who are handling your managed forex account have a wide experience in dealing with foreign currencies exchange, still there is a risk that they may take full control of your fund and diversify it. So it would be best for you to give some limitations and you also need to have a strong monitoring of ins and outs of forex activity.

The Rise in Popularity of the Forex Money Manager and Managed Accounts

Friday, October 22nd, 2010

If you are a forex trader, then you should definitely consider investing in a managed forex account. Today, trading in the foreign currency market isn’t what it used to be like, ie a gentleman’s club, limited to the exclusive few, where everyone at the table made money, and left happy. This article examines how the forex market has changed rapidly in recent years, and that profiting from investing in this market on an individual basis is extremely hard.

I remember a friend telling me a story about the wild west days of the forex market, back in the early and mid 90′s, before currency trading became such a fashionable and in vogue past time. In those days, it was extremely easy to make money from the forex market.  There were many tricks you could use to fool the brokers, and it was just not neccessary to invest part of your portfolio in a managed forex account, as there was plenty of money to be had from the brokers themselves.

There used to many ways of fooling the broker, and making money from trading forex, so it was just not necessary to invest in a managed forex account.  One method which was used was to place a buy trade and a sell trade either side of the current price, just before a big news announcement.  In those days, news announcements created big price movements, and it was an easy trade to make upwards of 100 pips with a big news event such as interest rates, unemployment figures etc.

And this was another aspect about the forex market ten years ago which is different than today.  There is not so much volatility in the market than there was back then.  Back in the day, everyone was making money – if your average managed forex account was making returns of 20% or 30% per month, then even the average trader could still make 10 a month on his personal forex trading account, just by using moderate levels of leverage.

So how are things so different today? Well, there are literally millions of retail players, people who have a couple of thousand dollars to play with, and who think they are the next George Soros, and believe that investing in a managed forex account is a waste of time and money.  This is coupled with the extraordinary levels of leverage that the forex brokers are offering their clients to trade with.

More and more forex brokers are opening up for business as it is a very profitable activity for them.  The average spread for a single lot traded of GBP/USD is 4 pips.  So if the broker is getting a price of 1 pip wholesale, he is making 3 pips on each trade, from each trader who opens an account – think about it – that’s $30 for each single trade! Now it becomes clear why so many brokers ares opening up for business each and every day!

To conclude, forex trading today is a very hazardous activity, and not so easy as the brokers want you to believe. Of course, it is very much in the interest of forex brokers to promote high leverage, adn to offer free training courses, in an attempt to lure people into thinking it is easy to make money in the currency market. But unfortunately this is a fallacy, and investors would be much better off investing in a managed forex account.

Managed Forex Accounts and Their Benefits for the Average Investor

Tuesday, August 10th, 2010

Managed forex accounts have become one of the most trendy investments in recent years, with thousands of people opening such accounts every month.  This article discusses the benefits of a forex managed account, and how to chooses the best account for an investor’s particular requests and requirements.

A managed currency account is different to a typical mutual fund, or bond fund in a variety of ways.  To begin with, and perhaps most obvious, is the fact that an investment in forex does not expose onself to the risks of shares, stocks or real estate.  There are a very wide variety of forex investments on the market today.  Some funds invest for the short term, others adopt a ‘buy and hold’ strategy.  Other forex funds may only take positions for the short term, indeed they may be in and out of the market in only a few hours, or occasionally, less than an hour.  We call these latter types of traders day traders, or ‘intra day’ traders.  Very often, these traders will exit trades at the end of the day, so they are not exposed to any risk overnight.

Another unique feature of a managed forex account is that, unlike a mutual fund, an investor has real time, 24/7 access to their account.  This can be seen with several examples.  To begin with, the investor can login to their account online, any time, and see their account balance. These figures cannot be changed by your fund manager, so give a true view of the balance of your account.
Secondly, a managed forex fund is different, as a client can take out his funds from the investment whenever he wants, and there is no withdrawal penalty, or restrictions.  This is unlike a mutual fund, hedge fund, or indeed any other form of collective investment scheme, where there can be very onerous restrictions on much you can withdraw at any one time, or where there are very often penalties involved in such withdrawals.
Another key benefit of managed forex accounts is that the returns have little bearing to the returns of other investments.  Ironically, the recent economic turmoil has seen forex returns increase over the past 2 or 3 years. It can therefore be seen that currencies are a good way to create alpha through diversification. If anything, the recent world financial crisis has presented many profitable trading opportunities, since as volatility around the world increases, this volatility creates many opportunities to profit from the market turmoil.

However, a final point to note is that whilst there are considerable advantages of allocating part of your portfolio in a managed forex  account, one requests to do their due diligence before investing their savings in a forex fund.  There are a lot of fraudulent forex fund managers in the marketplace today, the numbers of which are growing rapidly due to the rise of the internet, and the anonymity it provides.  An investor needs to do his or her research.  To start with, you need to see evidence of the fund performance.

Thus, it can be seen that managed forex accounts offer a number of advantages over regular forms of investment funds.  You need to realise that one requirements to analyse the investment returns of  the different managed forex providers, and conduct strict due diligence to ensure that you will get the returns that you are seeking. With prudent due diligence that an investment in a managed forex account will be a successful one.

How to Find a Top Performing Forex Money Manager

Friday, July 16th, 2010

Thousands of investors are looking to forex to boost their investment returns..  As a result, there is a growing market for high performing forex money managers who trade through managed forex accounts.  As we will see,  having your investment looked after by a forex money manager offers a variety of possibilities and advantages for the retail investor. This editorial examines why this has been the case, and questions why so many people are now investing with a forex money manager.

So what are the attractions of hiring a forex money manager to look after your money through a managed forex account?  In the first instance, it is the belief that they will make you money.  Is this the case for the majority of money managers?

Well, yes, most forex money managers do make more money than an ordinary retail investor.  It is a fact that most retail traders have blown their accounts within 3 months.  After this period, they either go back to investing in stocks and other asset classes, or look to find a professional to manage their money in the forex market.  Finding a reliable and high performing forex trading manager can sometimes be hard, but it well worth the search.

So how can a managed forex account help you in practice? The first benefit of a managed forex account is that it gives you access to top quality forex money managers, without having to invest hundred of thousands of dollars. Most reputable hedge funds have a minimum investment of $1,000,000.

Another of the key advantages of using a forex manager and a managed forex account is that you have total control over your investment.  What does this mean exactly.  The key to this, is that you open an account with the relevant currency brokerage, and at no point do you need to send money across to the fund manager.  This means that the manager will have no access to your money.

Of course, the manager will get access to trade your funds and you can begin your online forex investing experience.  This is set out in a power of attorney which you are required to execute, and return to the broker.  What this says, in effect, is that you have granted permission to the manager to take trades on your account, and to give him full trading privileges.  It does not, however, give him any other rights over you account, such as to make transfers or withdrawals of funds.

These different levels of security are a key reason why managed forex accounts have become so popular in recent years.  In the past few years, there have been several cases of hedge funds defrauding their clients of millions of dollars.  Perhaps the biggest case reported in the press was that of Bernie Madoff.

A further comfort in terms of safety of funds for investors is that your funds will be held by a properly regulated forex broker.  All regulated brokers need to deposit a capital amount with the government regulator, and to comply with strict regulations in order to be able to conduct forex broking business.  In addition, most countries will offer some form of deposit protection to the investor, so that in the event of the broker going bankrupt, the investor’s funds will be guaranteed by the government where the broker is based.