Riskreward
Using Risk Management to Not Lose Money Risk Management
In this article we are going to talk about the most exciting topic of risk management!
Sarcasm aside, this is probably the single most important lesson that any trader or investor can ever learn.
Warren Buffett famously said: "Rule No. 1: Never lose money. Rule No. 2: Never forget rule No. 1."
So, if it is good enough for the most successful investor of all time, it is good enough to write a post about.
Now, this quote does not apply to every single trade; no one trades without taking losses. But this is more about mindset, how to strategize, and your performance overall.
In fact, with what you are about to learn, you will see that it is actually possible to lose more trades than you win while STILL being a profitable trader.
We will get to the actual math/strategy in a moment. First, a short word about psychology.
Nothing makes a trader lose more money than not having a well thought out plan or not sticking to it.
We need to make our strategy first so that we can do it logically, and without emotion. This is easier to do beforehand because we haven’t actually put any money in the market yet.
So, what is it that we need to know?
What is my total account size?
What am I willing to lose per trade?
What is my Stop Loss?
What is my Position Size?
What is my Risk to Reward Ratio?
If you cannot answer these questions then it is not a good idea to click the “buy” button! Unless you just want to gamble and throw money away.
Question 1 - What is my total account size?
Probably the easiest question for you to answer.
Account size is the amount of money that you have in the market.
Personally, I like to split my total account size into two parts. One part for longer term HODLing. One part for short-mid term swing trading.
For my calculations, I forget about the HODL account and only look at the money in the trading account.
I personally do not day trade. If I get into a position, I expect to be in it for 1-4 weeks. Obviously, this rule is flexible based on market conditions.
Question 2 - What am I willing to lose per trade?
This one is a bit more subjective because it comes down to how risk averse you are.
It is generally accepted that you should risk between 1-5% of your account per trade.
For me, anything above 3% is higher than I like, so I stick to 1-2% and sometimes 3.
So, if you have a trading account of $10,000 and you want to risk 1%, you are risking $100:
$10,000 x .01 = $100
To be clear – Risking 1% of your account does NOT mean using 1% of your account each trade. You are not spending $100 on each trade. Risk =/= position size.
Risking 1% means that if your Stop Loss gets hit you lose $100.
Question 3 - What is my Stop Loss?
Firstly, what is a Stop Loss?
A Stop Loss is an order that is placed to automatically close you out of a position should the price be hit.
You should place your Stop Loss order right after you open your position.
This is also a good time to place another order to close out your position at your target price.
But where do you put the Stop Loss?
A Stop Loss is best placed at a price that invalidates the reason you got into the trade in the first place. Sometimes this is, very creatively, called the “Invalidation Level”.
For example, if you are trading a breakout to the upside, and then the price of your crypto shoots down in the other direction past your support levels, it is no longer a breakout and you should exit the position.
To restate this in a different way, this level should not be arbitrary. There is no reason to automatically put your Stop Loss at 6.7138%, or any other random number, of your entry.
The level you chose should be based on Technical Indicators; like a base of support, a Fibonacci level, or a previous high.
This is because the market does not care about your arbitrary values. The market is made up of people and whales (who, believe it or not, are also people), and they, the ‘Market’, care about TA.
Here is another example of a more short term trade to the downside. You could be more aggressive with the Price Target considering the resistance was so weak, but this is just an example to illustrate my point.
(MACD looks nice there too. Learn more about that HERE )
Question 4 - What is my position size?
In order to calculate position size we need to know a two different things:
Risk Per Trade - 1 to 5%
Distance from entry to the Stop Loss in percentage terms
So the equation is Position Size = (Total Trading Account Size X Risk Percentage)/Distance to Stop Loss from entry
For example, if you have a $10,000 account and you want to risk 2% while your Stop Loss is 10% away from your entry:
($10,000 X .02)/.1 = $2,000 Position Size while only risking $200.
One thing to note here is that the closer your Stop Loss is to your entry, the larger Position Size you can trade with.
So if you move the stop up to 5% away from your entry:
($10,000 X .02)/.05 = $4,000 Position Size while still only risking $200.
Naturally, a larger position gives you more potential profit. (Don’t take this to mean use margin. I personally don’t use margin for Crypto and would recommend that most people don’t either.)
Now that we have the position size, we should determine if the trade is worth getting into by finding your Risk to Reward Ratio.
Question 5 - What is My Risk to Reward Ratio?
The Risk Reward Ratio, sometimes simply known as R, is the ratio between your potential profit and potential loss.
Reward/Risk = R
So if you open a position where you can potentially lose $100, and you can potentially profit $300, then your trade has an R of 3.
If you click on the Long or Short Position button in TradingView, you can move the sliders up and down and see what your R will be in real time. Double clicking on this will take you to the settings where you can input exact values.
Since you set your Stop Loss at a logical point, one based on TA and not a whim, you should do the same with your Price Target.
So why is having a high and, more importantly, realistic R a good thing?
Because then you can actually lose MORE trades than you win and STILL be profitable.
If you know your average R you can easily calculate the minimum win rate you must have to stay profitable over the long term:
(1 / (1+R)) X 100
Let’s say your average R per trade is 2.5:
(1/(1+2.5)) X 100 = 28.5%
Meaning that you only need to win 28.5% of the time to not lose money overall.
Because of the nature of this equation as your R increases, your required winrate to stay profitable decreases.
Final Thoughts
So, now that you have asked yourself, and have answered, the five big questions you are ready to open a trade.
Remember why we do this. We should not expect to win every trade. But you must set yourself up so that when you do lose there is minimal damage to your account.
Understanding the basics of Risk Management is the tool you need to keep your losses small, and account intact.
Please let me know if you have any questions and if you like it, please hit the thumbs up and be sure to follow for more!
Links to my Fibonacci Retracement, RSI, and MACD guides are below. Give them a read for more information!
Gold short 3rd target reached ;)Just as expected, the shortage was being expected..
we now have reached all the targets. Let’s don’t be greedy! We will wait for another set up now. Paytience.
Thank you for the support and likes and comments help a lot. feel free to ask me any questions please.
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BTC great support This a crear example of support and resistance.
Keep this in mind:
The STOCHASTIC being oversold with a little movement downside of candlesticks.
We might start see BTC running with a better efficiency on mining news can be a great reaction.
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ETH great support It’s getting multiple supports from different angles.
Hello hello Everyone.
As you might see the stochastic is oversold.
The setup pattern is forming is also looking great support.
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LTC great setups We starting to see this powerful formation.
In most coins you will find this.
Is great because it has doble support and now it’s getting multiple support area.
This being said the 50 moving average is also working as support.
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XRP great Opportunity. History repeats itself The history it seems to be repeating itself.
Let’s just take a look at the charts and similarity.
For my Point of view it’s
Getting support and previous resistance level, and also the same exact chart as before. It’s matter of time to see XRP to 2.5$
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XAGUSD Down ward expectation!Base on the chart, price reached a major resistance area and a strong rejection have happened on 3rd of June and now the market reattempt to get its previous price but it failed which can be good sign of weakness on buyers at this area and on the other side, it can show the strength of sellers at this area.
So based on this scenario I prefer to be seller at this area with a good risk reward ratio about 1:4 which means low amount of risk and good potentiality of profit.
Note: As always please take risk management rules into consideration before opening any position on the market.
Good Luck!
GBPUSD Sounds a good buy opportunity!Based on the chart, we can found a very good market range since about 26 days ago! So we should have a good strong support and resistance which took price among them. An now price is on the support zone and remember before this ranging market, we had a good uptrend movement!
So I opened a buy position at this support area and will hold it until it reaches to the specified areas on the chart which can provide me a reasonable risk reward ratio(about 1:3.5)
Note: As always please take all risk management rules into consideration before opening any position on the market.
Good Luck!
Long Term Gold TradeBetween 5th and 31st March we saw that the Gold Market was in a downtrend but also indications that a reversal would take place due to a Double Bottom candlestick formation.
Reason For Trade Entry- Market Pullback followed by Engulfing Candle, anticipating that price will continue to rise.
SL is @Breakeven and TP1,TP2 and TP3 targets have been hit!!
ETH/USDT - considerable potential 67% movement after correctionHello, Traders!
The interest in altcoins begins to fall gradually. Traders are progressively fixing their positions in altcoins in favour of BTC, so Bitcoin's dominance begins to increase incrementally.
In such a situation, it is possible to look for ETH purchases on a deep correction, after the stops of aggressive buyers are collected.
It's best to wait for the price to move into the $1960 - $2140 zone and search for buy entry there.
A stop-loss can be placed below the level of $1740.
The targets for such purchases will be
$2488
$2800
$3000
$3200
$3590
Perfect risk/reward ratio of 3.60!
Good luck and watch out for the market!
P.S. This analysis is created for educational purposes and shall not be considered a piece of financial advice
As requested, here it is my analysis on MTNB!As another request, I’ll analyze MTNB today! This time for @D0981237654!
The stock has low liquidity, so, the intraday chart is hard to read. But we have some good signs in the daily chart. We have an inverted head and shoulders + an advanced breakout on the RSI.
In the weekly chart we are above an interesting support level. If I had to do anything here, I would buy, set a stop-loss under 0.72 and aim for the 1.70, or even the 2.20. Good risk-reward ratio!
If you liked this trading idea, remember to click on the “Follow” button to get more trading ideas like this, and if you agree with me, click on the “Agree” button 😉.
See you soon,
Melissa.
XAUUSD Good opportunity for buyers!Based on the chart, a resistance area is broken and after a while price dropped on this zone which acts as support right now, and a good rejection is about to happening. So this rejection can be a good sign of the strength of buyers and on the other side, the weakness of sellers at this area.
So based on this scenario I opened a buy position with a low amount of risk and good reward potentiality which is about 1:3.5
Note: As always please take risk management rules into consideration before opening any position on the market.
Good Luck!
how to risk smartly? position sizing, risk n reward, SL n TP 👌Risk refers to the probability of a negative event happening in your activities; an event that goes contrary to your intended outcome. Risk is part and parcel of the cryptocurrency trade. It is the chance of an undesired outcome on the trade, which translates to making losses. For instance, a 50% risk on a short position simply means that there is a 50% probability that the Bitcoin price will rise, resulting in a loss on your part.
Today, we take you through the simple rules to follow when managing risk in crypto trading.
Types Of Risk
The crypto trading world is exposed to four main types of financial risks:
Credit Risk
This risk affects crypto projects. It is the probability of the parties behind the crypto project failing to fulfill their due obligations. Credit risk is mostly attributed to theft and fraud in the crypto market. A good example is the hacking of Binance in 2018, which led to over $40 million loss.
Legal Risk
Legal risk refers to the probability of a negative event occurring with respect to regulatory rules. For instance, a ban on cryptocurrency trading in a specific country. A practical example of legal risk is when the states of Texas and North Carolina issued a cease-and-desist order to Bitconnect cryptocurrency exchange due to suspicion of fraud.
Liquidity Risk
Liquidity risk in respect to crypto trading refers to the chance of a trader being unable or incapacitated to convert their entire position to fiat currencies (USD, YEN, GBP) that they can use in their every-day spending.
Market Risk
Market risk refers to the chance of coin prices moving up or down contrary to your desire in an open position.
Operational Risk
Operational risk is the chance that a trader is unable to trade, deposit, or even withdraw money in their crypto wallets.
Main Risk Management Strategies
The rule of thumb in crypto trading is: “Do not risk more than you can afford to lose.” Given the gravity of risk in crypto trading, we generally advise traders to use not more than 10% of their budget or monthly revenue. Also, trading with borrowed money is not advisable as it puts them in a credit risk position.
Risk management strategies can be broadly categorized into three: risk/reward ratio, position-sizing, as well as stop loss & take profits.
1. Position Sizing
Position sizing dictates how many coins or tokens of cryptocurrency a trader is willing to buy. The probability of realizing great profits in crypto trading tempts traders to invest 30%, 50% or even 100% of their trading capital. However, this is a disruptive move that puts you at serious financial risks. The golden rule is: never put all your eggs in one basket. Here are three ways to achieve position sizing.
Enter Amount vs Risk Amount
This approach considers two different amounts. The first involves money you are willing to invest in every single deal. We advise traders to look at this amount as the size of each new order they take, regardless of its type. The second involves money at risk, i.e. the money that you stand to lose in case the trading fails.
This is how you define your enter amount:
A = ((Stack size * Risk per Trade) / (Entry Price – Stop Loss)) * Entry Price
Let’s say we wish to purchase BTC with USDT with a target of $13,000. Our parameters would be:
Stack Size: $5,000
Risk per Trade: 2%
Entry Price: $11,500
Stop Loss: $10,500
Our enter amount would be:
A= ((5,000 * 0.02) / (11,500 – 10,500)) * 11,500 = 1,150
The ideal amount to invest in this deal is $1,150 or 23%. However, due to our Stop Loss, we only risk 2% as it will stop the trade once it reaches the determined level.
Risk trading in cryptocurrency
Elder’s “Sharks” and “Piranhas”
This concept of position sizing relates to diversifying your investments. Dr. Alexander Elder, who is credited with the concept, suggests two rules:
Limiting every position to 2% risk. Elder compares risk to a shark bite. Sometimes you would wish to risk a huge amount, but the risk would be huge and catastrophic as a shark bite.
Limiting trading sessions to 6% per session. In a losing streak, you may end up spending everything you own little by little. Elder compares this risk to a piranha attack, which takes small bites of its victim until it consumes it all.
Following Elder’s sharks and piranhas approach results in no more than three open positions per 2% each or six ones per 1%. Limiting results in reverse compounding; losses get smaller and smaller with each subsequent loss you make.
Kelly Criterion
The Kelly criterion is a formula developed by John Larry Kelly in 1956. It is a position sizing approach that defines the percentage of capital to bet. It suits long-term trading.
A = (Success % / Loss Ratio at Stop Loss) – ((1 – success %) / Profit Ratio at Take Profit)
Using the previous example, the features would be:
Stock size: $5,000
Invested Amount: $1,150
Success %: 60%
Entry Price: $11,500
Stop Loss: $10,500
Loss Ratio: 1.10
Take Profits: $13,000
Our result would be:
A = (0.6 / 1.10) – ((1 – 0.06) / 1.13) = 0.19
This means you should not risk more than 19% of the entire capital of $5,000 for you to arrive at the best possible outcome in a series of deals.
2. Risk/Reward Ratio
The risk/reward ratio compares the actual level of risk with the potential returns. In trading, the riskier a position, the more profitable it can get. Understanding the risk /reward ratio enables you to know when to enter a trade and when it is unprofitable. The risk/reward ratio is calculated as follows:
R = (Target Price – Entry Price) / (Entry Price – Stop Loss)
From the previous illustration:
Entry price: $11,500
Stop Loss: $10,500
Target price: $13,000
Our ratio would be:
R = (13,000 – 11,500) / (11,500 – 10,500) = 1.5 or 1:1.5
A ratio of 1:1.5 is good. We advise traders not to trade with a ratio lower than 1:1.
3. Stop Loss + Take Profit
Stop Loss refers to an executable order which closes an open position when a price decreases to a specific barrier. Take Profit, on the other hand, is an executable order that liquidates open orders when the prices rise to a certain level. Both are good approaches to managing risk. Stop Losses save you from trading in unprofitable deals while Take Profits let you get out of the trade before the market can turn against you.
You can make use of Trailing Stop Losses and Take Profits which follow the rate’s changes automatically. Such a feature, however, isn’t available at the majority of crypto exchanges. Fortunately, with crypto terminals like Superorder, you can set your Trailing Stop Losses and Take Profits right from the terminal.
Winning Strategies
Accept Failures
Risk is part and parcel of trading. Besides, we cannot eliminate it but only manage it. You should, therefore, accept your losses and rely on plan-based decision making to realize profits in future trades.
Consider Fees
New traders often do not know the fees that come along with trading. Such include withdrawal fees, leverage fees, etc. You should consider these in your risk management.
Focus on the Win Rate
Risks will always be there to discourage you from trading. However, focusing on the number of times you win helps to develop a positive attitude in trading.
Measure Drawdown
This refers to the total reduction of your initial funds after a series of losses. For instance, if you lost $1,000 from $5,000, your measure drawdown is 10%. The higher the amount, the more you would need to inject into a trade for it to recover. As Dr. Elder advised, stick to a 6% risk limit.
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