Many traders live by the often-repeated “the trend is your friend until the end” rule; they are comforted with the knowledge that they are with the majority of the market. Being able to ride on a trend is akin to making full use of the wind direction to steer your ship towards your destination. For a ship to go against the wind requires a tremendous amount of effort – one has to fight the stubborn resistance from the opposing wind. Indeed, for most of the time, it pays more to be on the side of the current trend than to go against it. In the forex market, trend riders can capture any trend regardless of whether it is rising or falling in an attempt to generate trading profits.
Forex tends to have quite trending markets, regardless of which time frame you are looking at – trends are often formed on hourly, daily or weekly charts. This is due to the fact that currency price movements are very much influenced by the underlying macroeconomic factors which in turn shape the market players’ views of where currency prices should be heading. With trends possibly having a long lifespan stretching to months, or even years, it is no wonder that many traders and fund managers exalt the strategy of hitching onto trends, with the glorious aim of capturing enormous profits from start to finish.
Trend riding is one of my favourite trading approaches, and I often ride the uptrend or downtrend after the trend has been established, rather than anticipating the move before it happens. I would say that even though the trend is your friend most of the times, one has to use a variety of methods to distinguish between a continuation of the trend and a possible trend reversal. But before you can ride on trends, you first need to identify what the current trend is, and to determine the time frame of the trend.
Time Frames of Trends
Sometimes, people ask me for my opinion on the current trend for certain currency pairs, I reply with another question in return, “According to the past 5 mins, 5 hours, 5 days or 5 weeks?” Some traders are not aware that different trends exist in different time frames. The question of what kind of trend is in place cannot be separated from the time frame that a trend is in. Trends are, after all, used to determine the relative direction of prices in a market over different time periods.
There are mainly three types of trends in terms of time measurement:
1. primary (long-term),
2. intermediate (medium-term), and
3. short-term.
These are discussed in further detail below.
1. Primary trend
Aprimary trend lasts the longest period of time, and its lifespan may range between eight months and two years. This is the major trend that can be spotted easily on longer term charts such as the daily, weekly or monthly charts. Long-term traders who trade according to the primary trend are the most concerned about the fundamental picture of the currency pairs that they are trading, since fundamental factors will provide these traders with an idea of supply and demand on a bigger scale.
2. Intermediate trend
Within a primary trend, there will be counter-cyclical trends, and such price movements form the intermediate trend. This type of trend could last from a month to as long as eight months. Knowing what the intermediate trend is of great importance to the position trader who tends to hold positions for several weeks or months at one go.
3. Short-term trend
A short-term trend can last for a few days to as long as a month. It appears during the course of the intermediate trend due to global capital flows reacting to daily economic news and political situations. Day traders are concerned with spotting and identifying short-term trends and as such short-term price movements are aplenty in the currency market, and can provide significant profit opportunities within a very short period of time.
No matter which time frame you may trade, it is vital to monitor and identify the primary trend, the intermediate trend, and the short-term trend for a better overall picture of the trend.
Source: How To Ride The Trends?
