08:10am  Back home after a short break away so I will be doing some chart watching on and off through the day – any trades I have will be reported below.

Market Update:

Main market news of the day is the upcoming Federal Reserve’s interest rate decision later today and this is already having an effect on the markets with the overnight Asian session ending mixed as traders manoeuvre their positions ahead of the announcement at 20:00hrs European time.

The Asian trading session was down overall with Australia’s Consumer Price Index number coming in at -0.2% against an expectation of +0.3% so more stimulus is expected now from its Central Bank and traders are also bracing themselves for the Bank Of Japan’s rate announcement tomorrow. Across the region all other indices fell and this has weighed heavily on the European open this morning where the German DAX-30 is currently down 11 pips and the FTSE-100 off by 19 pips.

There is no real expectation the the U.S. Fed will raise their minimum lending rate today but investors will be analysing the FOMC statement for clues as to whether the much anticipated rise will occur in June. Do not expect much movement in the S&P-500 or Dow Jones-30 through the day but volume will increase as the U.S. trading session comes to a close.

Trading Diary:

08:50am   My favourite charts are not giving me any opportunities yet so I am off for a cycle ride for an hour or so.

12:05pm  There is a possibility of a ‘short’ UTB pattern emerging on my Brent Crude chart so I am watching it carefully at the moment. This type of trade will always be quite risky today due to the U.S. Oil Inventory numbers coming out later this afternoon but the stop loss looks as though it could be small.

12:20pm  I am now in the above UTB position, my stop loss is just 14 pips.

12:40pm   Off for an early lunch with some trader friends – I’ve left the stop loss where it is to give the position some room.

15:00pm   Just back from a long lunch and seen that my Brent Crude trade has been stopped out at -14 pips.

16:10pm    Just entered a ‘long’ trendFX position (strategy-1) on my FTSE-100 chart – I have a 12 pip stop loss.

16:40pm   The London trading session has closed now and as a consequence the price action has slowed slightly so I have just closed off my FTSE-100 trade at +18 pips.