Products You May Like
How to trade TRY
The Turkish Lira has
fallen dramatically in recent weeks. The Lira is down over 30% on the year and
it had a 16% drop on just the 10th of August alone. One of the key
reasons for the implosion of the economy has been Turkey’s current account
deficit.
This simply means that
Turkey’s economy is operating on borrowed money, with other countries financing
the economy and allowing the country to run on a deficit. Turkey has an
external financing need of over $200bln. According to the Financial Times there
will need to be repayments of over $130bln this year.
Take your trading to
the next
level today
On top of this current
account deficit a strong USD with the Federal reserve on a path of rate hikes
has added pressure to the USD/TRY pair. Furthermore, Erdogan placed his own son
in law in charge of the central bank. This move has resulted in some strange
economic decisions with one of the most marked one being a strong reluctance to
raise interest rates, even though the country has desperately needed to in
order to address its rising inflation.
So, if you want to try
and capitalize on the Lira’s recent volatility here are 5 tips for trading the
USD/TRY.
#1 Check the spread
The first tip before
you open a trade on the USD/TRY pair is to check the current spread. The
spread for the USD/TRY pair can be large, and in the snapshot below taken from a
number of different brokers the spread varied from 660+ points to 31.8 points
at a moment in time. So, before you place your trade, just check the spread so
that you don’t enter during an illiquid time and pay a hefty premium for doing
so. This is particularly relevant if there is a strong time of uncertainty or
volatility in the market. It is at these times that spreads can widen
considerably.
#2 Check your position
size
Due to the large
number of points on the USD/TRY pair it can be very easy to open a very
large position size by accident. So, as a general rule of thumb, you will
need to use 1/10th of your normal lot size. If for example, on an intraday
EUR/USD trade, you normally trade with 1 lot, then to do a similar amount of
your normal risk trade on the USD/TRY pair you would open only 0.10 lots.
So, do not open a
USD/TRY position size without first calculating your risk. With a large
spread, and a lot of points on the pair it would be very easy to open too large
a position and you could find yourself with a margin call in no time at all.
So, make sure you check that position size. If you open a position casually you
will quickly regret it.
#3 Using moving
average to define and limit risk.
You can use the 100
and 200 moving averages to define and limit your risk. With the large moves we
have had recently the 50, 100 and 200 moving averages have provided places for
traders to lean against.
You can define and
limit your risk with the ebb and flow of news out of Turkey. Going forward
these moving average levels will be excellent levels on the 1hr, 4hr, and daily
charts to find good places to enter and sensible places to put your stop.
#4 – Keep an eye on
the EUR/USD pair
A far more liquid pair
to trade than the USD/TRY is the EUR/USD. The EUR/USD pair is being affected by
the Turkish Lira crisis due to the amount of financing that Europe’s banks have
given to Turkey.
The fear was that if
the Lira became any weaker than the Turkish banks and institutions would
default on their loans they had taken from Europe’s banks. As a result, the
Euro lost value with the Lira. So, a smart move, if the Turkish crisis
re-emerges, and the Lira weakens again, might be to short EUR/USD.
The pair has a much
higher liquidity that USD/TRY, being one of the world’s most traded currency
pair, and a much smaller spread. Risk is also easier to calculate on the
EUR/USD pair than on the USD/TRY pair, so this is worth remembering.
#5 Keep an eye on the
news
Turkey introduced a
number of measures which have temporarily halted the tumble in the Lira.
However, the next direction will be decided by the actions of the US and
Turkey. Any improvement in politics between the US and Turkey will be
supportive. Recently Qatar injected $15bln of support which helped further stem
the bleed of the weakening Lira.
The key event to look
out for though, is a central bank rate hike to start addressing the twin
problems of a weaker Lira and higher inflation which is affecting the country.
This will cause the Lira to strengthen and is what markets are really wanting
to see happen in order to give strength to the failing Lira.
This
post was submitted by LegacyFX