Federal Reserve Chief Ben Bernanke spoke at the Bank of Japan on May 25, 2010, demanding that central banks be considered “independent” of politics. “In undertaking financial reforms, it is important that we maintain and protect the aspects of central banking that proved to be strengths during the crisis and that will remain essential to the future stability and prosperity of the global economy,” Bernanke said. His meaning was perfectly clear. Congress — don’t pass legislation that allows you to audit the Federal Reserve. He said, “Chief among these aspects has been the ability of central banks to make monetary policy decisions based on what is good for the economy in the longer run, independent of short-term political considerations. Central bankers must be fully accountable to the public for their decisions, but both theory and experience strongly support the proposition that insulating monetary policy from short-term political pressures helps foster desirable macroeconomic outcomes and financial stability.”

Bernanke’s speech comes right after Congress nearly unanimously passed a measure on May 11th, granting authorization to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Congress told the GAO to audit the Federal Reserve’s emergency-response programs. In a very split Congress, between Democrats and Republicans, imagine that this was nearly unanimous, one of the only bi-partisan measures passed in years. This measure is part of the bank reform legislation. “This makes it clear that the Fed can no longer operate under the kind of secrecy it has been operating under,” said Sen. Bernie Sanders. The measure also grants authorization to the GAO to engage in audits of any financial institutions that borrowed Fed Funds during the financial crisis. And finally, the measure also authorizes the GAO to engage in continuing audits of the Fed’s policies.

Why is the Fed so opposed to this audit? Might it be that one of their “undocumented” actions is their direct participation in the Plunge Protection Team (PPT) and they do not want it exposed? German Economy Minister Rainer Bruederle announced on May 28th, that the US Federal Reserve actively buys and sells stocks in the secondary market. The Fed is actively involved in currency intervention to realize profit from their stock purchases. “It is a regular procedure of central banks,” to intervene in currency markets, Bruederle said. “It is not a secret,” that central banks have a foreign exchange rate target,” he added. Bruederle comments follow statements made by in Switzerland, that the Swiss National Bank purchased Euros to bolster the single currency.

Bernanke was very adamant about Fed independence during his May 25 speech. He said, “A broad consensus has emerged among policymakers, academics, and other informed observers around the world that the goals of monetary policy should be established by the political authorities, but that the conduct of monetary policy in pursuit of those goals should be free from political control.” “Undue political influence on monetary policy decisions can also impair the inflation-fighting credibility of the central bank, resulting in higher average inflation and, consequently, a less-productive economy.” Again, he reiterates — stay away from the Fed.

In January, Charles Biderman, CEO of TrimTabs Investment Research, pronounced that the Treasury, the Fed and major Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs were having direct impact in the stock market rally each and every day, driving prices higher and higer. Biderman, without hesitation, observed that the normal source of funds flowing into the market could not substantiate a $6 trillion increase in U.S. stock-market capitalization. “We cannot identify the source of the new money that pushed stock prices up so far so fast,” Biderman said. Biderman made sure to elaborate that financial inflow was not coming from traditional sources such as companies, hedge funds, retail investors, pension funds, or foreign investors. “We know that the U.S. government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars to support the auto industry, the housing market, and the banks and brokers. Why not support the stock market as well?”

Suspicions that the Fed has been a long standing participant in the Plunge Protection Team (PPT) have reigned forever, even though the Fed actively denies their participation. If the Fed is audited, they will be forced to reveal how funds are controlled, where they go and to whom, how often, and how much.If the Fed artificially inflated the stock market and thereby caused rising stock valuations through undercover PPT activities, this will be determined by the audit.

During his speech, Bernanke said, “In some situations, a government that controls the central bank may face a strong temptation to abuse the central bank’s money-printing powers to help finance its budget deficit.” Could he be saying right here that the Fed is part of the PPT? “As we move along the path of reform, however, it is crucial that we maintain the ability of central banks to make monetary policy independently of short-term political influence.”

The “official” role of the Plunge Protection Team was to prevent another 1987 “Black Monday”. The PPT now has the U.S. Treasury at its finger tips, and can manipulate stock markets through derivative trading. Wikipedia defines derivatives as “a financial instrument – or more simply, an agreement between two people or two parties – that has a value determined by the price of something else (called the underlying).”

Propping up the Market through derivative trading by the Fed was revealed by the Guardian as early as 2001. “A secretive committee – the Working Group on Financial Markets, dubbed ‘the plunge protection team’ – includes bankers as well as representatives of the New York Stock Exchange, Nasdaq and the US Treasury. It is ready to co-ordinate intervention by the Federal Reserve on an unprecedented scale.” The fed buys equities from mutual funds, pension funds, and other institutional sellers when there is evidence of panic selling in conjunction with international financial institutions.

The PPT makes use of U.S. Treasury assets to artificially amplify commodity and stock prices through derivative trading. Executive Order 12631 signed by Ronald Reagan handed the Fed authorization to establish a “Working Group” on Financial Matters consisting of 1) the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve 2) the Secretary of the Treasury 3) the Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission 4) the Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. As of late, this “Working Group” has been extended to include large brokerage firms (Goldman Sachs).

The GAO audit will expose the Plunge Protection Team. Former Federal Reserve Board member Robert Heller stated that “Instead of flooding the entire economy with liquidity, and thereby increasing the danger of inflation, the Fed could support the stock market directly by buying market averages in the futures market (through derivatives), thereby stabilizing the market as a whole.” What is the impact to the stock market that is used to being bolstered up after the Fed is audited? Could it be that finally the market must stand on its own 2 feet, either make it or lose it, no more being held up with bobby pins and rubber bands by the Treasury without the approval of US taxpayers.

During his speech, Bernanke said, “We are committed to exploring new ways to enhance the Federal Reserve’s transparency without compromising our mandated monetary policy and financial stability objectives.” The question is…when did participation in the PPT become mandated? When did currency manipulation to increase stock valuations become mandated, and if so, by whom?

The bank reform bill that was just passed by the Senate and House oversees usage of derivative trading, a key resource of the Fed and the PPT. “We are sending a clear message to Wall Street, the party is over. Never again will reckless behavior on the part of the few threaten the fiscal stability of our people,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. “The legislation will finally protect Main Street from the worst of Wall Street.”

Isn’t this the reason the Fed opposes bank reform, especially given the section concerning Fed oversight? Bernanke himself said on Tuesday, “As has been demonstrated during financial panics for literally hundreds of years, the ability of central banks to independently undertake such lending allows for a more rapid and effective response in a crisis. The nature and scope of the independence granted regulatory agencies is likely to be somewhat different than that afforded monetary policy.” The PPT is definitely different…

Barbara Cohen has been a professional day trader for over 10 years. She has trained hundreds of students to trade the Futures Market with Shadowtraders online day trading strategies. As the CIO, Barbara frequently hosts Shadowtraders daily online trading chatroom. Before you purchase any trading software, make sure you attend Shadowtraders Monday Night Webinar, and hosted by Barbara Cohen

Now might be the right time to try investment trading. It is common knowledge that a lot of people have already met with some fair amount of success in various trading markets. Before you decide to take the risk though, it may be worth your while to consider some vital considerations covering your reasons for trading, market selection and trading system.

Reasons to Trade

A lot of people get into trading because they want to become financially well off. As a lot of people know, the commodities, stocks and forex markets all give wonderful opportunities for huge profits. Aside from earning well, one more reason to trade is to be able to take advantage of the chance to become one’s own boss. Both these reasons hold a lot of weight. This doesn’t mean though that these are the only reasons you should have to begin trading. One vital requirement to succeed is to adopt more specific reasons for wanting to trade.

Making Goals

The chance to come up with specific trading reasons comes when you sit down and set your goals. It is important to lay down very particular and personal reasons and goals so that you will get motivated to succeed. You can for instance decide to trade so you can provide sufficient funds for kids who are about to go off to college. After coming up with a similar reason, take another step by specifying the exact profit figures and the dates you would want to reach them. Specific terms are what will enable you to generate the drive and commitment to push through with finding profitable trades.

There is more for you to do than just outline specific points. Before you even begin with this step, always remind yourself to think along realistic lines. Focus on the fact that you can never get rich in the blink of an eye in any trading market. If you can’t drill this into your head, trading is not for you.

Picking a Market

Trading is a broad term. There is more than one market that you can choose to trade in. If you are a new trader, one vital secret to success is choosing a specific market. For beginners, the stock market is perhaps the best point to start because it is unleveraged and is thus the least risky trade market. You might later want to diversify by trying your hand at riskier investment types such as currency trading. Do this however only when you are fairly certain that you are ready for the greater challenge of working with leveraged assets.

Trading Plan

Trading plans are sometimes taken for granted. Following a personal set of rules however on when to enter and exit trades is among the best ways to ensure success. When combined with the principles of risk management, you can hardly fail. Once you decide to follow a particular plan, make the commitment to stick to it regardless of how the market turns. This will keep you on the track of logical instead of emotional trading.

Some expert traders have publicly declared their systems. These become tempting patterns for beginners to follow. Although you may be able to benefit from some parts of a system, nothing beats having a system of your own. Creating a plan for yourself is an excellent way of ensuring that your personal interests are what drive your system.

Once you have a plan in mind, make sure to write it on paper. This is a way for you to own your plan. This is an important step because it eliminates the possibility of you blaming someone or something else for possible failures. Once you own your plan, you become ultimately responsible for it.

Investment trading truly is one of the best ways to secure your future. Don’t imagine for a second though that this is an easy path to pursue. If you want to succeed, make sure you have put some thought into essential preliminary points for consideration.

Learn how to become the best stock broker. Drop by http://www.freetradingsystems.org/.

Welcome to May…now sell all your stocks. This week, U.S. stocks plunged 772 points in heavy trading volume the first week of May. This was the worst May ever in this history of the Market. The Euro vs the Dollar dropped to 1.27. Why? Concern over Europe’s debt situation especially in Greece, questioning the pace of any economic recovery. From the April high to the May 6 low, Japanese stocks are down 4.2%, Europe dropped 9.5% and the U.S. plunged 7.6%.

“No one really wants to be long over the weekend with the Greece situation hanging out there,” said Alan Valdes, who is the director of floor operations at the New York Stock Exchange for Kabrik Trading. “Everything is based on that concern right now.”

With last week’s trading, the Futures Market was where all the action was. On Thursday, in just a few quick moments, the Market plummeted almost 1000 points before it rebounded somewhat. At the exact same time, the S&P 500 EMini dove 50 points, with the S&P 500 EMini trading in points not ticks. Day traders were making money faster than they could count. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange traded over 5million contracts, its highest ever volume. Normally, traders are happy to make 2 or 3 ticks, not 2 or 3 points in each trade!

With this kind of dramatic sell off, the good economic news played second fiddle. Unemployment news was released on Friday, showing that the US added 290,000 jobs. Even excluding temporary census jobs, the US continued to add 224,000 nonfarm jobs, and nearly all of the jobs were from the private sector. This is the first real sign of economic recovery. Moreover, the previous two month payrolls data increased by 121,000 jobs. Finally, we began seeing some relief in the job market after waiting 2 years.

But with Portugal downgraded by Standard and Poor’s and Greece rioting, and given the looming possibility of further downgrades by Spain and Ireland, the Market simply gave up its gains for the last 2 months. The CBOE’s Volatility Index, the VIX measured the US Stock Market’s fear by rising over 40. The VIX works in reverse, the higher the number, the more fear in the Market. For the week, the VIX went up 88%.

But this provided unlimited opportunities to trade the S&P 500 EMini. With the Market plunging, it is a perfect time to go short. To see trading opportunities, watch the video that Shadowtraders.com put out on Shadowtraders Youtube to show the trading opportunities.

Rising fear in the Market had more fuel due to the fact that more banks failed this week, bringing the total number of failed backs in 2010 to 66. San Diego, Calif. 1st Pacific Bank, Mesa, Ariz. Towne Bank of Arizona, and the Bank of Bonifay, Champlin, Minn. Access Bank, were all closed, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) said. These failures cost the FDIC fund $213.7 million, said the FDIC.

The question still remains…what caused the Market to crash 1000 points on Thursday. Wall Street hadn’t seen such volatility since Black Monday, the October 1987 crash. For conspiracy theorists, here are the reasons why the Market plunged…

There was a “fat finger trade”, someone entered a “b” for billion instead of an “m” for million in a trade involving Procter & Gamble. According to CNBC, sources told the network that a trader (possibly at Citigroup) caused the problem.

There might have been computer errors. Rich Adamonis, New York Stock Exchange spokesman, said that “there were a number of erroneous trades” on May 6th.

Another conspiracy theory was that automated trading programs triggered stop loss orders. That pushed the stock market down even further. When the market plunges to lowest levels, there are automated trading programs that get started, acting almost as a rollercoaster. They trigger more and more stop loss orders. Hedge funds and larger institutional traders watch for Market crashes and start selling, creating their own self-fulfilling prophecy that the Market will deteriorate even further.

Or was it fear that Greece’s financial debt situation would spread like wildfire to other nations. Portugal was downgraded. Will Spain be next country, or Ireland? If this were the real reason, then what Citi analysts projected on Friday could happen…a Market correction of 20%. Citi analysts said that while even though there were financial problems in the recent past, the Greek crisis is “graver than these were.”

Could it actually have been cyber-terrorism? Automated trading programs now account for 60% of all trading in the New York Stock Exchange. Regardless of which conspiracy theory is true, this is a Market that trades in nanoseconds. Certainly by this time we should know what caused the Market’s crash. By not informing investors what happened, the Market may not recover any time soon. Investors remember that there were just recovering from the 2008 crisis where they lost 3 trillion. Now they are facing the Greek crisis. This may permanently keep them out of the Stock Market.

Barbara Cohen has been a professional day trader for over 10 years. She has trained hundreds of day traders in trading futures with Shadowtraders online day trading strategies. As the CIO, Barbara frequently hosts Shadowtraders daily online trading chatroom. Before you purchase any trading education, make sure you attend Shadowtraders Monday Night Webinar, and hosted by Barbara Cohen

Today’s economics are not for the timid. Above and beyond knowing the basics of how money works, there is another layer which needs to be fathomed. That layer is called by many shadow banking.

To the degree that the population becomes wise to how this works, is the degree to which all of us can avoid the pitfalls of financial oppression.

The warning signs were clear that nothing good would come from the development of Collateralized Debt Obligations, CDOs. I was fortunate to have been in banking and in a group which voiced serious concerns over the development of crazier and crazier esoteric instruments. They were to be peddled as “same as cash” but were in fact far from that. By July 07 the auctions for these began to fail as financial institutions backed away.

For the bankers the bigger fool theory was the rage by then. Systematically, the institutions such as Merrill Lynch, and Wachovia Securities dumped millions of dollars of these into the hands of unsuspecting companies, and even retirees to get them out of their holding before the wheels fell totally off the cart.

When the auctions failed totally in Mid-Feb 2008 300 billion dollars in “same as cash” became illiquid. That is to say they about as far from “same as cash” as you can get.

Those who had trusted that these instruments were really the same as cash found their economic lives grinding to a halt. The regulators of course were flooded by complaints.

Of course, no on e in the industry had really done anything wrong. The result was that at least a number of small investors got back their principal.

Was the press interested? Well, it didn’t boil down to a quick set of soundbytes. Besides, the perpetrators were some of the biggest financial institutions in the country.

Finally, when Bernanke and Paulson held the country ransom for 700 billion dollars the story got media attention.

It is not my ideal of accountability to have the taxpayer pay for the financial excesses of the financial institutions.

The rough condition of the stock market just after the last election was rumored to in part have been due to the rumor that “full bonuses” may not be forthcoming to the architects of the meltdown.

So what kind of bonuses are we talking. Dick Fuld, had in 07 cleared 34 million.

Clearly Rand’s notion of enlightened self-interest did not trump raw greed for the banking industry. For more on Rand, see Objectivism and the 1957 novel “Atlas Shrugged”.This all plays nicely into the capital C Conspiracy Theorists who are ready to gloat over the “I told ya so’s”.

These “Too big to fail” are not national institutions. They are international. The idea of a sovereign nation is a thing of the past.

Will the New Vikings prevail? Stay tuned

James Horne has been a financial analyst for over 10 years. He is CEO of Pure Reason LLC, the home of Shadowtraders. His voice has been heard by hundreds of students learning to trade Futures with Shadowtraders online day trading strategies. Before you purchase any trading software, make sure you attend Shadowtraders Monday Night Webinar, and hosted by Barbara Cohen

There are so many foreign exchange robots in the internet. If you are a trader, you need to consider getting one so that you don’t have to go through so many bad trades.

When it comes to the foreign exchange, day traders have the ability to earn so much but they can also lose a lot from bad bets.

You really have to think long and hard with every trading robot that you choose to purchase.

Different trading robots work with different circumstances. There are some trading robots that work only for long trades while there are others that work only with short trades.

Ivybot is a trading robot that works for short trades. It’s a fact that short trades are easier won than long ones.

The robot Ivybot generates bets that follow the current trendlines instead of opposing them. This is all done to make sure that the bets are all accurate. In fact, Ivybot has a 96% accuracy.

If you are more of a person who does manual trading, you can download different scripts from the website.

For the record, Ivybot works only with 1 hour time frames so that in one week, you will be able to trade at least 3 to 10 times in a week.

Trading robots work with real money involved. In order to make sure that the software is working well, Ivybot went through years of extensive research before it could go through quality checks.

The Ivybot even went through alternate stages of testing and development as well as spread protection program.

Before Ivybot increases the winning probabilities, it first considers the liquidity and volatility of the markets.

You will be able to receive four different trading robots in 4 different currencies. You can also avail of product updates without any charge.

Thanks for reading this post. To find out how you can make money on the internet then checkout my review site. Another site I recommend taking a look at is my friends the cash code site.

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Isn’t it puzzling how your neighbor who doesn’t go out to work can pay for dream vacations and maintain a rich lifestyle?

I’m pretty sure these people do not come from ridiculously wealthy families and they don’t have well established companies a well. But why are they making so much money?

He may be one of those day traders who work through their computers. The foreign exchange market is perfect because you really don’t need that much money in order for you to start trading.

You can trade in a number of markets using different currencies and, if you wish, you can even trade for 24 hours.

But the best thing about the foreign exchange market is that you don’t have to be a know- it-all for you to start earning from it. Basically, all you need are the necessary information on how things usually operate but that’s it.

If you need extra help with making bets, you can purchase a reliable forex robot.

Searching for a forex robot in the internet is fairly easy but finding a really good one can be quite difficult. You need to sift through a couple of underperforming ones but there are a number of excellent ones like Ivybot.

Basically, it makes use of trends. It will base its bets on the existing trendlines and not on the opposite ones. By doing so, you will have a high degree of accuracy with 95 successful trades for every 100 trades.

IvyBot was conceived after years of extensive trading research. It went through numerous stages of testing and development.

It bases its bets on a number of important factors including price actions, technical price patterns, market liquidity and volatility.

But before you go and purchase Ivybot if you’re truly interested in entering the foreign exchange market, you need to know a couple of things first. You have to understand that Ivybot works only on short trades and not on long ones.

It also trades using a 1 hour timeframe so you’ll average 3-10 trades every week. If you don’t mind these factors or if you don’t have that much cash to spare you’ll be able to enjoy Ivybot.

Stop. To learn more about ivy bot then go to my site quick. And take a look at my free proxy list website right this second.

Futures trading is all about trading Futures Contracts. Just what is a Futures Contract and how does it trade? A Futures Contract, also known as a “Forward” Contract, or even a cash forward sale, is a contract between a buyer interested in a specific product, and a seller intent on supplying the product on a future date for a specified price. Futures Contracts are formal agreements, obligating both the buyer and seller. Futures Trading is known as a zero sum game. Every dollar made by the buyer is a loss to the seller and vice versa. Prices that are too high or too low…either the buyer or the seller profits, but at the expense of the other. For example, if soy prices rise, the farmer benefits but the soy milk manufacturer suffers. If soy prices fall, the farmer suffers, but the soy milk manufacturer’s bottom line does better.

Futures trading takes place in two different ways. Commodities are traded at a Futures exchange, on the floor like at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), where there are open outcry pits. But Futures trading can also be done “electronically,” with an internet connection, where individual investors place their buy and sell orders straight from their desktop trading platforms, like Tradestation.

There are 2 types of Futures traders: hedgers and speculators. A trader who is a hedger would be a farmer, manufacturer, importer, or exporter. Hedgers create futures positions for the purpose of reducing the risk that the price of their commodity may fall. For example, a soy farmer knows his crop will be harvested in August. He negotiates a soy futures contract before the harvest at the current price in July for delivery in September, after the harvest. In July, the price of soy is high because of limited supply. Should the price of soy fall in September (when the contract comes due), because of a bumper crop, the farmers’ price is already protected. Of coarse, the farmer is taking a risk. Should there be no bumper crop in September, the price of soy would rise even further but the farmer is already be obligated to deliver soy at the price negotiated in July. He would lose the additional profit. In September there could be a bumper crop and the price of soy is lower than his July price. In this case he wins.

Speculators want to be trading Futures to earn a profit, not to protect the price of their commodity. Speculators actually embody the majority of traders in almost all markets. Speculators are able to assume risk. They hope that if they buy low, they can sell high by going long. Oppositely, speculators can sell high and later buy back low, going short. As an example, say the pork belly speculator knows that there has been a virus and pork bellies will be limited in September. The speculator is happy to buy the pork bellies Futures contracts in May at the current price. He is betting that the price of pork bellies will skyrocket and he will make a fortune in September after the small roundup. Speculators give the Futures Market liquidity that is needed. Without speculators, no one would accept the other half of the hedger’s contracts. As in the example above, the farmer sells the pork bellies to the speculator in May for the current price. The speculator assumes risk, hoping that by September, the delivery date, the price of pork bellies has risen back up and he can make a profit at the farmer’s expense. What he really doesn’t want to happen is that in September, the price of pork bellies goes down, meaning that he paid far too much, and he is the loser.

Before there were organized Futures exchanges like the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), Futures trading was much more risky. Contracts were written between one farmer and one speculator. The contracts were signed wherever the farmer happened to be selling his produce, like in farmers markets. There were many problems with individual contracts. First of all, either the farmer or the speculator could default on the contract. Who would ensure payment? If the speculator was going to lose his shirt, he would not pay for the contract. If the farmer saw that the price of soy had skyrocketed, he would default and sell the soy on the open market. Moreover, as contracts were between individuals, the speculator was not allowed to sell his contract to any other speculator because the contract was specifically created for that one speculator. Another problem was, who would certify the quality of the delivery? Farmers could fulfill their end of the contract with lower grade soy. What could the speculator do about it.

Since the coming of organized exchanges, it became the responsibility of the exchange to certify delivery, quality, and payment. Exchanges now require good-faith money with a third party to ensure contract performance,thereby reducing the number of contract defaults. Exchanges were also able to standardize contracts, stipulating terms, such as commodity delivery dates and product grades.

Organized exchanges have taken Futures trading far beyond buying and selling of just commodity contracts like corn, wheat, rice, soy or pork bellies. Today, there are futures contracts for several different asset classes, including energies, treasuries, currencies and equities. Futures belong to an asset class called “derivatives,” securities whose prices are derived from one or more underlying assets. As an example, the S&P 500 Futures Contract underlying asset is the New York Stock Exchange’s (NYSE) S&P 500 Index. The S&P 500 Index is one of the most intensely watched equity indexes around the world. The index represents the top 500 well recognized stocks that are now traded on the NYSE. Here is the difficulty with the S&P index, however…you cannot trade the Index. The CME devised the S&P 500 Futures Contract that you are able to trade. As with the case of the S&P 500 Futures Contract, when the value of the S&P 500 Index inflates, the S&P 500 Futures Contract inflates with it, and vice versa.

There are also future derivatives whose underlying asset is a currency index. For smaller investors, the Currency Futures Market is created for the few contracts that individual investors intend to trade. Trading with Currency Futures, individual investors can trade the exact same dollars/euros that are being traded in the Forex market, but trade them on the CME.

Shadowtraders specialty is in training individual investors how to be Trading Futures. Most of the other Futures education companies can only train investors in trading the S&P 500 Futures Contract, and in particular, the Emini, earmarked towards individual traders. Shadowtraders is much more interested in presenting to its clients a variety of different Futures, including energies, treasuries, currencies, etc. We trade many assets, all of which have liquidity and volatility. For example, we know the days of the week that a particular Future trades, the times of day it is easiest to trade, how many contracts are traded for that, whether or not you can even trade it, etc. That is Shadowtraders expertise.

If you are tired of just trading the S&P 500 Emini, or you are new at the Futures trading game and want to find out more, attend a Shadowtraders Webinar on Monday nights.

Barbara Cohen has been a professional day trader for over 10 years and is the CIO of Shadowtraders. She has trained hundreds of students to trade the Futures Market with Shadowtraders trading seminar. Before you purchase any trading course, make sure you attend Shadowtraders Monday Night Webinar, and hosted by Barbara Cohen

More and more people want to get into day trading. We hear them say, “I am interested in day trading but I don’t have the funds necessary to open the account and meet the minimum requirements. Since 9/11, day trading stocks requires at least $25,000 in your brokerage account. With the economy as tough as it is for everyone, with highest ever unemployment, $25,000 can be a barrier.

At last there is a way for you bypass the barrier to daytrading even though you do not have $25,000 in your brokerage account…learn to trade Emini Futures, a whole new form of education. Emini Futures gives you the capacity to open a brokerage account, and yet have only $2,500. That is significantly less than what you need to open an account to day trade stocks. And imagine trading with only $500/ trade. There are many volatile Emini Futures contracts which require just $500 / contract. Can you name shares of stock that you can be traded for $500, a stock with volatility and liquidity?

For example, there is one Futures contract you can be day trading for just $500/contract…the Emini S&P 500. On margin, it only needs $500/contract to trade, and some brokerages demand even less.

The Emini S&P 500 is a Futures Contract. The “E” means it trades electronically over the internet, and the “Mini” means it is a smaller version of the exact same contract traded by the hedge funds and institutions. Futures trade in “Contracts” instead of shares. The symbol for the Emini S&P 500 Future is “ES”. Think of trading this Emini as if you were day trading all of the top 500 stocks that make up the S&P 500 Index at one time. The Emini S&P 500 Futures Contract goes up and down just as the S&P 500 Index does on the New York Stock Exchange.

Think of day trading Emini Futures as the same thing as day trading stocks. Your technical analysis charts that you use with stocks work the same, with MACD, stochastics, moving averages, etc. You can use the same trading strategies and same trading software that you would when you are day trading stocks. You can setup up trading alerts, the same alerts that work with your stock trades. Best of all, you are trading the S&P 500 Emini, a contract that represents all the top 500 stocks on the NYSE. You’ll only need 1 technical analysis chart to represent all 500 stocks, not 4 or 5 charts.

Day trading 1 Emini S&P 500 requires about $500 per contract. That depends upon your broker of course. Emini S&P 500 Futures day trade with margin, and your broker must decide the margin he can allow for each customer. Most Futures brokers permit your trading 1 contract for $500. You really should open an account with a Futures broker not a brokerage that primarily trades Stocks and also allows day trades Futures, because Futures Brokers offer discount commissions and lower margins.

For each “tick” profit, the Emini S&P 500 earns you $12.50. 1 tick is 1 price movement, like 1 penny increase on stocks.

For example, compare day trading 100 shares of stock costing $25/share and day trading 1 S&P 500 Emini Futures contract costing $500/contract. First of all, you will need to trade the stock in 100 share lots. Immediately, you’ll need $2500 for trading that stock. But with the S&P 500 Emini Futures Contract, you will be trading with $500 for 1 contract. In order to profit $12.50, the 100 stock shares must appreciate about 13 cents, 13 price movements. The S&P 500 Emini need only appreciate 1 tick — 1 price movement. Comparing investment to investment, you could actually be trading five S&P 500 Emini contracts for the same $2500 investment. Then 1 tick gives you a profit of $60 not $12.50. 1 stock share now must appreciate $6.00, 600 price movements, to match the profit from trading 1 price movement up of the S&P 500 Emini.

You’re only moving up 1 price movement with S&P 500 Emini Futures, and 1 price movement could well be under 4 minutes of live trading time. Mind you, it could be that your elapsed time trading in front of the computer is longer than 4 minutes. But we’re talking actual day trading live in the Futures Market, less than 4 minutes.

If you are interested in this kind of day trading, you should attend a Monday night http://Shadowtraders.com Webinar and see for yourself what Emini S&P 500 Futures trading is all about. Shadowtraders offers an online trading course, a 4-Day intensive online trading seminar, trading software, trading strategies and trading alerts using technical analysis charts.

Barbara Cohen is a professional day trader. She has trained hundreds of students to trade Futures with Shadowtraders trading strategies. Before you purchase any trading software, make sure you attend Shadowtraders Monday Night Webinar, and hosted by Barbara Cohen

To understand the relevance of trading with pivots, first understand, the market is controlled. It could even be said that the Market is completely controlled. If it were not controlled, millions of shares and millions contracts could not change hands every day so efficiently.

You don’t believe that the market is controlled? Let’s see an example of how control works. At the end of May 2009, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner went to China and met with Chinese government officials. The Chinese handed Geithner a kind of warning, the conversation most likely went like this…their telling him that they have invested in the U.S. stock market and in Treasury bonds. They are willing to sell their holdings if the stock market does not rise soon.

Geithner knows that could literally crash the U.S. economy, an economy held together with bobby pins.

Can Geithner and his buddies in the Treasury do anything? Geithner’s meeting with the Chinese takes place at the END of May. Upon his return, the Dow goes from 8,200 to 8,800 in two weeks, a 600-point spike. This is a market that had not moved for over two months, hanging around 8,000. How could the stock market move 600 points in two weeks if it hadn’t moved in over 2 months? In July and August, the stock market went up almost 1,000 points. Look at the Dow chart for the last five years. You can see that May through August are always thought to be summer doldrums. How, then, could the market go up 1,300 points in just over one month?

How does that kind of control help you to become a 12-minute trader? Simple. The point of this story is that the market is controlled. The market’s “insiders” know where they are interested in taking the market to and they can control just how fast it gets there. Insiders follow very controlled trading rules, an important one of which is Futures Pivots. To become a 12-minute trader, you need to learn the insider’s rules…buy when they buy and sell when they sell. Become a market shadow.

What then, are pivots? Pivots are support and resistance price levels that allow the insiders to control daily highs and lows during any given trading day. There are in actuality 17 Futures trading pivots — eight intraday (occurring in just one day) and nine inter-day (occurring over more than 1 day). Futures Market insiders use Futures Pivots and stock market insiders use Stock Market pivots. To be a successful 12-minute trader, you need to have the pivots to appear on your technical analysis charts. It is very difficult to trade without pivots because you won’t know where the market may turn on a dime.

Want to uncover more about being a 12-minute trader? Want to learn more about Futures Market pivots and technical analysis? Attend a Monday night webinar on trading the Futures marker put on by http://www.shadowtrader.com. You’ll see for yourself the 17 pivots in action on the current day’s technical chart. Shadowtraders always demonstrates the current day’s chart, not some chart from several weeks or months earlier.

Before you buy another trading course, make sure you attend one of Barbara Cohen’s excellent free Monday night Webinars

For anyone who has been invested in the markets over the past two years, it should come as no surprise to discover that market volatility, as measured by the Chicago Board Options Exchange, has risen from the range 16 to nearly 80, the highest level ever recorded.

To give perspective to just how high the volatility index climbed, think back to the chaos that followed September 11, 2001. That point, volatility “spiked” to 33. These days, as the index reports a number in the 30 range, the markets seems subdued. This is definitely not the case, which means investors can continue to profit from volatility.

When taking a run at profiting from the markets, individual investors will only succeed when they are able to distance themselves from the emotion of investing. This is extremely difficult to do, however, and is why so many investors are gun shy and keeping their money invested in safer instruments. It’s not difficult to understand; we all work hard for our money and to see it erode in a market where we receive no tangible benefits is terribly difficult. Trading software that tells us when to buy and sell can eliminate this emotion as the software, like an investment manager, does not care that we invested blood and tears into our investments.

Secondly, the investor should have a good understanding of volatility. Reviewing the charts at Yahoo! Finance by typing “^VIX” in the quote box is a good start. Another essential is to understand the definition of volatility, which is simply “rate of change of the deviation from the mean.” The higher the volatility, the more quickly will stray from its mean.

The last thing an investor needs to do is tame the beast known as greed. This is a difficult thing to do since short term returns give us a taste of just how much we might make if we stay invested just a little longer for just a little more money. By using trading software, investors are better able to remove the emotion since the software will study concrete factors like volatility, moving averages, momentum, and so on whereas investors study the profit and potential for more.

While trading systems allow investors to remove the emotional side of investing, they are not absolutely required provided that the investors can control their greed. By eliminating emotion, investors can take advantage of the profit opportunities that volatility offers.

Chris has more than 16 years of financial services experience. He was instrumental in providing the Top Fund Pick of 2010 for the MutualFundSite.org, which was a High Yield Investment. He is bullish on some Bond Funds and cautious on others.