When it comes to improving your Forex game, inspiration can come from many different sources. While many traders focus exclusively on the trading screens in a bid to improve their trading ability, sometimes the big screen can offer helpful inspiration too. There are of course many obvious trading films which might be running through your mind now but, sometimes you need to look further afield. One film that has some particularly relevant lessons is Jumanji. Read on to find out what Jumanji can teach you about Forex trading.

Know Your Weaknesses

Everyone has a weakness, both in life and in their professional and personal pursuits. In Jumanji, Moose Finbar’s weakness is cake and when he spots a delicious cake in the market place, he can’t fight the urge to take a bite but then explodes and loses a life.

In Forex trading it is incredibly important to identify your weaknesses and establish ways to protect yourself from letting them bring you down. For example if you suffer from over-trading, try to limit your time spent in-front of the screens outside designated times for identifying setups and setting trades. If you find yourself prone to chasing momentum and trading emotionally, consider not trading around news spikes to avoid getting suckered by volatile markets.

Know That You Are in A Jungle

In Jumanji, the characters have to quickly adapt to the fact that they are in a jungle and as such, need to modify their behaviour. The jungle is a dangerous and volatile place where the environment is constantly changing and posing different challenges and risks.

Forex traders need to develop the proper mindset when they sit down at the screens. The market is just as volatile and dangerous as the jungle and traders need to have their wits about them. One way to help protect yourself against the dangers of the Forex jungle is to develop a solid trading plan and write down the rules of your strategy to use as a guide to help you stick to your strategy when things get wild and avoid trading emotionally.

Find a Teacher

One lesson that stands out immediately in Jumanji is the importance of finding a teacher. When the characters need to infiltrate a vehicle depot guarded by two men they come up with the idea of using one of the females in the gang to go and flirt with the guards to distract them. Martha, as the most attractive of the girls, was chosen to go and flirt. However, Martha had never flirted with a by before and didn’t know what to do so Bethany, who had experience in this area, gave Martha a training sessions and taught her everything she needed to know.

Many new Forex traders dream of conquering the Forex market on their own by learning how to trade themselves and developing their own strategy. However, most find that it really is not this simple and waste a lot of time learning useless information and jumping from strategy to strategy. The most effective way to learn how to trade forex is to find a mentor to tutor you. If you can learn from someone who has already achieved success in trading you will find it much.

The Importance of Resilience

Another key lesson that sticks out in Jumanji is that accidents will happen but you can recover from them. While on a helicopter ride, Fridge leans out of the side to be sick but as he does so his backpack opens and the jewel he was carrying falls out. While it seems like all hope is lost, the team simply fly back to the area and they eventually recover the jewel.

One of the hardest parts of trading is learning to cope with losses. New traders often struggle with the inevitable losses that occur during trading and drawdowns can be particularly difficult to endure. However, any professional trader will tell you that losses are simply part of the game and you need to learn to embrace losses as part of the process. Provided your strategy has positive risk:reward, losses will not stop you from achieving success.

There have been many great traders and strategists in the history of forex trading, who have compelled the world to sit down and watch in awe, as they became billionaires and changed the course of the markets. When we talk about these traders, there is one name that will always take the top position. That man is George Soros, also called “the man who broke the Bank of England.”

George Soros achieved iconic status in September 1992, when he earned $10 billion on a single bet against the British Pound Sterling. He reportedly profited more than £1 billion from his short position in the pound sterling, ahead of Black Wednesday, September 16, 1992.

Early Life

As a teenager, George Soros fled his native country of Hungary to arrive in the UK, where he attended the London School of Economics. He went on to work in an investment bank in London, and later went to the US in 1956. There, he worked in companies like FM Mayer, Wertheim & Co and many others. In 1973, he founded his own hedge fund, Soros Fund Management, which eventually became the Quantum Fund.

By the 1980s, George Soros was one of the richest people on the planet. This was when he started concentrating on philanthropic activities. As a person, he is a strong advocate of human rights, education and political freedom. He has spoken and written extensively on these matters.

Creating History – The 1992 Pound Short

Britain was a part of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM), which required the government to intervene if the British pound weakened beyond a certain level against the Deutsche Mark. Soros knew that the UK was in an unfavourable position under the ERM and that the inflation rate also was very high.

For months leading up to September 1992, Soros had been building a short position in the pound sterling. By September 16, 1992, his fund had sold short more than $10 billion worth of pounds. The UK government’s reluctance to increase its interest rate or to float its currency worked in Soros’ favour. On the morning of Black Wednesday, when the Bank of England began buying billions of pounds from the market, they found the price had moved. Taking the cue from Soros, speculators had also started selling in the market.

The UK announced its exit from the ERM and started the free-floating of the pound sterling. The currency plunged 15% against the Deutsche Mark, and 25% against the US dollar, but Quantum Fund made over $1 billion. Thus, Soros became “the man who broke the BOE.”

The Soros Technique

His investment strategy was always a combination of free markets, human rights and scientific enquiry. Highlights of his strategy are:

• The Scientific Method:George Soros creates a strategy based on current market data. He tests his theory on smaller investments first and then on larger ones, when the smaller ones succeed.
• Reflexivity Theory:This method values assets based on market feedback, to understand how the rest of the market is valuing the assets. Soros uses this method to predict opportunities and market bubbles.

Soros has an ability to combine global and economic trends with detailed leveraged forex strategies in both currencies and bonds. He has always trusted his gut and has been on a constant lookout for ways to stand out amongst the crowd.