Author Bio

He’s been blackballed, reinstated, banned again, and neglected. For Asaf, Currensee co-founder and vigilante of Forex, it’s just another day at the Forex playground when he’s called out or held under suspicion for our social network. Questions like: What’s in it for us? How do we make money? How is this safe? All valid questions we hear often from both new members and intrigued traders.

Asaf’s trademark take-it-or-leave-it style can be seen in forums and online social spaces across the Forex scene. And in case you missed it, he recently fought the good fight for 50 straight days on Forex Factory. Fifty days – now that deserves a cupcake!

The attacks on Currensee Towers got childish (and repetitive) at times, but the skeptics did bring up some worthwhile questions. As with any new venture, we have been asked questions about security, privacy, and our ulterior motives. So for you naysayers, here is a summarized version of that now infamous (around here anyway) Factory conversation. Think of it as a FAQ of sorts.

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Huey: Why does Currensee ask for my broker username and password? It’s just a matter of time before someone hacks into it and wipes out my account!

Dewey: Yeah, Huey!

Louie: Plus, this is probably against your broker’s rules, so if the pip hits the fan, the trader is responsible.

Asaf: There’s no smoke and mirrors here. All the brokers we support are fully aware that we ask for credentials, and they recognize how Currensee increases trader profitability and sustainability. We are regulated by the NFA, the same body that regulates your precious broker. We are held to the same security and privacy standards, audits and all.

The point of Currensee is to “put your money where your mouth is” and provide a link between the information and “insights” you offer with your real trading account. Without it we’d just be another forum, and really, what good is your hypothetical advice when there’s real money on the line?

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Louie: Demo accounts are a legit form of teaching and sharing ideas about Forex. I’d take a demo chart from a profitable/experienced trader over a real chart from an inexperienced trader any day.

Asaf: (cracks knuckles) Ok, now we’re talking. Put simply, demo trading and bragging about trading successful in demo is meaningless and misleading. Demo accounts do not represent reality – not for the trader or the broker. A good 90% of your trading is a psychology/money management combo, which is not represented in a demo account. Any worthwhile investment analyst or blogger will tell you that a trader worth his/her salt won’t hide behind a demo account. Call it a harsh position, but we stand by it because without it, we’d be no better than all the other Forex “services” out there. Next question.

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Louie: You are registered with the NFA as an introducing broker (IB), not a futures commissions merchant (FCM), which is not the same thing.

Dewey: Right on!

Asaf: So you know a thing or two about IBs. Well, then you must know being a regulated IB under the NFA is actually a very difficult task. After a grueling 6 month audit, we are fully regulated and are held to the same privacy and security standards as FCMs. Anyone regulated by the NFA must comply. Fun fact: there are less than 50 regulated Forex IBs in the US, so we pat ourselves on the back. This was no small feat.

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Louie: You’re just out to make a buck off me. I just know it.

Dewey: Word.

Asaf: Our community is made up mostly professional traders, money managers, and commodity trading advisors (CTAs). The community is entirely free, and no one is forced or mandated to trade under our IB. The social network is free and intended to help traders connect and collaborate.

None of our brokers we support pay Currensee commissions. No spreads either. No, really. Free social network really means free.

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Huey: If I want to follow someone else’s trading strategy, I’m going to a hedge fund, not Currensee.

Asaf: Well good. The point of Currensee is to collaborate, not blindly copy. Let me know how that hedge fund works out for you.

We don’t claim to make traders more profitable, but collaboration helps ease the burn. About 30% of our trades make money, which in an industry where 95% lose, that is just plain brag worthy.

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Huey: So Currensee is the wave of the future, huh? What makes it better than a forum?

Asaf: Forums offer valuable discussions to the online Forex community, but Currensee takes it one step further because you know who you’re talking to. You can see their trading performance before collaborating with them. If that’s too “real” for you, then stick to your anonymous forums.

We’re dedicated to bringing transparency to the entire Forex industry (all $4 trillion traded daily’s worth), so we encourage open dialogue on our Facebook page and on Twitter. Many of our Currensee members read and participate in forums, so we also spark discussions on outside forums like Forex Factory and Mataf.

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If you have any questions about Currensee (whether you’re a member or not), throw us a line. Your question or concern could be the next focus of Marcie’s weekly “How can I help” series. No question is too hard. Give us your best one.

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Be sure to read the full risk disclosure before trading Forex. Please note that Forex trading involves significant risk of loss. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before trading. Performance, strategies and charts shown are not necessarily predictive of any particular result. And, as always, past performance is no indication of future results.

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Be sure to read the full risk disclosure before trading Forex. Please note that Forex trading involves significant risk of loss. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before trading. Performance, strategies and charts shown are not necessarily predictive of any particular result. And, as always, past performance is no indication of future results. Investor returns may vary from Trade Leader returns based on slippage, fees, broker spreads, volatility or other market conditions.

Author Bio

There has been much discussion in forums lately suggesting that Currensee should support demo accounts and we certainly understand why people are asking for this.  Let me explain why we do not have any short-term plans to do this.

First off, we recognize the value of demo accounts as a valuable tool for learning, experimentation and for testing trading systems and new approaches.  However there is nothing like real trading.  When real money is on the line, what people may really be willing to do may be quite different.  This is one reason why I personally would never take seriously the performance of a trading system that has no real performance, just back-tested performance in a demo account.  You cannot assume that the leverage used or the distance on the stops would reflect the level of drawdown that the trader would be willing to take with his or her real money.

On the other hand we truly want to keep Currensee about real-time trade collaboration.  This is a guiding principle of our Forex Social Trading Network. And today the best way to ensure this is to make sure that our members have real trading accounts and the trades they are sharing are real trades.  This creates a very powerful social dynamic that cannot exist in traditional forums and chat rooms.  As a trader in Currensee when I make a suggestion to the community that there is an opportunity to go long on the GDP/JPY and I never make the trade then I lose social credibility in the community.  But when I do make that trade – whether I win or lose – my trading friends can rely on the fact that I truly believe with my wallet that this is a valid trading idea.  And when I close my position my trading friends can rely on the fact that I believe that my winnings are sufficient or I cannot tolerate any more loss.  Additionally, our social indicators are based on the actual real trading activity of the Currensee community.  These indicators are growing more interesting by the day as the community grows rapidly, and we want to ensure that our members know that the social indicators are based entirely on real trades.

So if you do have a demo account, we suggest you take your time to prepare yourself for real trading and when you are ready just open your real account and securely link it to Currensee.  Our network is ready to welcome you!

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Be sure to read the full risk disclosure before trading Forex.  Please note that Forex trading involves significant risk of loss. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before trading. Performance, strategies and charts shown are not necessarily predictive of any particular result. And, as always, past performance is no indication of future results.

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Be sure to read the full risk disclosure before trading Forex. Please note that Forex trading involves significant risk of loss. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before trading. Performance, strategies and charts shown are not necessarily predictive of any particular result. And, as always, past performance is no indication of future results. Investor returns may vary from Trade Leader returns based on slippage, fees, broker spreads, volatility or other market conditions.

Author Bio

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Be sure to read the full risk disclosure before trading Forex. Please note that Forex trading involves significant risk of loss. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before trading. Performance, strategies and charts shown are not necessarily predictive of any particular result. And, as always, past performance is no indication of future results. Investor returns may vary from Trade Leader returns based on slippage, fees, broker spreads, volatility or other market conditions.

Author Bio

We spend a lot of time here at Currensee explaining what we do to other people. Traders, analysts, bloggers, journalists – all somewhat normal people with a common interest in Forex. When we describe Currensee, we talk about being a Forex trading social network. When you say “social network,” it’s hard not to mention the usual suspects like Facebook and Twitter (there I go again). That’s why I find it fascinating that there aren’t any other Forex-specific social networks out there and, believe me, I’ve looked.

Perhaps they are masked as forums like Forex Factory and the many other gathering places for Forex traders to converse. Or maybe they are happening in slices of general-purpose social networks, like the StockTweets Forex stream or certain Forex Facebook pages. But, as an avid social networker, when I look at the forums and online chatrooms, I don’t see a social network. I see a place where people create avatars and usernames and talk at each other, for the most part. The challenge is that you often don’t really know who FXPrincess or N00b2Forex are, the conversation is often very one-way and it’s not helping me grow my network of real Forex people. This brings me back to my question.

If chat rooms, message boards, and forums appear to be relics of the early web, why hasn’t Forex evolved with the rise of social media and social networks? If you’re out there, Forex social networks, please raise your hands.

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Be sure to read the full risk disclosure before trading Forex.  Please note that Forex trading involves significant risk of loss. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before trading. Performance, strategies and charts shown are not necessarily predictive of any particular result. And, as always, past performance is no indication of future results.

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Be sure to read the full risk disclosure before trading Forex. Please note that Forex trading involves significant risk of loss. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before trading. Performance, strategies and charts shown are not necessarily predictive of any particular result. And, as always, past performance is no indication of future results. Investor returns may vary from Trade Leader returns based on slippage, fees, broker spreads, volatility or other market conditions.