Lesson 4 of 11 · 12 min
Placing, managing and closing a trade
A fixed routine for the mechanics of a trade, from sizing and the ticket to the only adjustments your plan allows and the journal entry at the end.
By the end you'll be able to
- Size a trade from your risk and stop, then build a ticket with the stop and target attached before you click
- Choose between a market and a pending order and run the five pre-click checks on the ticket
- Manage and close an open trade using only the actions your plan allows, then journal it straight away
Free course
Enrol in “From Demo to Live: Your First 90 Days” to start this lesson
Enrolling is free. Your progress, quiz scores and certificate are kept in your account, on every device.
- 11 short lessons with quizzes and interactive tools
- Lesson videos for members
- A certificate when you finish
Your pre-trade checklist says yes, the setup is there, and the price is moving. This is where new traders improvise. This lesson turns the click into a routine you repeat every time.
Market or pending order
Fills immediately at the current ask (buying) or bid (selling). You get speed; you accept whatever the price is right now.
Current price is 1.0850. Tap each order type to see where it sits and when it fills. Stop loss and take profit ride along with whichever entry you choose.
A market order fills now: a buy at the ask, a sell at the bid. A pending order waits for a price you choose. A limit order fills at your price or better, or not at all. A stop order fills once price trades through your level, at the next available price.
Decide which in your plan, not at the screen. “Sell the retest of 1.2730” is a sell limit you set and leave. “Sell when a candle closes below support” is a market order after the close. See the order types lesson for detail.
The placing routine
Run these six steps in this order, every trade:
- Size first. Work out your position size from your risk per trade and stop distance (position sizing). Round down.
- Build the ticket with the stop and target attached. Type the stop loss and take profit into the ticket before you place it.
- Pick the order type your plan names: market or pending.
- Run the five pre-click checks (below), then place the order.
- Confirm the fill. In the positions tab, check the entry price and that the stop and target show real prices, not blanks.
- Set an alert and leave. Add a price alert at +1R (one stop-distance in profit), then close the platform.
The five pre-click checks, read off the ticket itself:
- Pair: the one you planned, not the last one you viewed.
- Side: buy or sell, as planned.
- Volume: the lot size you just calculated.
- SL: on the correct side, at the planned price.
- TP: on the other side, as planned.
Ten seconds. It catches the 1.00 lot typed instead of 0.10.
Confirm the fill
Illustrative. Market and stop orders fill at the next available price, which in fast markets can be several pips away. Limit orders fill at your price or better, or not at all.
Market and stop orders can suffer slippage, most of all around news, so your fill may differ from the price you saw. Note any slippage in your journal. If the stop column is empty, set the stop at once or close the trade.
Managing: only what the plan allows
Once the trade is live, you do almost nothing. Your trading plan lists the only actions allowed, for example:
- At +1R: move the stop to entry, a break-even stop. A reversal now costs roughly nothing.
- At 2R (if your target is further out): close half and leave the rest to the target.
- Never: widen the stop, remove the target to “let it run”, or add to a losing position.
If an action is not on the list, you do not take it. The alert tells you when a move is due, so you need not watch every tick.
Closing and recording
A trade ends in one of three ways: the stop, the target, or a planned time exit, such as “close anything still open at 16:00 UK time on Friday”. Anything else is a broken rule.
Record it in your trading journal within the hour: entry, exit, result in R, and whether every rule was followed.
Try it
Practice ticket with the worked example's quote. Change the volume to 0.16, then try deleting the stop or moving it below the entry. Illustrative prices; nothing is sent anywhere.
Set the volume to 0.16 and check the risk reads $48 (0.96%). Then try 0.40 lots, clear the stop, or set it to 1.26800.
Notice how the ticket refuses an order with no stop, a stop on the wrong side or more than 2% at risk: on a real platform, your pre-click checks do that job.
Quick check
Quick check
Question 1 of 4
Which order is right for placing a trade?
Question 2 of 4
$5,000 account, 1% risk, GBP/USD stop of 30 pips. What volume goes on the ticket?
Question 3 of 4
Your sell is at −0.8R and price is climbing towards the stop. Your plan allows only a break-even move at +1R. What do you do?
Question 4 of 4
After placing a trade, the positions tab shows your entry but the SL column is blank. What now?
Go deeper: Forex order types explained: market, limit and stop · Position sizing in forex: how to calculate your lot size · Trailing stop loss: how it works and when to use it