Trader's Time Frame

I am a full time Forex trader and have been conducting workshops at Singapore Management University (SMU) and at Traders Round Trable (TRT).

During the workshops, one of the frequently asked questions is about trader's time frame.  Or rather, when the question is popped, it is normally "What time frame are you trading?"

I did not find it easy to answer as most people would already have a fixated mind that a trader should have a specific time frame, which I cannot fault them.  My experiences taught me something different.

Commonly, we do need a specific time frame for our planning, but we need to go to both higher and lower time frames to look for information to support our planning (Multiple Time Frame Analysis).  And when comes to execution, usually we would go to lower time frames simply for the reason that we need more detail information from the market and always need to reconcile back before the final decision.

The conclusion is that you would need the various time frame for different purposes.

In any case, knowing how to use the time frames are basic skill sets of a trader and this is just part of the foundation.  It would not be the key to turn your trading profitable, but it is an important and mandatory skill to acquire.  And this usually takes hundreds of hours to train.