Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

I've been away from this blog too long. Domestic matters have taken precedent and I apologise for not communicating my situation. In the meantime, BTC has rallied to USD 1,200 and crashed towards USD 400. But it's still there. It seems that this cryptocurrency is indestructible. Even throwing a Karpeles sized spanner in the works at MtGox has failed to deter the development and innovation in the burgeoning Bitcoin ecosystem. Almost every day, there's a new service, another ATM being located in a city and, especially interesting, another way to trade Bitcoin.

Given that BTC exchanges have a nasty habit of blowing up, I have chosen to trade the cryptocurrency via CFDs. Initially, I used Plus500: it was a simple procedure to open the account and just as easy to trade from my PC or mobile device. When I funded the account, I got a 100% trading bonus which enabled me to halve the risk to my capital. Which was very nice. But as margin rates jumped with the exponentially rising BTC price, that advantage was soon eroded and my account has languished since Dec 2013. However the BTC CFD is a daily contract and if you want to simulate a long or short only position in BTC, I have found there can be large slippage as one day's contract expires and you then wait for the next day's contract to go live.


So I looked at these guys - Avatrade. Good news is they have improved their account opening process, you get a demo account with which you can get prices and charts they do have decent customer service and they will call you to answer your queries. Additionally, you get a 21 day demo account to practise your strategy before going live. They have longer Bitcoin (BTC) and Litecoin (LTC) CFD's contracts available - in this case, weekly - and mini contracts in both currencies.

The advantage of the weekly CFD with this firm is that:

• Avatrade use the MT4 trading platform which has tons of resources, EA's and forums
• you avoid losses due to slippage as one daily contract expires and another is opened;
• you cross the spread fewer times when you trade weekly vs daily which reduces your trading costs and
• you can 'set and forget' trades without the hassle of daily expiry.

Currently they are offerring attractive trading bonus which help to reduce risk to your trading capital.

But if you're not the cautious type, at current BTC levels, that bonus is a gift to aggressive traders wanting to take larger position sizes and boost their returns.

I shall resume my signals shortly and in the meantime, enjoy the soggy Bank Holiday!