Stocks Long and Short and Charts

In trading, there are two types of trades, these are:

• Long (buy) - long is if the trend is buy/bullish.
• Short (sell) - short is if the trend is sell/bearish.

Buying/Long and Selling/short in Stocks

Both terms in Stocks, refer to things we do when open a trade.

Buying Long - stocks term to use when buying and when opening a trade.

Selling short - stocks term to use when selling and when opening a trade.

Long - Long is another term used to refer to buying in stocks, If a trader opens long it means that he buys the instrument that is heading in an upward trend direction. When the price is moving in an upward trend the trend is referred to as bullish trend.

Short - Short is a term used to refer to selling of a instrument that is going in a downward trend direction. When the price is going downwards then it is referred to as a bearish trend.

Basically the term, "selling short" can be refer to selling in the markets. Selling short is used to transact a instrument that is predicted to depreciate in value compared to another, when this instrument is sold then it is the same as not holding value in this stock and holding the same value in another form against which this instrument is traded against - mostly US Dollars.

Buy/Long

If the price is going up we buy, this is referred to as going long - Therefore long is just another name for buy. When the market trend is going up it is referred to as bullish, this is when a buy trade is placed. A bullish trend is identified by drawing an upward trendline on a chart. The example shown & described below displays a long/buy trade signal.

Buy/Long

Sell/Short

If the price pair is heading down we sell, this is referred to as going short. When the market trend is going down it is referred to as a bearish. The example shown & described below displays a downward trend, this is when a short sell is placed. The short/sell is identified by drawing a down ward trendline on a chart. The example shown & described below displays a short/sell trade signal.

Sell/Short - Stocks Buy Trade and Sell Trade

Charts

A trading chart provides a visual representation of prices (drawn on the y-axis) against time (drawn on the x-axis) for stocks. The movement of prices is plotted on these charts. The chart can be drawn as candlestick charts like the one below or as line charts or bar charts.

Stock Chart - Candles Charts

The three common types of charts used in stock trading are:

• Candles Charts
• Line Charts
• Bar Charts

These 3 are explained in the topic Stock Chart Types.

Stock Platform

This is the software that's provided by a broker to help traders place their transactions. Once you download and installs this software on your computer you can then begin to trade in the market. All trades are executed through this platform. If you want to learn a platform, MT4 Software is a good platform to begin with.

To set these orders, open MT4 Platform, open a 'chart', right click on 'chart', select 'New Order' and then select the order either sell or buy as shown below. (Keyboard Short Cut Keys - Press F9 Key)

Setting Buy Long Order and Sell Short Order in Meta Trader 4