DollarSaenz

Getting Paid? With the USD/TRY Carry Trade?

Education
FX:USDTRY   U.S. Dollar / Turkish Lira
The USD/TRY has one of the highest Roll Over Interest out there should you choose to take on this highly volatile pair. It isn't so much that it is volatile, it has to do more with price just moves one direction, and that is up. The way we want to go is down (short) or at least sideways (ranging). Why is this interesting? It is because the Rollover Interest for going short stands at a whopping annualized rate of 28.94%. With 1:4 Margin Requirement for trading a standard lot on the TRY (based off the broker I use), $25,000 could earn me $28,940 yearly, which would be a staggering 115% return at the end of the year. Compounded, I would be a multimillionaire in no time, Buying up yachts, private jets, gourmet food, luxury cars, a pony that shoots lasers, Space X Starship, and countless other items.

But hold up, is there a downside or something that makes this too good to be true? Yes, there is price movement as well as changes in interest rates as well as capital in the account. Having only $25,000 in the account, going full throttle and placing one huge position is sure to activate a margin call within seconds (as price can move thousands of pips against you quickly) and/or cause you to lose more than you put in. Now, we don't want that. You would need to have at least double the amount in the account in order to allow for price movement. The return would be halved, but making over 50% yearly isn't too bad either, is it? With price movement, the USD/TRY (I just call it the TRY), price moved higher over 57,000 pips in 2022, and over 100,000 pips in 2023; that is $18,240 and $32,000 respectively. Interest have just reached 45%, so things definitely would not have been good. Now, with funds in your account, not to many of us have $25,000 lying around to utilize in the markets, nor do we want to just tie up $25,000 into something really risky.

Yet if used correctly and price does stabilize, then the TRY carry trade could payout (similar to the EUR/HUF). What could be done to reduce the risk? For starters, position sizing. Don't use the full force of your account and go "YOLO." Manage expectations. With a $25,000 account size, only getting into a position at around $3,750 (which is about 15% of the account used and a 15k position), would be around $3,650 return, which would be about a 14.6% return (still not bad. How many people can do this). If things go sour and price does move up at the end the year by 100,000 pips against you ($0.05 move per pip), that would be -$5,000 reduced to $1,350 because of the gained rollover interest (which would be only a 5% hit to your account instead of 20%). Putting some hedges in could also reduce some of the risk. Additionally, research and analysis, this could push you to make a more informative speculation on if getting into the pair is a good idea. Furthermore, to really ensure you don't lose any money, is to not get into the pair at all.

For myself, I am utilizing around 41% of my Forex account in this pair, about 14% of my overall accounts. There are hedges in place to reduce the impact of price moving against me as well as my position being small enough to not cause any traumatic moves, even if price moves 100,000 pips against me (of course don't want that to happen). The decision is also made to stay in this pair for the long term or until there is some major changes. There is additional funds in reserves if needed, if things don't go well, in order to put another plan into play to get out of my positions in an orderly fashion.

You all have some great trading out there.

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