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This interview features Mark Fraser of Bond Outlooks on the Words of Rizdom trading podcast, hosted by Riz. Fraser’s a fundamentals-first trader who explains how institutions actually frame markets—why price moves, what the big desks look at, and how to pair that thinking with clean technical execution. If you’ve ever wondered what “trade like the banks” really means, this is the most practical breakdown you’ll hear from a working pro who coaches traders and builds research for real-world decision making.
You’ll learn a concrete, beginner-friendly framework for turning macro data into trades: HSBC’s five-rule model (carry, monetary policy trajectory, a simple moving-average confirmation, 60-day relative value, and REER valuation), how CPI/PPI/wage growth/PMIs shift currency direction, and why “fundamentals set direction while technicals time risk.” Fraser also shows how to size stops with volatility (think ATR), avoid getting chopped around news, and build patience to hold swings for multi-hundred-pip moves. If you want a repeatable way to think like a pro—without drowning in jargon—this conversation gives you the playbook.
Mark Fraser Playbook & Strategy: How He Actually Trades
The Core Philosophy: Fundamentals Set Direction, Technicals Set Timing
Fraser treats fundamentals as the engine and technicals as the steering wheel. You use macro and policy to pick the currency’s path, then let simple price tools decide when to hit the gas. This section lays out the directional checklist he runs before a single chart line matters.
- Define the policy spread: is your target currency’s central bank on a tighter/looser path than its pair? If hiking > counterpart, bias long; if easing < counterpart, bias short.
- Track inflation momentum (CPI/PPI/wages) month-over-month; two consecutive upside surprises vs. consensus = directional tailwind; two downside surprises = headwind.
- Note growth pulse via PMIs: >50 and rising for two months favors longs; <50 and falling favors shorts.
- Score carry: positive short-rate differential ≥ +75 bps adds conviction to longs; ≤ −75 bps adds conviction to shorts.
- Only trade with the macro: if three of the four items above align, you have a directional bias; if not, stay flat.
Trend Filter: Keep It Simple and Mechanical
He avoids indicator soup. A single moving average keeps you on the right side of the tape and kills the urge to “guess tops.” This section explains a dead-simple filter to stop fighting trends.
- Use a 50-day SMA on the daily chart as the primary filter.
- Longs only if price closes above the 50-SMA for 3 consecutive sessions; shorts only if below for 3 consecutive sessions.
- If price chops ±0.75×ATR around the SMA for 5+ days, stand aside until a clean break and hold.
- Weekly confirmation: the 10-week SMA must agree with the daily filter; if not, reduce risk by half.
Relative Value & Valuation: Buy the Strong, Short the Weak
Fraser pairs currencies by ranking strength, not by gut feel. The idea is to be long the strongest macro/trend combo and short the weakest. Here’s how to build that quick-and-dirty league table.
- Create a 60-day relative strength score: % change of each currency vs. a trade-weighted basket; go long top-2, short bottom-2.
- Add a valuation sanity check: avoid fresh longs if your currency rallied >+8% in 60 days unless macro is “4/4” strong; avoid fresh shorts if it fell <−8% unless macro is “4/4” weak.
- Prefer pairs where policy spread + trend + relative strength all point the same direction; pass on mixed signals.
- Re-rank every Friday close and keep positions aligned with the new table the following Monday.
News & Event Playbook: Don’t Get Run Over
He treats major releases like road crossings—look both ways or don’t step off the curb. This section shows when to hold, fold, or press around data.
- No fresh entries within 60 minutes pre-event for Tier-1 (rates, CPI, NFP, PMIs, central bank).
- If already in, halve position size or trail stops to breakeven 15–30 minutes pre-event.
- Only add post-event if the first 30-minute candle closes with direction matching your macro bias and range < 1.5×ATR(14).
- If a release flips a macro pillar (e.g., CPI surprises hard), re-score bias immediately; exit if the score drops below 3/4.
Entries: Clean Triggers, No Heroics
Fraser’s entries are boring by design—high-probability, low-stress. Here’s how he pulls the trigger once the macro and trend boxes are checked.
- Timeframe: 4H chart for entries, Daily for bias, Weekly for context.
- Long setup: pullback to 20-EMA (4H) while daily is above 50-SMA; enter on a bullish 4H close that engulfs the prior candle’s body.
- Short setup: rally to 20-EMA (4H) while daily is below 50-SMA; enter on a bearish 4H close that engulfs the prior candle’s body.
- If price is extended >1.5×ATR(14) from the 20-EMA, skip—wait for a mean-revert tag first.
- Maximum two attempts per idea; if both fail, the pair is benched for 48 hours.
Risk & Sizing: Volatility Pays the Bills (and Sets the Stop)
He sizes by volatility, so a wild pair doesn’t blow up the day. This section gives you the exact math to standardize risk.
- Risk 0.5%–0.8% of equity per trade; total open risk max 2% across all pairs.
- Initial stop = entry ± 1.25×ATR(14, 4H) beyond the signal candle.
- Position size (lots) = (Account Equity × Risk%) / (Stop in pips × Pip Value).
- First scale-out at +1×ATR; move stop to breakeven; second scale-out at +2×ATR; let a final runner trail on a 4H swing-low/high.
- If daily closes against the trend filter (e.g., long and price closes < 50-SMA), exit the remainder at the next 4H close.
Trade Management: Let Winners Breathe, Kill Losers Fast
The goal is to compound clean trends, not to babysit noise. These rules keep emotions out and structure in.
- After BE, trail a Chandelier-style stop: stop = highest close since entry − 2×ATR(14, 4H) for longs (inverse for shorts).
- Add only on fresh pullbacks to 20-EMA (4H) that produce a second engulfing close; cap at two adds per original risk unit.
- If three consecutive lower highs (for longs) or higher lows (for shorts) form on 4H, take 50% off and tighten trail to 1.5×ATR.
- Never widen stops; if volatility spikes above 2× its 20-day median, reduce exposure by 30% across positions.
Weekly Process: Prep Like a Pro
Fraser’s edge compounds in the preparation, not the click. This section outlines the weekend routine that sets the week’s trades on rails.
- Saturday: update macro scorecards (policy path, inflation, PMIs, carry); assign each currency a 0–4 score.
- Sunday: build a watchlist of 4–6 pairs where macro score ≥3 and trend filter aligns; set alerts at 20-EMA and prior swing levels.
- Pre-mark invalidation zones (where a macro pillar would flip) and event windows for the coming week.
- Plan maximum number of trades = 6 and maximum correlated exposure (e.g., USD-heavy) = 1.5×a single position’s risk.
Execution Checklist: Same Steps, Every Trade
Consistency is the strategy. This checklist makes sure you don’t skip the basics when the market gets loud.
- Bias confirmed (macro score ≥3/4)
- Trend filter aligned (daily 50-SMA and weekly 10-SMA agree)
- No Tier-1 event within 60 minutes
- Entry pattern present (4H engulf at 20-EMA)
- Stop = 1.25×ATR; size = risk formula; targets mapped (1×ATR, 2×ATR, runner)
- Correlation and total risk within limits; alerts set; journal pre-filled with hypothesis
Journal Metrics: Track What Actually Moves P&L
Fraser focuses on a handful of stats to refine signal quality, not pages of diary prose. These bullets tell you what to measure so the system improves automatically.
- Set up win rate and expectancy by pair and by macro score (3 vs. 4).
- R multiple distribution (mean, median, max adverse excursion) to refine stop/target ratios.
- Event proximity vs. outcomes (entries taken within 24h of data) to calibrate your news buffer.
- Trend integrity (days above/below 50-SMA during hold) vs. result to validate the filter.
- Slippage by session (Asia/London/NY) to decide when your entries deserve limit vs. market orders.
Size Risk First: Volatility-Adjusted Positions Before Any Trade Idea
Mark Fraser opens by making sizing the first decision, not the last. Before he even thinks “long or short,” he measures how wild the pair is and caps exposure accordingly. He frames it as buying risk, not assets—your job is to purchase a controlled amount of uncertainty at a fair price. If the volatility is elevated, the position shrinks; if it’s calm, size can breathe—but never beyond the predefined risk cap.
Fraser’s go-to is a simple volatility yardstick like ATR to place the stop and back-solve position size so each trade risks a fixed slice of equity. That keeps losers uniform, which is the only way winners can compound cleanly. He also ties size to event risk: ahead of Tier-1 data, he halves size or waits, because volatility expansion can turn a good idea into bad math. The takeaway is blunt: if your sizing flexes with volatility the way Mark Fraser’s does, edge survives even when your read on direction doesn’t.
Trade the Mechanics, Not Predictions: Let Process Drive Entries
Mark Fraser argues that prediction is a trap; mechanics are the edge. Instead of forecasting where EURUSD “should” go, he defines a repeatable trigger and waits for it—no narrative required. His workflow: macro sets the bias, but an entry only fires on a specific price behavior like a 4H pullback to the 20-EMA and a confirmed engulfing close. By forcing entries through this checklist, Fraser removes the wiggle room where fear and FOMO usually live.
Fraser also insists on full-bar confirmation and never front-runs signals, even when the story feels obvious. He rejects mid-news improvisation: if Tier-1 data is inside the next hour, the setup is invalid until after the first post-release candle closes. Orders are sized and staged before the trigger, so execution is push-button, not emotional. The result, as Mark Fraser puts it, is simple: let the rules trade, and your opinions stop costing you money.
Diversify by Underlying, Strategy, and Duration to Smooth Equity Curve
Mark Fraser stresses that diversification isn’t owning “more things,” it’s owning different return engines that don’t puke at the same time. He spreads risk across uncorrelated underlyings (e.g., USD vs. commodity FX), mixes strategy types (trend-follow, mean-revert, carry), and staggers holding periods so not every position lives or dies on the same timeframe. The goal is a portfolio where one idea’s drawdown is another idea’s paycheck.
Fraser also caps correlation by design—if two pairs move off the same USD impulse, he treats them as a single risk unit. He keeps winners in different “time buckets,” letting a swing trade run while a shorter mean-reversion nibble recycles risk. When volatility regimes shift, he rotates exposure rather than forcing old setups to work. The message from Mark Fraser is clear: diversify what you trade, how you trade it, and how long you hold it, and your equity curve will stop behaving like a roller coaster.
Define Your Risk: Prefer Capped Exposure Over Undefined Tail Hazards
Mark Fraser draws a hard line between defined and undefined risk, and he refuses to cross it. If a trade can theoretically blow past your stop due to slippage or no stop exists at all, he bins it as a tail hazard. He avoids averaging down, grid schemes, and anything that grows in size as the price moves against him. Instead, Fraser sizes to a fixed loss in currency terms and places the stop where the idea is wrong, not where the pain begins.
He also treats known event risk as a boundary, not a dare—capping size or stepping aside when spreads can gap. Selling naked optionality or running martingale tactics are off the table; hedged structures, hard stops, and volatility-aware position sizes are in. Fraser’s test is simple: if you can state your maximum loss before entry and it survives a bad fill, it’s defined risk; if not, it’s gambling. That mindset, Mark Fraser says, is how you stay solvent long enough for the edge to matter.
Write the Rules, Follow Them: Checklist Discipline Beats Impulse
Mark Fraser treats his playbook like a preflight ritual—no checklist, no takeoff. Before clicking buy or sell, he confirms bias, trend filter, event window, entry pattern, stop math, and correlation exposure in that order. If any item fails, the trade is shelved, not “massaged” into existence.
Fraser also journals the same way he trades—structured and repeatable. Each filled order gets a hypothesis, an invalidation point, and planned management steps so he can score execution, not just outcomes. He audits himself weekly: which rules he broke, why he broke them, and how to remove that choice next time. As Mark Fraser puts it, discipline isn’t willpower; it’s building a process that makes the right action the easiest one to take.
In the end, Mark Fraser’s edge is disarmingly simple: let fundamentals set direction, then let mechanics control the risk. He hammers patience—“it’s a marathon, not a sprint”—and insists you understand why price moves so losses make sense and wins can compound. He minimizes event landmines by either standing aside or cutting size into Tier-1 releases, and he sizes positions to volatility so a wild pair can’t blow up a calm risk plan. That’s why his stops flex with ATR and why EUR/GBP doesn’t get the same leash as gold—context dictates distance, math dictates size.
From there, it’s disciplined execution: swing the move, not the minute, accept wider but defined stops, and aim for outsized targets when the macro backs the trend. He talks in hundreds of pips for winners because the thesis is multi-day to multi-week, and partials keep the account steady while the core rides. Combine that with a clean checklist—bias, event window, trigger, ATR stop, correlation—and you’ve got a process that survives bad headlines and broker quirks alike. The takeaway is clear: if you anchor bias in fundamentals, price your risk with volatility, and stay ruthlessly mechanical around entries and events, the equity curve starts to look like a business, not a roller coaster.
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