Trading Around the Red Folder: How to Use the Economic Calendar to Plan Your Prop Trading Week

Trading Around the Red Folder: How to Use the Economic Calendar to Plan Your Prop Trading Week

Most prop firm traders think about news events reactively. Either they try to trade high-impact releases — reacting to the number as it hits the wire — or they avoid news entirely, closing positions before scheduled events and staying flat until things settle. Both approaches use the economic calendar as a warning system rather than a planning tool.

There's a better way to work with the calendar. The economic calendar isn't just a list of things to react to — it's the scaffolding you can use to organise your trading week. High-impact scheduled events tell you when volatility is coming, what markets it's likely to hit, and when the market conditions your strategy needs may or may not exist. Traders who use the calendar as a planning tool — rather than a reaction trigger — make better decisions across their entire week, not just during release moments.

This guide covers a planning framework for using the economic calendar effectively as a prop firm trader. We'll cover why planning-around-news matters differently than trading-during-news, how to categorise events by impact and market focus, how to structure your week around the calendar, and how to navigate the specific challenges that prop firm rules create around scheduled events.

One important editorial note upfront: many prop firms have specific rules about trading during news events — some restrict news trading heavily, others permit it with specific constraints. Always verify your specific firm's news trading policies before applying tactics based on this guide. Rules vary substantially across firms, and violating news trading rules can end evaluations or funded accounts regardless of the trade outcome.

For related context on where retail traders can compete against institutional participants during high-impact events, see our institutional speed advantages post.

TL;DR – The Framework

Using the economic calendar as a planning tool comes down to a five-part weekly framework:

1. Review the calendar before the week starts — identify high-impact events and their timing
2. Categorise events by expected market impact — not all "red folder" events matter equally to your strategy
3. Adjust your trading approach around scheduled events — pre-event positioning, during-event protocols, post-event opportunities
4. Respect your prop firm's news trading rules — understand what's permitted, restricted, or prohibited
5. Track outcomes and refine your framework — some events matter more to your specific strategy than others

The comprehensive framework below covers each element in depth. The goal isn't to become a news trader — it's to use the calendar to organise your trading approach across the whole week regardless of your strategy style.

Planning Around News vs Trading During News

Before diving into the framework, worth distinguishing between two different activities that get conflated in most trading content.

Trading During News

"Trading news" typically means executing during or immediately after a scheduled release — attempting to profit from the price movement the release causes. This includes:

• Placing orders in the seconds before a release, anticipating direction
• Reacting to the released number and executing quickly enough to catch the initial move
• Straddle strategies where you're positioned for volatility regardless of direction
• Fading initial moves that overshoot rational responses

The reality for retail prop firm traders: trading during news is structurally difficult. Institutional participants have systematic speed advantages (see our institutional-retail asymmetry analysis), execution slippage can be extreme during volatile releases, spreads widen substantially at CFD prop firms, and prop firm rules often restrict or prohibit news trading entirely.

For most retail prop firm traders, trading during news is not where their edge lives.

Planning Around News

"Planning around news" is different. It means using scheduled events as inputs to your broader trading process — knowing when volatility is coming so you can adjust position sizes, close positions before releases, avoid certain sessions, or identify longer-timeframe opportunities that develop after releases resolve.

Planning around news benefits every trader style:

• Scalpers and day traders — knowing when not to be in the market
• Swing traders — understanding weekly volatility patterns that affect multi-day positions
• Trend followers — recognising when trend-breaking events are scheduled
• News-driven strategies — identifying which events actually produce the moves worth trading (usually far fewer than the calendar suggests)

The economic calendar as a planning tool serves all these trader types. As a trading trigger, it primarily serves specialist news traders — a smaller and more sophisticated subset.

This guide focuses on planning around news, not trading during it.

Understanding the Calendar Structure

Before applying the framework, worth understanding how economic calendars organise information. Most reliable calendars use similar structural conventions.

Impact Ratings

Events are typically rated by expected market impact:

High-impact events (red folder) — events that reliably produce significant market movement. These include central bank rate decisions, employment reports, inflation data, and major geopolitical announcements. Red folder events warrant deliberate planning.

Medium-impact events (orange or yellow folder) — events that sometimes move markets meaningfully but often don't produce sustained direction. These include second-tier economic data, some regional data, and secondary announcements.

Low-impact events (green folder or unmarked) — events that occasionally cause brief movement but rarely sustained impact. Many economic releases fall here.

For weekly planning purposes, focus primarily on red folder events. Medium-impact events warrant awareness; low-impact events typically don't require adjustment to your plan.

Currency/Market Focus

Events are typically tagged by which currencies or markets they most directly affect:

• USD events — US employment data, Fed decisions, US GDP, US inflation
• EUR events — ECB decisions, Eurozone inflation, German data, French data
• GBP events — Bank of England decisions, UK employment, UK inflation
• JPY events — Bank of Japan decisions, Japan CPI
• Other currencies — CAD, AUD, NZD, CHF events all appear on the calendar
• Cross-market events — Some events (like FOMC) affect multiple currencies and equity/futures markets simultaneously

The practical implication: an EUR event when you're trading USDJPY may not directly affect your position, but a USD event when you're trading EURJPY absolutely will. Match calendar events to your specific instruments.

Timing Precision

Calendar entries typically include:

• Event name (e.g., "US Non-Farm Payrolls")
• Scheduled release time (specific to your local timezone)
• Consensus expectation (what economists project)
• Previous reading (last release value)
• Actual result (populated after release)

Consensus vs actual matters because markets typically react to the surprise element — how much the actual result differs from what was expected — rather than the raw number.

The Weekly Planning Framework

Here's the five-part framework for using the economic calendar to organise your trading week:

Step 1: Review the Calendar Before the Week Starts

Ideally on Sunday evening or Monday morning before market open, spend fifteen minutes reviewing the week's scheduled events. What you're looking for:

Red folder events for your instruments:

• Which high-impact events are scheduled?
• Which currencies/markets do they affect?
• What day and time do they release?

Multi-event days:

• Are there days with multiple red folder events?
• Are events clustered around certain sessions?

Central bank weeks:

• Is any major central bank meeting this week?
• Are there central bank speaker events beyond the meeting itself?

Correlation risks:

• Are events scheduled that could affect multiple instruments you trade?
• Are events likely to affect broader market sentiment (e.g., US CPI often affects everything)?

Most economic calendar sites let you filter by impact rating and currency — set your filters to reduce noise. You don't need to see every low-impact release; focus on what actually matters to your trading.

For calendar tools, most trader-focused sites and platforms provide economic calendar functionality. ForexFactory, Investing.com, and similar sources offer freely-available calendars. Many trading platforms (MetaTrader, cTrader, TradingView, Bloomberg terminals) integrate calendars directly. Choose the source you find easiest to work with — the underlying event data is largely the same across reputable providers.

Step 2: Categorise Events by Expected Impact on Your Strategy

Not all red folder events matter equally to your specific trading approach. This is where generic "news trading" content typically fails — it treats all high-impact events as equally significant.

Categorise events into three buckets:

Bucket 1: Direct impact events. These directly affect the instruments you trade. If you trade EURUSD, then ECB decisions, US employment, US inflation, and US Fed decisions are all direct-impact events. Plan explicitly around these.

Bucket 2: Indirect impact events. These affect correlated markets or broader sentiment. If you trade equity index futures, then major central bank decisions in Europe or Japan may affect risk sentiment even without directly moving your instruments. Awareness matters; explicit planning may not.

Bucket 3: Background events. These are on the calendar but don't meaningfully affect your specific trading. A New Zealand rate decision matters less to a US futures trader than to an AUDNZD trader. Note them; don't overweight them.

The point of categorisation: you can't plan meaningfully around every calendar event. Categorisation lets you focus attention where it matters to your specific approach.

Step 3: Structure Your Week Around Events

With events categorised, structure your trading week deliberately:

Pre-event positioning:

• How close to a red folder event will you continue trading? Some traders close all positions 30 minutes before red folder events. Others close 15 minutes before. Some hold through if positions are small enough relative to expected volatility. Define your own protocol.
• What position sizes will you allow ahead of scheduled events? Even if you don't close positions entirely, reducing size ahead of events reduces catastrophic risk.
• Which sessions before scheduled events warrant caution? Volatility often reduces in the sessions leading up to major events as market participants position more carefully.

During-event protocol:

• Are you flat during releases? For most prop firm traders, yes.
• Are stops adjusted for wider spreads? During releases, spreads widen substantially at CFD prop firms.
• Are you monitoring or stepping away? Trying to react to releases in real-time typically produces poor outcomes for retail traders — see our institutional-retail asymmetry analysis for the structural reality.

Post-event opportunities:

• After the initial reaction resolves, what setups appear? Post-event trading often produces cleaner opportunities than the release itself. The first 30-60 minutes after a release are typically noisy; the sessions that follow often provide more tradeable setups.
• Do releases create sustained directional moves you can trade? Some events produce initial reactions that reverse; others produce sustained moves that develop over days. Pattern recognition matters.
• How does your normal strategy work post-event? Sometimes releases confirm existing setups; sometimes they invalidate them. Adjust accordingly.

Session structure adjustments:

• NFP Fridays (US employment reports, first Friday most months) often warrant reduced trading activity or specific tactical adjustments — the entire day's volatility profile differs from typical Fridays.
• FOMC weeks (Fed decision weeks) often have pre-meeting caution and post-meeting adjustment periods.
• Central bank speaker events — Fed Chair or ECB President speaking events can produce volatility comparable to actual policy decisions.

Step 4: Respect Your Prop Firm's News Trading Rules

Prop firms have varying rules around news trading. Verify your specific firm's policies before applying tactics based on this guide.

Common rule patterns:

Full news trading permitted:

• Some prop firms permit news trading with no specific restrictions
• Traders can hold positions through releases
• Standard drawdown and daily loss limit rules apply normally

News trading restricted:

• Some firms prohibit opening positions in specific timeframes around scheduled events
• Some prohibit holding positions through releases
• Some require closing positions X minutes before red folder events

News trading heavily restricted:

• Some firms restrict positioning around any red folder event
• Some prohibit news trading during evaluation phase entirely
• Some allow news trading only on funded accounts

Verification protocol:

Before your first trading week at any prop firm:

1. Read the firm's specific news trading rules in their terms
2. Check which events they specifically flag (some firms have specific event lists)
3. Understand timing windows (how many minutes before/after)
4. Understand what "news trading" means at that specific firm (some define it broadly, others narrowly)
5. When in doubt, contact firm support directly

For traders operating multiple firms simultaneously, remember that different firms have different rules. What's permitted at one firm may violate rules at another. Multi-firm portfolios (see our multi-firm portfolio guide) require awareness of each firm's specific news trading framework.

Step 5: Track Outcomes and Refine Your Framework

The final step transforms the framework from generic guidance into personalised planning tool.

Track for a few weeks:

• Which events actually affected your positions?
• Which events produced no meaningful impact despite being red folder?
• Which post-event setups produced tradeable opportunities?
• Which sessions around events were consistently profitable or unprofitable?

Refine your categorisation:

• Some events on paper look high-impact but consistently don't move your specific instruments
• Some events look secondary but consistently move your markets meaningfully
• Your Bucket 1 (direct impact) list should reflect your actual experience, not just event category ratings

Refine your pre-event and post-event protocols:

• If closing positions 30 minutes before events consistently costs you profits that develop, adjust the timing
• If post-event setups in the first hour consistently underperform post-event setups 2-3 hours later, adjust when you re-engage
• If specific event types produce consistent post-event moves, incorporate them into your strategy explicitly

The framework improves through iteration. Traders who use the calendar mechanically without tracking outcomes get generic results. Traders who track and refine develop personalised frameworks that materially improve their performance.

For broader guidance on strategy development that incorporates event awareness, see our trading strategy framework guide.

Major Event Categories

An overview of the major event categories that appear on most economic calendars, and what typically matters about them:

Central Bank Decisions

Examples: Fed FOMC meetings, ECB rate decisions, Bank of England MPC decisions, Bank of Japan meetings, other major central bank meetings.

Why they matter: central bank policy decisions directly affect currency values, bond yields, equity markets, and broader risk sentiment. FOMC decisions in particular often produce multi-day sustained moves.

Planning approach: central bank days warrant explicit protocols — pre-decision positioning caution, during-decision flat protocols, post-decision analysis for tradeable follow-through.

Employment Reports

Examples: US Non-Farm Payrolls (first Friday most months), UK employment reports, Eurozone employment data.

Why they matter: employment reports affect central bank policy expectations, which feeds through to currencies, bonds, and equities. NFP specifically often produces sustained USD moves and equity market reactions.

Planning approach: NFP Fridays warrant specific attention — many traders reduce activity or apply specific NFP protocols. Understand your firm's rules around NFP specifically.

Inflation Data

Examples: US CPI, US PPI, Eurozone inflation, UK inflation, other national inflation releases.

Why they matter: inflation data affects central bank policy expectations. In current market conditions (verify current relevance at time of reading), inflation releases can produce substantial market moves.

Planning approach: major inflation releases warrant explicit awareness. Multi-day positioning may need adjustment ahead of releases.

GDP Data

Examples: US GDP releases, Eurozone GDP, UK GDP, quarterly national GDP releases.

Why they matter: GDP releases reflect economic health and affect broader sentiment and central bank expectations.

Planning approach: GDP releases matter for macro context but often produce shorter-lived market reactions than employment or inflation data.

Central Bank Speaker Events

Examples: Fed Chair speeches, FOMC member speeches, ECB President speeches, BoE Governor speeches.

Why they matter: central bank speakers often signal upcoming policy shifts, which markets react to substantially.

Planning approach: Fed Chair and ECB President speaking events warrant particular attention. Regional Fed member speeches vary in market impact based on the specific member and topic.

Geopolitical Events

Examples: major elections, geopolitical crisis moments, trade policy announcements, major diplomatic developments.

Why they matter: geopolitical events can produce substantial market moves, though they're often less predictable than economic releases.

Planning approach: stay aware of scheduled geopolitical events. Unscheduled geopolitical developments require reactive adjustment rather than planning.

Retail Data

Examples: US retail sales, Eurozone retail data.

Why they matter: retail data affects economic outlook and consumer strength assessment.

Planning approach: typically lower impact than employment or inflation but still warrants awareness.

For deeper analysis of any specific event category, dedicated economic analysis resources provide more detail than a prop firm-focused guide can appropriately cover.

Common Mistakes When Planning Around News

Several common mistakes reduce the effectiveness of calendar-based planning:

1. Treating all red folder events equally. Not every red folder event matters to your specific strategy. Categorisation by direct impact prevents overweighting events that don't affect your instruments.

2. Reviewing the calendar only during the week. Weekly planning happens before the week starts. Reviewing on Wednesday morning misses the opportunity to structure Monday and Tuesday sessions deliberately.

3. Ignoring correlation risk. A USD event affects EURUSD, GBPUSD, USDJPY, USDCHF, DXY, and US equity indices. Traders operating multiple correlated instruments need to plan around events that hit their entire portfolio.

4. Reactive rather than proactive planning. Waiting until an event is imminent to decide what to do produces worse decisions than planning the response ahead of time.

5. Ignoring your prop firm's specific rules. News trading rules vary substantially across firms. Applying tactics from generic guides without verifying your firm's specific rules can end evaluations or funded accounts.

6. Not tracking outcomes. Generic frameworks produce generic results. Personal tracking transforms the framework into a genuinely useful tool.

7. Trying to trade during releases. For most retail prop firm traders, trading during releases is structurally difficult. Planning around news is more valuable than trading during news for most traders.

8. Ignoring the calendar entirely. Some traders avoid the economic calendar entirely, believing pure technical trading is sufficient. This ignores real volatility drivers that can invalidate technical setups.

For broader coverage of rule violations that trip up otherwise-successful prop firm traders, see our common prop firm rule violations guide.

The Calendar as Strategy Input, Not Trading Trigger

Bringing the framework together: the economic calendar is genuinely useful for prop firm traders when used as a planning input rather than a trading trigger.

Planning input means:

• Structuring your week around scheduled events
• Adjusting position sizes and timing around volatility periods
• Identifying which sessions warrant caution and which don't
• Protecting your account from catastrophic loss during volatile releases
• Positioning for post-event opportunities that develop after initial reactions resolve

Trading trigger means:

• Executing during release moments
• Reacting to numbers as they hit the wire
• Attempting to profit from initial event volatility

Most retail prop firm traders benefit substantially from the planning input approach. Most retail prop firm traders do not have structural advantages in the trading trigger approach.

The economic calendar rewards traders who use it deliberately as one input in their broader planning process. It doesn't reward traders who ignore it entirely, and it doesn't reward traders who let it become the primary driver of their trading decisions.

For traders integrating the calendar with broader strategy development, our trading strategy framework guide covers how event awareness fits into the wider strategy building process. For guidance on trader traits that consistently correlate with prop firm success, see our traits of prop traders who get paid post.

Practical Weekly Routine

To make the framework concrete, here's a practical weekly routine:

Sunday evening (15 minutes):

• Open economic calendar for the coming week
• Filter by impact rating (red folder events) and relevant currencies
• Note events by day and time in your trading journal
• Identify multi-event days or event-heavy sessions
• Note any central bank speaker events beyond scheduled meetings

Monday morning (5 minutes):

• Review Monday's specific events
• Set pre-event position closure times in your daily plan
• Note any events warranting complete session avoidance

Each trading day (2 minutes):

• Confirm the day's scheduled events
• Set alerts for event times if useful
• Adjust intraday plan based on event schedule

Wednesday check-in (5 minutes):

• Review the rest of the week's events
• Note any updates to scheduled events (occasionally events reschedule)
• Adjust weekly plan based on Monday-Tuesday outcomes

Friday review (10 minutes):

• Review how the week's events actually affected your trading
• Note events that were more or less impactful than expected
• Update your personal event categorisation based on observed outcomes

Monthly review (30 minutes):

• Aggregate weekly observations
• Refine your Bucket 1 (direct impact) event list
• Refine pre-event and post-event protocols
• Track consistent patterns that emerge

Total time commitment: approximately 45-60 minutes per week across all touchpoints. For traders who genuinely benefit from calendar-based planning, this time investment produces meaningful trading process improvement.

Final Thoughts

Using the economic calendar effectively isn't about becoming a news trader — it's about integrating scheduled events into your broader trading process as one input among several. The traders who benefit most from calendar-based planning aren't specialists trying to trade releases; they're generalists who use the calendar to structure their week deliberately.

The core principles:

• Planning around news serves every trader style; trading during news serves a smaller specialist subset
• Not all red folder events matter equally — categorise by direct impact on your specific instruments
• Structure your week around events deliberately — pre-event positioning, during-event protocols, post-event opportunities
• Respect your prop firm's specific news trading rules — they vary substantially across firms
• Track outcomes and refine your framework — generic frameworks produce generic results

The practical reality: the economic calendar is one of the most useful tools available to retail prop firm traders when used correctly. It provides scheduled information about when volatility is coming, which markets it'll hit, and which sessions warrant caution. Traders who ignore it are trading blind to real volatility drivers. Traders who over-focus on it try to become specialist news traders when they should be using it as a planning input.

The framework above gives you a structural approach to using the calendar effectively without either extreme. Adapt it to your specific style, refine it through experience, and use it as one component of a broader trading process rather than the primary driver.

For related content on building disciplined trading approaches, see our decision framework guide, trading strategy framework, multi-firm portfolio guide, and challenge-passing playbook.

For ongoing PFC coverage across firm news, product updates, and industry analysis, follow @propfirmscmpd. For dedicated US futures coverage, follow @PFCFutures.

The economic calendar has always been there. The question is whether you're using it as a warning system, a reaction trigger, or a genuine planning tool. This framework helps you make it the third one.

FAQs – Trading Around the Economic Calendar

What's the "red folder" in economic calendar terms?

Red folder is the industry shorthand for the highest-impact events on the economic calendar — events that reliably produce significant market movement. Examples include central bank rate decisions (FOMC, ECB, BoE, BoJ), employment reports (NFP), inflation data (CPI), and major geopolitical announcements. Most economic calendar sites use colour coding where red indicates high impact, orange or yellow indicates medium impact, and green or unmarked indicates low impact.

Should I trade during high-impact news releases?

For most retail prop firm traders, no. Trading during releases is structurally difficult due to institutional speed advantages, spread widening at CFD firms, execution slippage, and prop firm rules that often restrict news trading. Planning around news is more valuable than trading during news for most traders. See our institutional-retail asymmetry analysis for the structural reality.

What are the most important events to plan around?

Central bank decisions (FOMC, ECB, BoE, BoJ), employment reports (especially NFP), inflation data (CPI), and Fed Chair or ECB President speaking events typically produce the most significant market movement across FX and equity index futures. GDP releases, retail data, and secondary economic data warrant awareness but typically produce shorter-lived reactions.

How do I find the economic calendar?

Most trader-focused sites and platforms provide economic calendar functionality. ForexFactory, Investing.com, and similar sources offer freely-available calendars. Many trading platforms (MetaTrader, cTrader, TradingView, Bloomberg terminals) integrate calendars directly. Choose the source you find easiest to work with — the underlying event data is largely the same across reputable providers.

Do all prop firms allow news trading?

No. Prop firms have varying rules around news trading — some permit it fully, others restrict positioning around events, others prohibit news trading entirely (particularly during evaluation phase). Always verify your specific firm's news trading rules before applying tactics from any guide. Violating news trading rules can end evaluations or funded accounts regardless of trade outcome.

How far ahead of an event should I close positions?

No universal answer — depends on your firm's rules, your position sizing, and your strategy. Some traders close 30 minutes before red folder events; others close 15 minutes before; some hold through smaller positions relative to expected volatility. Define your own protocol based on your specific risk tolerance and firm rules. Verify what your prop firm requires as the minimum window if they specify one.

What's the difference between direct and indirect impact events?

Direct impact events affect the instruments you specifically trade — a USD event affects EURUSD directly. Indirect impact events affect correlated markets or broader sentiment but not your specific instruments — a JPY event may affect USDJPY without directly affecting EURGBP. Prioritise planning around direct impact events; maintain awareness of indirect impact events.

How much time should calendar-based planning take?

Approximately 45-60 minutes per week across all touchpoints (Sunday review, daily confirmations, mid-week check, Friday review, monthly refinement). This time investment produces meaningful process improvement for traders who use the calendar effectively. Traders spending significantly less typically don't extract full value; traders spending significantly more may be over-engineering the framework.

Should I trade the sessions right after a release?

Depends on the release and your strategy. The first 30-60 minutes after a release are typically noisy — initial reactions often reverse or fail to sustain. The sessions that follow often provide cleaner setups. Track your specific outcomes across different post-event windows to identify what works for your approach.

What about unscheduled events or breaking news?

Unscheduled events (geopolitical crises, natural disasters, unexpected corporate news) can't be planned around in advance. These require reactive adjustment rather than proactive planning. Standard risk management applies — smaller positions in volatile moments, tighter stops in fast markets, avoiding leverage that would produce catastrophic losses in extreme moves.

How does calendar planning integrate with technical analysis?

As one input among several. Technical setups that develop across event schedules may still work; setups that require conditions incompatible with scheduled volatility may not. Calendar awareness helps you avoid positioning into events that will invalidate your technical framework, without abandoning technical analysis entirely. For strategy development that incorporates event awareness, see our trading strategy framework guide.

What if my prop firm has a specific event list they flag?

Follow their specific list rather than generic guidance. Some firms explicitly list events they consider news events; others define "news trading" more broadly. If your firm provides a specific list, that's the authoritative source — apply their definitions to your protocols regardless of what general guides suggest.

Should I run multiple prop firms with different news rules?

Yes, but with awareness of the specific rules at each firm. Multi-firm portfolios produce genuine operational advantages — see our multi-firm portfolio guide — but different firms have different rules. What's permitted at one firm may violate rules at another. Track each firm's news trading framework specifically rather than assuming uniformity.

How do I refine the framework for my specific strategy?

Track outcomes for a few weeks. Note which events actually affected your positions, which produced no meaningful impact despite being red folder, and which post-event setups produced tradeable opportunities. Refine your Bucket 1 (direct impact) event list based on observed outcomes. The framework improves through iteration — generic frameworks produce generic results; personalised frameworks reflect actual experience.

Where can I follow ongoing PFC coverage?

Follow @propfirmscmpd for main-brand PFC coverage across the industry, and @PFCFutures for dedicated US futures coverage. PFC publishes ongoing content on trading strategy, firm selection, news events affecting the industry, and other topics relevant to prop firm traders.

Last updated: 21 July 2026. This guide provides a planning framework for using the economic calendar effectively. Prop firm rules around news trading vary substantially — always verify your specific firm's policies before applying tactics based on this guide.

Editorial disclosure: This educational guide is not tied to any specific firm or platform. Economic calendar tools mentioned are illustrative of the category rather than specific endorsements. For our full editorial framework, see our how to be a good prop firm affiliate post.

Risk disclaimer: Trading involves substantial risk of loss. Past performance is not indicative of future results. The information in this article is for educational and informational purposes only and is not investment advice. High-impact economic events can produce extreme market volatility with substantial loss risk.