News taxonomy for discretionary scalpers: the edge cases

[LondonScalper]

I sort news into categories, partly to decide what to do and partly to stop myself treating every headline as equally urgent. The obvious categories are easy. It's the awkward ones that taught me the most.

My basic taxonomy: scheduled data, scheduled central bank events, scheduled speeches, unscheduled official comments, unscheduled market events like a large bank or fund in trouble, and geopolitical news. Each has its own default response.

The edge cases:

Scheduled events with unscheduled content. A central banker's speech is on the calendar but the topic isn't. If it's about financial stability, nobody cares. If they comment on rates, it moves. I now treat any speech by a voting member as potentially high impact until the first headlines show otherwise.

Reports that are leaked or "sources say" stories. These look like news but are really rumours. They often get denied or walked back. I treat them as noise for the first 15 minutes.

Events that are on the calendar but whose timing is fuzzy, like a government statement "later today". I treat the whole window as risky.

Market structure events: index rebalances, month-end and quarter-end flows, options expiries. Not news in the usual sense, but they move prices at predictable times.

[Shadow Trader]

The voting member rule is a good one. I'd extend it to the Q and A after the speech, which is where the real headlines often come from. The prepared text can be about something dull and the first question is about rates.

On "sources say" stories, I treat them a bit differently depending on the source. A known wire reporter on a central bank story is right more often than not, and I've been caught on the wrong side waiting 15 minutes. For those I just stop trading the currency for an hour.

Another edge case I'd add: data released at the same time from two countries. When Canadian and US jobs both come out at 13:30, USDCAD can do strange things in the first minute, as the two numbers point in opposite directions.

Month end flows are worth a closer look. Around the 16:00 London fix on the last trading day, I've seen EURUSD move 20 pips with nothing on the calendar.

Where do you put bank holidays in one market but not another, like a US holiday during the London session?

[Shadow Trader]

One edge case category I'd add to your taxonomy is the silent revision. A prior print gets revised inside a later release, with no separate calendar row, and the pair moves on the revision while the headline looks soft.

I got caught on that twice on US retail sales last year. The headline was close to forecast, so I treated it as low drama, and the prior month revision is what actually moved EURUSD about 15 pips in the first minute.

Now any release that commonly carries revisions gets tagged on my sheet the night before. If the tag is there, I treat the whole print as high impact until I have read the revision line, not just the headline.

Dual prints you already covered. Silent leaks of a vote or a rating first on social wires are the other cousin. Those I flat for thirty minutes rather than trade the first headline.

Where do you file revisions that arrive inside another release, LondonScalper? I still bounce them between scheduled data and unscheduled market events.