Currency: Expert Guides and Resources

Foreign exchange (or forex) markets are one of the fastest and most volatile financial markets to trade. Money can be made or lost in a matter of seconds; at the same time, currencies can display significant trends lasting several days, weeks, even years. Most importantly, forex markets are always moving, providing an accessible and target-rich trading environment.

When it comes to trading options, knowing how to look for breaks is key. For more details on a zoomed-out look at this, read How to Find a Breakout in Trading.One way to trade a breakout is after the break has occurred. You may not have noticed the significance of a particular technical level, or you may not have left orders in overnight to exploit a break.

If you’re basing your trading strategies on trend-line analysis, you need to be aware that price levels derived from trend lines will change depending on the slope of the trend line. The slope of a trend line refers to the angle of a trend line relative to a horizontal line. The steeper the slope of the trend line, the more the relevant price level will change over time; the shallower the slope, the more gradually the price levels will change with time.

In addition to the ebb and flow of liquidity and market interest during the global currency trading day, the following daily events tend to occur around the same times each day. When currency options expire Currency options are typically set to expire either at the Tokyo expiry (3 p.m. Tokyo time) or the New York expiry (10 a.

Forex markets refer to trading currencies by pairs, with names that combine the two different currencies being traded against each other, or exchanged for one another. Additionally, forex markets have given most currency pairs nicknames or abbreviations, which reference the pair and not necessarily the individual currencies involved.

When you look at currency pairs, you may notice that the currencies are combined in a seemingly strange order. For instance, if sterling-yen (GBP/JPY) is a yen cross, why isn’t it referred to as “yen-sterling” and written “JPY/GBP”? The answer is that these quoting conventions evolved over the years to reflect traditionally strong currencies versus traditionally weak currencies, with the stronger currency coming first.

Online currency trading is offered by dozens of different retail trading brokerage firms operating from all over the world, so you have many options to choose from. Here are some key questions to ask when you’re choosing a broker: How good are trading executions? The key to evaluating any brokers is the speed and reliability of your trade executions.

Knowing the fundamental drivers of currency rates is the foundation of understanding price movements. This is very important to understand if you want to trade currency as an investment. Here are some suggestions: Get to know the major economic data reports from all the major economies. Understand the importance of expectations versus actual outcomes.