In its simplest form, it’s the process of buying one currency and simultaneously selling another with the hopes of making a potential profit from the changes in value between the two currencies according to the price movement.
However, many other variables go into trading the forex market, which is why we’ve listed all the necessary factors, each with its own detailed section underneath.
Different categories of forex currency pairs
Every forex currency will always appear as a three-letter code; the first two letters represent the country of origin, and the last represents the currency’s name. For example, if we take USD, the first two letters stand for the United States, and the third letter is a dollar.
As previously mentioned, in forex trading, currencies are always traded in pairs; however, out of all the currency pairs available, they will only fall into one of three categories: majors, minors, or exotics.
Let’s have a closer look at each of these categories in more detail.
- Majors: These currency pairs include the currencies from the world’s biggest economies: the Euro, Pound, US dollar, Japanese yen, New Zealand dollar, Australian dollar, Canadian dollar, and Swiss franc. They are some of the most traded pairs in the forex market. All major currency pairs will include the US dollar as the base currency or the quote currency, for example, AUD/USD or USD/JPY. The reason for this is because the US dollar is seen as the world’s primary reserve currency.
- Minors: These currency pairs are also known as cross-currency pairs. This is because these pairs still include major currencies but don’t include the US dollar, for example, EUR/AUD or GBP/JPY. These types of currency pairs are still popular among traders; however, they do see less liquidity than major pairs. This is mainly due to the fact they don’t include the US dollar.
- Exotics: These currency pairs are some of the least traded currency pairs. These consist of one major currency paired with a currency from any emerging economy. For example, USD/SEK (US dollar against the Swedish krona) or EUR/TRY (Euro against the Turkish lira). Most traders will always end up trading major currency pairs mainly due to the high liquidity that those pairs offer.
Trading with leverage
Leverage trading involves borrowing funds from your broker, allowing you to open a much bigger position by only depositing a small amount of investment capital called margin.
Leverage will always come in the form of a ratio, which states the amount of funds the broker could be willing to lend you. For instance, if you have a leverage ratio of 20:1, it means that for every $1 you deposit, your broker will lend you $20.
Trading forex through a derivative product such as spread betting or CFDs allows you to trade with leverage.
Trading with leverage will magnify any potential profits. However, it will also magnify any losses. The reason for this is because a trade’s results are calculated based on the entire size of the position and not just your initial margin capital.
The main reason why forex trading is mainly done through leverage is because, generally, the price movements are so small that leverage allows you to open a position of greater value to try and profit from these small price movements.
Trading on margin
As mentioned above, margin is the capital you’ll need to open a position with leverage.
Margin is typically displayed as an amount or a percentage on your chosen platform.
With margin trading, you might want to remember the maintenance margin. This refers to the minimum equity required to keep a position open; if your initial margin fell below this required level due to consecutive losses, you would experience a margin call.
A margin call is a notification sent out by the broker informing you to add more funds to your account in order to continue trading.
If this isn’t corrected, the broker could automatically close all open trades at the current market price to prevent your remaining margin from falling to zero.
Forex trading hours
The forex market trading hours operates 24 hours a day, five days a week and follows the time zones of four major financial capitals: Sydney, Tokyo, London, and New York.
On a normal trading day, the market will open with the Sydney session, then move towards the Tokyo session, then the London session, and end with the New York session.
While the market is open, some sessions will overlap, as seen in the picture below. The Sydney session overlaps with the Tokyo session, Tokyo will overlap with the London session, and the London session overlaps with the New York session.
If one of these countries has a public holiday, the market will remain open; however, the trading volume for that specific session will be significantly less than usual.
What is a base and quote currency?
As previously mentioned, forex currencies are always traded in pairs called the base and quote currency. The first is the base currency, and the second is the quote currency.
The base currency will always equal one, and the quote currency will state how much is needed to purchase one unit of the base currency, also known as the exchange rate.
Let’s take EUR/USD as an example, where EUR is the base currency and USD is the quote currency. If the exchange rate is 1.4300, you’ll need to pay $1.43 to get €1.
What are bid and ask prices?
When trading currencies, two prices will always be listed for a currency pair: the bid price and the asking (offer) price. The asking price is the price you’ll look at when you want to open a buy (long) position, and the bid price is the one you’ll look at when you open a short (sell) position.
The asking price will always be higher than the bid price, and the difference between these two prices is known as the spread.
Spreads in forex trading
As mentioned in the previous section, the spread is the difference between the bid and ask price and can be seen as the price you’ll pay the broker to open a position on your behalf, which is essentially compensation that goes towards the broker.
In forex trading, two different types of spreads will be available: variable and fixed.
Fixed spreads will always stay the same; it doesn’t matter how volatile the markets get. However, the spread might differ depending on the financial asset you could be trading.
Variable spreads, on the other hand, constantly change as the bid and ask prices change due to trading volume, liquidity, volatility, and supply and demand.
What is a lot?
A lot in forex trading is used as a standard unit of measurement for the trade size. Lots are used because the price movements are generally very small, which increases the value of a currency pair when trading.
However, with that said, it might be best to remember that the higher the lots you choose to trade, the more risk you’ll be taking on.
Now, there are four different lot categories you could have access to, depending on your chosen broker. These are:
- Standard lots: These are 100,000 units of base currency.
- Mini lots: These are 10,000 units of base currency.
- Micro lots: These are 1000 units of base currency.
- Nano lots: These are 100 units of base currency.
What is a pip?
A pip stands for a percentage in point or price interest point and is the smallest movement a price can make in a forex currency pair.
The measurement occurs at the fourth decimal place within the price. So, let’s say EUR/USD is trading at 1.3658, and it moves up towards 1.3659, which has moved up one pip.
Now, if it were to move from 1.3658 towards 1.3758, it would then move up 100 pips.
For most currency pairs, pip movements stay the same; however, some exceptions exist. For example, currency pairs where the Japanese Yen is the quote currency will have the pip movement occurring at the second decimal place.
For example, if the USD/JPY is trading at 123.55 and moves up towards 123.56, that will be a single pip move.
There are other currency pairs where the pip movement also happens at the second decimal place. However, those currency pairs tend to fall into the category of exotic pairs and aren’t necessarily traded as often as the major currency pairs.