Monday, July 12, 2010

Intraday Forex Day Trading

One of the best ways to succeed in forex trading is to trade a time frame that fits your personality. There are three major time frames categorized as day trading, swing trading and position trading. Now let's take a look at each time frame style to help you decide which is best for you to trade.

Day trading or intraday trading are quick trades that often last anywhere from minutes to hours and take place within the same trading day. Day trading is also known as scalping and trades are very rapid, usually small in size and many trades are taken each day.

The pros of day trading or scalping include smaller risk per trade through smaller stops losses and take profits. You can make money quicker although it takes deep focus in order to day trade.

There is always risk in trading and while there are upsides to day trading there are also down sides. Cons of intraday trading include traders due to frequent trading pay a high amount of fees through spreads or broker commissions. Also small mistakes can turn into large losses if a position gets away from a trader and their account can loss a lot of money in a very short amount of time.

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Forex: Benefits of Trading the Forex Market

Trading the Forex market has become very popular in the last years. Why is it that traders around the world see the Forex market as an investment opportunity? We will try to answer this question in this article. Also we will discuss come differences between the Forex market, the stocks market and the futures market.

Some of the benefits of trading the Forex market are:

Superior liquidity
Liquidity is what really makes the Forex market different from other markets. The Forex market is by far the most liquid financial market in the world with nearly 2 trillion dollars traded everyday. This ensures price stability and better trade execution. Allowing traders to open and close transactions with ease. Also such a tremendous volume makes it hard to manipulate the market in an extended manner.

24hr Market
This one is also one of the greatest advantages of trading Forex. It is an around the click market, the market opens on Sunday at 3:00 pm EST when New Zealand begins operations, and closes on Friday at 5:00 pm EST when San Francisco terminates operations. There are transactions in practically every time zone, allowing active traders to choose at what time to trade.
Leverage trading

Trading the Forex Market offers a greater buying power than many other markets. Some Forex brokers offer leverage up to 400:1, allowing traders to have only 0.25% in margin of the total investment. For instance, a trader using 100:1 means that to have a US$100,000 position, only US$1,000 are needed on margin to be able to open that position.

Low Transaction costs
Almost all brokers offer commission free trading. The only cost traders incur in any transaction is the spread (difference between the buy and sell price of each currency pair). This spread could be as low as 1 pip (the minimum increment in any currency pair) in some pairs.

Low minimum investment
The Forex market requires less capital to start trading than any other markets. The initial investment could go as low as $300 USD, depending on leverage offered by the broker. This is a great advantage since Forex traders are able to keep their risk investment to the lowest level.

Specialized trading
The liquidity of the market allows us to focus on just a few instruments (or currency pairs) as our main investments (85% of all trading transactions are made on the seven major currencies). Allowing us to monitor, and at the end get to know each instrument better.

Trading from anywhere
If you do a lot of traveling, you can trade from anywhere in the world just having an internet connection.

Some of the most important differences between the Forex market and other markets are explained below.

Forex market vs. Equity markets

Liquidity
FX market: Near two trillion dollars of daily volume.
Equity market: Around 200 billion on a daily basis.

Trading hours
FX market: 24hr market, 5.5 days a week
Equity market: Monday through Friday from 8:30 EST to 5:00 EST

Profit potential
FX market: In both, rising and falling markets.
Equity market: Most traders/investor profit only from rising markets.

Transaction costs
FX market: Commission free and tight spreads.
Equity market: High Commissions and transaction fees.

Buying power
FX market: Leverage up to 400:1
Equity market: Leverage from 2:1 to 4:1

Specialization
FX market: most volume (85%) is made on major currencies (USD, EUR, JPY, GBP, CHF, CAD and AUD)
Equity market: More than 40,000 stocks to choose from

Forex market vs. Futures market

Liquidity
FX Market: Near two trillion dollars of daily volume.
Futures market: Around 400 billion dollars on a daily basis.

Transaction costs
FX market: Commission free and tight spreads.
Futures market: High commissions fees.

Margin
FX market: Fixed rate of margin on every position.
Futures market: Different levels of margin on overnight positions than day time positions.

Trade execution
FX market: Instantaneous execution.
Futures market: Inconsistent execution.


All this makes the Forex market very attractive to investors and traders. But I need to make something clear, although the benefits of trading the Forex market are notorious; it is still difficult to make a successful career trading the Forex market. It requires a lot of education, discipline, commitment and patience, as any other market.


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Free Forex Software

Free Forex software is possible to obtain. It is usually a one months trail basis.

This gives you a good chance to see if you like it and if it can help you profit. It is an ideal way to use Forex software without risking any outlay.

There are numerous internet sites which are providing different software programs that can allow the traders to do forex trading. However, make sure that the software has accuracy.

When you acquire a certain software as your tool, try it first. Allow dry runs or testing especially when decision making is concerned. There are lots of forex trading sites that are offering trial runs of their products.

The software can determine the currency rates each day. Besides this useful task, some software also helps the trader by analyzing data and predicting market behaviors. It can also involve graph utilization which shows the rising and falling of currencies.

There are various security layers that would be difficult for hackers to crack into. This security is much needed when huge traffic volumes occur in the forex market.

The general security of the forex trading software ensures that the personal data of the traders are also protected. The two things being considered are data integrity and privacy. This will prevent the hackers from getting into the transaction for a possible change in forex rates. Hackers can change rates in huge amounts putting the business in chaos which can crash global markets.

Forex trading software allows the traders to see the entire forex markets conditions at once. It helps in increasing forex sales volumes in the market. Take note, forex market can be sometimes difficult to determine.

You need to understand every detail to select the best to make it work for you. As much as possible, learn the latest forex trading software and apply it. The software is considered as two-in-one. It includes both the trading software and charting software. Excellent profits are not impossible to gain if the traders are able to interpret these correctly.

Although forex trading is very popular today, make sure that you employ the right software in order to reach your goal. The advantages of software programs that were mentioned above are useless if it is not properly reviewed. Remember that web technology continuously increases in popularity becoming the latest trading avenue.

There are numerous internet sites which are providing different software programs that can allow the traders to do forex trading. However, make sure that the software has accuracy. When you acquire a certain software as your tool, try it first. Allow dry runs or testing especially when decision making is concerned. There are lots of forex trading sites that are offering trial runs of their products. The software can determine the currency rates each day.

Besides this useful task, some software also helps the trader by analyzing data and predicting market behaviors. It can also involve graph utilization which shows the rising and falling of currencies.

Upon subscribing to a site on forex trading, secure transactions can be already attained.

You can now have an access to the different markets of sellers and buyers worldwide. It is not difficult to conduct business transactions regardless of time as long as it is still market hours. Novice traders should not worry. They can add services such as accessing the expert’s sites for advice. These experts help the traders in analyzing the behavior of the market. Later on, the traders can be able to make wiser decisions regarding the best currency to trade and be successful.

Forex trading software is really the foundation for making good profits from Forex on a regular basis.


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Forex Leading Indicators

Derived from the words "foreign exchange," Forex is the largest financial market in the world. A highly liquid, voluminous market based on no specific fixed exchange, the forex is traded through financial institutions, dealers, brokers, banks and, most recently, private individuals. An up-and-coming endeavor for the smaller, personal investor, the forex market has only recently become accessible to such traders. In the past, large, required deposits counted out the small investors. But with the advent of internet trading and growing competition within the market, this type of trading is easily accessible for the average investor. Innovations in technology (ie: Internet, 24-hour trading and a global economy) have made it easier than ever to monitor the market and trade when necessary, but without proper forex training and education, private investors run a dangerous road.

Forex trading indicators abound, aiding investors in their search for optimum trading times and investing opportunities. Countless amounts of time and energy can be spent studying the latest indicators for keys to success in the market.

The average true range indicator measures the volatility of a given forex trading market, where high values indicate that currency trading prices are changing a large amount during the day. Trading bands, such as Bollinger Bands, are among the most popular technical indicators on the market today. In essence, they are lines drawn at certain intervals around a central moving average. They vary in distance from the moving average, once again based on volatility. Another widely used indicator, the Commodity Channel Index, determines how far the current price has been from the average price. High values translate to several days with higher than average prices, and vice versa for low values. But other expert forex investor says indicators might not be the ultimate key to success trading on this market. These traders state that although indicators are the buzz word today new traders should keep in mind that if there was a way to figure out the market, there would be no market. In other words, instead of trying to solve the market, you should approach trading with the correct mindset. How can I get involved, survive and then ultimately take a profit? These traders also say that the ultimate trading indicator, is simply put: price. All other indicators should follow. Success can only be obtained on the forex through proper training, practice, implementation of knowledge learned and repeating those steps consistently, he concluded.

With correct training and implementation of correct indicators, trading the forex can be ideal for private investors on many levels. First, it is easy to exchange most currencies based on the enormity of the market. Second, volatility of the market leads to large profits in a very short time. While this is a dangerous investment without a thorough understanding of the market, proper forex training will put any investor in the profit margin. Third, 24-hour-a-day trading, five days a week allows constant access to the forex via telephone, Internet or a broker.


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