Forex or Foreign exchange trading is a complicated business. The foreign exchange trader must take into account the “fundamental” factors of a country’s economy (i.e. the qualitative factors that may have a bearing on its currency’s exchange rate). So, what are these “fundamental” factors? They include political positions and developments (such as changes to a country’s government’s economic policy) and relevant decisions made by a country’s central bank. They also include any relevant pieces of economic news affecting the country in question. The Forex trader needs to not only be aware of this information at an early stage, but to effectively “second guess” how the money markets will react to it. It would probably be unwise for traders (even those with considerable market experience) to ignore these fundamental elements and to just base their market decisions on technical analyses.
Approximately three trillion dollars is traded each day on the foreign exchange market (on those days that it is operating), making it the world’s most liquid market. FX trading is vastly different to stock trading. (For example, in the Forex market, currencies are “paired” in that when one is bought, the other is sold, and vice versa.) As such, investors may find FX trading to be a useful means of diversifying their investment portfolios.
A number of factors make the Forex market unique (in addition to its liquidity, mentioned above). These include the fact that the market operates 24 hours a day, 6 days a week, and that traders in the market typically generate low profit margins (when compared with other markets). Continue Reading »