Archive for January, 2008

How to Value Currency Pairs

By James Theiss

Typically, in the FOREX market, currencies are traded in pairs. For example, Euro/US Dollar or US Dollar/Japanese Yen. Whenever you trade currencies online, you are then, buying one currency and selling another. Currency pairs are abbreviated. The above pairs would be EUR/USD and USD/JPY. The currency on the left is called the base currency, and the one on the right is the cross currency.

The value of a currency pair is determined by the strength or weakness of the base currency in relation to the cross currency. The base currency value is always 1. That means when you see a quote of 1.4652 for the EUR/USD, its value means 1 Euro will buy 1.4652 dollars. The next day you may see a quote for the EUR/USD of 1.4725. If you listen to the financial news you will hear them say something along the lines of, “the Euro gained strength against the Dollar today”, or “the Dollar fell today against the Euro”. In pocketbook english, that simply means it takes more dollars today to buy 1 Euro than yesterday.

Let’’s say you have an online FOREX account and bought the EUR/USD yesterday at the above price of 1.4652 and today you sold, or closed out your trade at 1.4725. That would leave a profit of 73 pips. What the heck is a pip you might ask. Well a pip has two definitions but they both mean the same thing, dollar wise at least: Price Interest Point and Percentage In Point. I have never been able to get a clear difference in the definitions no matter who I have asked, and don”t really worry about it anymore because, like I said, they mean the same thing dollar wise.

When you trade currencies online you will have to open an account with a forex dealer. You can open either a standard account or a mini account. In the standard account a pip is worth approximately $10 dollars, and in the mini account it is worth approximately $1 dollar. It used to be the pip was the smallest unit of value in the FOREX market. Today however, many forex dealers quote in tenths of a pip. They have carried out the quote one extra decimal number to give better and more accurate spreads. So the above quote might have read 1.47253, where the 3 is the tenth of a pip. So its value would be either $3 dollars or $.30 cents depending on the type of account you have.

You may have noticed that I said pip values are approximately $1 dollar. That’’s because each currency pair has its own pip value. The true value is determined by mathematical formulas and the exchange rate of the currency pair. Some pip values are fixed and others fluctuate slightly as one currency rises or falls in value relative to the other currency in the pair.

Currency trades are made in fixed dollar amounts called lots. One lot in a standard account is equal to $1000, which controls $100,000. One lot in the mini account is equal to $100, and controls $10,000. Both standard and mini accounts typically have a 1% margin which allows the FOREX trader 100 to 1 leverage on their investment dollars.

If you trade currencies online, the ultimate goal is to capture as many pips as you can, and not get bogged down in the details of what the exact value of each currency pair is. Unless you are interested in becoming an economist or some such thing, the information presented here is more than enough to let you get on with putting as many pips in your account as possible.

About The Author

James is a successful online currency trader and also runs the popular website http://www.todayscurrencytrading.com. Go there now and you can sign up for his FREE, “Currency Trade of the Week”.

Are USA Major Banks Today in the Middle of an Unstoppable Downward Major Financial Crisis?

By Wayne Miller

Day Traders, this could be an “opportunity of a lifetime” for you if you can learn how these banks really operate.

When billions of real US Dollars are leaving the Bond markets monthly, and when major banks are losing billions monthly also, do you think there is a unique opportunity there for higher than normal profits right now?

You bet there is so read this article. Are you a Day Trader or even a regular trader of the Stock and Commodity markets who needs an educational adventure of a lifetime that could make you seriously wealthy fairly soon?

The better news is, you can keep on making serious money by finding trade after trade for yourself with new trading trends for the rest of your life with the correct trading education and certain secrets. You might want to find out what is causing the USA financial crisis today.

To do so, takes a whole lot of research and I am one trader who has done the research. Did you know the trading world is all inter connected?

Did you know that what affects just one major US Bank losing billions (and trust me on this, lots of the major ones are losing mega billions too), it will effect different world markets and the US economy as well?

Folks, this bank problem will impack the US Markets in a bad way. Case in point: The sub-prime meltdown of today. To find out what to do next, you really need to read a book titled “The US Financial Crisis of 2007″.

This financial crisis alone has already effected every major bank inside the USA and a lot elsewhere and it may even be more important and at a minimum just as important as the $600 billion war expenses already spent on the Iraq war already today.

Many different things affect the markets today for Day Traders. The recent forest fires really do provide super trading events also if you know where to look for quick profits.

Another thing is the current Iraq war as it has an important effect on many different markets inside and outside of America.

So much so, you can easily take advantage of a lot of money making situations that today are affected by this ongoing war.

Now, all you have to do is apply time-tested and time-proven trading methods on mainly key research by taking action once you get educated.

Want to learn how to become a millionaire? That is what becoming an easy millionaire or even a multimillionaire is about and do not get me wrong.

It is tough to get there and I am not saying that you can do it day trading although one day Warren Buffett made $1 billion dollars within 24 hrs, but then he is already a mega-billionaire.

If you get the right trading education, you can make yourself “big money”. In other words, after learning certain trading secrets that I can lead you to, you will have an “unfair advantage” over 99% of the world of traders and trust me when I tell you this; 80% of traders out there are dummies.

Once you learn about these secrets of trading that deal with sometimes multi-trillion dollar daily trading markets by mega-billionaire investors, it’’s fairly easy to get your slice of the money pie.

Let me tell you, after following in the footsteps of these billionaire guys as a trader myself for more than 20 years now, they do not lose to often and you can take that to the bank.

If you are a Day Trader, you already have enough risk capital to trade with as it does require you to have a minimum amount.

Even the smallest of traders can now follow and trade side by side these billionaires right here inside the USA and trust me, until recently that just was not the case as you had to have the very deep pockets “like a million dollars minimum trading account” to even break this financial private barrier. That is simply not the case today as the average Joe can trade right along side the big boys.

Today, what you must realize is that the USA is in the middle of a major financial crisis due to the sub-prime meltdown and Foreign investors are pulling out mega billions per month from our US markets. What you need to learn is certain trading education so you can take advantage of this situation as a day trader.

You must find out where this money is going and more so you need to learn how to profit by it quickly with your timing efforts.

That is key to day traders and knowledge you need so you know where to put your risk capital for the highest potential reward. Forget about making 10 or 20 percent a year, I am telling you right now that if you have enough risk capital to trade with, the real life potential of generating over 2,000% over the next six months to a year due to the current USA Financial Crisis mess we are into today is not only possible, its predicable. All you need to do is to learn how to spot major new trends before they happen. That is where the big money is at today.

What you have to understand is this. With the correct information in your hands, even you might join the ranks of the rich and powerful soon if you simply apply what you learn and tag along with these billionaires without their knowledge.

It’’s that serious of a trading education to learn how to trade for the most profits, where to look for the most profits and when to take action.

Timing is always important to trading and the time to act is now to pull in millions in profits later. You will need to learn how to open the front door to higher profits.

All you have to do then is to open the door of the right financial vehicle yourself and apply what is learned in order to grab your own share of the easy and fast loot that is very possible as a day trader.

About The Author

Wayne Miller has spotted major trend reversals prior to them happening such as the reverse in Crude Oil with Pres. Clinton was in office and around $10 per bl.; the reverse in Gold when it was around $240 an oz.; the Stock Market Crash of 2000 and more. To find out more. http://www.toptenbook.mobi

What Is The Best Way to Trade in The Forex Market

By Mark Plummer

Today forex currency trading is a form of trading that working men choose as this can be traded at your convenience, 24 hours a day. Trading here is done on the basis of trading of liquid currencies which are currencies of different countries that can back their currencies with commodities like gold and silver.

It is the backing of the leading financial institution that has made forex currency trading popular. With forex currency trading, you play your luck on the currency market based not only on supply and demand, but on cash. You invest money in the market, with the wish that the exchange rate of the currency you invest in ends in a profit.

As with the stock market,the forex market is also influenced by many variables.Changes on these variables take place on a daily basis based on news that might reflect on the currencies which are traded on the currency markets.When there is econmic or political news within a country this can reflect on their currency causing major drops in the exchange rate which can turn into losses.

Similarly, if there is an economical gain in the company through new routes or commodities involved in international trade, the cost of the currency exchange for their currency increases. This leaves you in a profit for your currency, than the previous day. And coincidently, inflation in the country proves to be profitable to you if you sell your currency at a high rate. This is because just like in the stock market, you have to buy low and sell high in the forex currency market.

Forex trading is usually done on a shorter timeframe.Because many things can happen in one day with the economy of a particular country that can cause panic and have an effect on the currency rate.A rumour can already be enough to make a move on the forex market to maximize profits or keep losses to a minimum.

This is the reason why success when investing in the currency exchange market lies in understanding and keeping up with the constant fluctuations of the currency market. With close monitoring on forex currency markets, you can realize when to change money to make the maximum profit in your currency market.

When you want to invest a large sum of money in to the currency market it’’s better to use an investment fund that trades currencies as they are more experienced at this and the change of making profits is much bigger.But if you feel comfortable doing it yourself after studying these markets you can always do it yourself using a currency broker.

Like everything in life,checking up on several brokerage firms before deciding which one to use is a wise thing to do.There are several experienced and trustworthy forex brokers out there.The internet can be used as a valuable source of information when studying the forex markets and it’’s brokerages.Educating yourselves is the most important aspect before investing your funds in these markets.

About The Author

Mark Plummer is a UK based independent Offshore Investment advisor.Has been involved in the financial services and financial planning business since leaving full time education.
If forex trading by yourself is not for you then you must checkout this website http://www.wealthcapfund.com

Forex Trading - Can You Use Too Many Technical Indicators?

By James Woolley

The majority of people who trade forex use technical analysis to make their trading decisions. They generally use a wide variety of the hundreds of technical indicators available at their disposal, but how many should you use if you want to be a profitable forex trader, and can you use too many?

There’’s no question that the internet, and the subsequent ease of access to technical charts and indicators, has led to more and more traders being able to learn and become accomplished at using technical analysis to help them make trading decisions.

Indeed, people will spend hours on end experimenting with numerous different technical indicators in order to find that holy grail combination that will help them to become rich from trading the forex markets.

However no combination will prove to be 100% successful. The key is to find a combination that suits your trading style, and enables you to make high probability trades that will give you a positive equity curve (ie profits) in the long run.

If you have a sound stop loss policy and a rigid and disciplined trading system based on certain indicators, then you can make a good income from forex trading.

You don”t need to use several indicators at once. Indeed many top traders argue that you should minimise the number that you use, simply because the more you use, the more you will get conflicting information, and confusion and uncertainty does not equate to profits.

For instance you may use six different indicators to help you make your entry and exit positions, but you may, for example, have four of them indicating an oversold position and telling you to enter a long position, but the other two are crossing downwards and indicating a forthcoming downwards movement, so in this case you would probably abandon the initial long trade you were going to make.

This is further complicated when you use multiple time frames because this becomes even more of an issue. Multiple indicators over different time frames will invariably give you conflicting information and the net result will be that you end up not trading at all, and essentially always being afraid to take a position.

This is why so many top traders recommend using just a few tried and tested indicators. You don”t need to have a really complex set-up to be successful. You can make a decent living from forex by just sticking to a few basic indicators like RSI, stochastics and MACD, or just using support and resistance levels to make trading decisions.

Furthermore, some traders, like Avi Frister for example, only use one indicator, and argue that it’’s the only one you really need - price.

So if you”re striving to become a profitable trader, don”t overcomplicate things. You can be just as successful using just a few simple indicators than constantly trying out the latest and greatest new indicators in order to find that elusive winning combination.

About The Author

Click on the following links to read more about Avi Frister and a review of his Forex Trading Machine ebook course, which reveals his three most profitable price-driven trading strategies:

http://theforexarticles.com/forex-trading-machine-review

If You are Interested in Commodity Investing then Try these Tips

By Mark Plummer

If you”ve heard of commodities trading, you might be interested in knowing more about it. Commodities are products of commerce that are traded in commodity markets. These are materials such as financial investments, foreign currencies, agricultural products, metals and petroleum. When commodities markets began, they were used as agricultural trade platforms for local communities, utilized for agricultural products. Today, commodity markets have gone global, with country barriers broken down via technological advancements. Globalization and industrialization have meant that these goods have also been industrialized and the world has become its own trading center.

When you trade commodities, you must follow certain rules. First, trading is done only for products that are standard. Second, commodity transactions are done through something called “futures contracts.” With futures contracts, commodities are actually bought or sold on a future date, not the present date. However, the commodity’’s selling price is agreed upon immediately when the contract is made. Therefore, even though the commodity is sold at a future date, the price itself is already fixed when the contract is made.

“Futures contracts” aren”t the only type of commodities contracts. Spot contracts are put in place so that commodities get transferred when a contract is made instead of at a later date. You use a spot contract to exercise future contract after a period of time has gone by. Some types of commodities investing include commodity food market, commodity fund investing, and commodity petroleum.

When commodities investing started, trading was done in just a few sectors. In addition, commodities were restricted to those used in regular, everyday life. Presently, anyone who wants to engage in commodities trading can.

If you decide you want to invest in commodities, you should know that one of their advantages is reduced risk. Commodities investment can help you even out losses that might occur in other areas you”ve invested in. Commodities can offer less risk because when you deal with commodities, you invest in a number of items. Because you are using futures contracts, you can also more easily ensure that the risks you take are much lower than they might be, so that you can reduce or even eliminate risk.

If you want to monitor a particular commodity’’s performance, you can do so pretty easily. This is because in general, a particular commodity will perform well when other areas such as the stock market are not doing as well. By contrast, when the stock market is doing well, the commodities market might be doing more poorly. This makes it much easier to predict what commodity prices will be and to foresee market changes. However, even though this is a basic rule of thumb, it still should not be used as a means to actually predict true performance in any market sector, including the stock market, commodities market, et cetera.

If you”re interested in learning more about trading commodities, there are commodity-trading advisors who can help you. These are individuals or firms who can help you decide what your position should be in the commodity market, either long or short. They can also tell you when it’’s best to liquidate your position. In addition, they can help you see if your goals will match with their particular trading philosophies and strategies.

For the best commodity-trading advisor, first figure out what your own goals and objectives are. Then, choose an advisor that matches what you want as closely as possible. Communications these days are easy, and you can keep in touch with your advisor by fax, pager, phone, or e-mail. In addition, if you don”t want to trade in commodities yourself, you can still invest in commodities trading by utilizing a variety of investment funds that do just this with their portfolios.

About The Author

Mark Plummer is a UK based independent Offshore Investment advisor.Has been involved in the financial services and financial planning business since leaving full time education.If you want to find out more on commodity trading then please visit http://www.wealthcapfund.com

How To Use An Online Forex Trading Platform

By John Howard

Online Forex trading platform are software through which online brokers and investors can perform daily forex trading from anywhere around the world. New age platforms offer you advanced, unique features that can actually change the way one used to perceive online trading. The best online platform presents the blend of functional usage combined with ease of use.

The best online trading platform will be designed to help the investor in executing the trading most effectively by employing strategies to maximize the return. Most of the trading platforms are powered with unique analysis and strategy-testing features to test all buy and sell rules. With a click of your mouse you can access strategy performance reports with simulated results like profit versus loss, annual rate of return, etc. Based on them you can modify your trading strategies without incurring losses.

The best platform always comes with fully automated real-time online streaming data from the market to take the advantage of the liquidity of the market. The best online forex trading platform connects your monitor to the markets. This also ensures that you get the execution prices on every order type available without any slippage. The best trading platform should provide the robust backbone to handle transaction of heavy data and information traffic.

The best platform must offer more than one type of account like standard, institutional or mini. The platform should come with different operating packages like Flash, Java, or WAP. These software’’s provide firewall protection to maintain the security and integrity of your trading. You can perform your trading from home, office, laptop on the go or even from an internet cafe with equal ease. The best online forex trading platform will facilitate you to use the system without downloading any program, which presents perfect mobility to the traders or investors.

The best platform should offer:
- Tight spread on all major currency pairs with cutting-edge trading technology
- Quick execution with unlimited transaction amount
- No slippages and no requites
- Constant margin requirements in all volatile market condition
- Multiple real-time charts and other technical analysis based predictions with maximum visual representation
- Flexibility of placing complex orders including contingency orders
- Real time margin and position monitoring.
- Technical analysis for all demo and live accounts
- Authentic market news and economic calendar
- Performance, Security, Simplicity and Transparency
- Trading history and print out any reports

With advanced mobile platforms, you can operate when you are away from your computer.

Therefore the best online forex-trading platform with facilities of mobile trading enables you access and trade your forex account from anywhere with your mobile phone. These platforms come with easy to use interface, where you can easily move from one screen to the next. You can place market and contingent orders with simple steps and can have full reports including execution and open order.

About The Author

For your free course teaching you exactly how to succeed with forex trading using simple and effective forex trading systems simply go to http://forex-trading-platform.org

Getting The Right Forex Trading Training

By John Howard

Forex is nothing but a Foreign Exchange Market where money itself is being sold and brought. It is a market which deals with the up’’s and down’’s of different countries, currencies and allows users of the forex market to profit from the hikes. People who are interested in making money with the help of Forex have to go through training sessions so that they can totally understand as to how to make the best out of the given situations in the market. Without trainings the users may find themselves at a loss as they will not know how to handle situations. At times the users may be trained with the help of the brokers through whom they are entering the market. But most of the times it is advisable to take up the forex trading training.

Forex trading training is a session where users will understand what the forex market entirely is! The beginners are not the only ones who may profit from the training. People with good experience in stocks who want to give the forex market a try and also struggling investors of the forex market also take up the forex trading training. A forex trading training may contain essential tools that will help the users to buy or sell there currencies in the forex market. The training may also help the users to understand as to how the forex market works, what are the benefits of the people who are investing and trading there currencies, what are the trading strategies that are to be followed in order to buy and sell the proper kind of currencies, what may be the proper time to enter the market and the like.

It may also help the users to use a proper platform that is to use proper currency trading software. Trading software will help the users by giving proper statistical analysis of the current position of the market in the form of spreadsheets, data logs and other graphical representations, charts that will make the users analyze his investments.

The trainings involve making the users understand the basics that are needed for the currency trading. It also helps the users to interpret the charts, graphical representations so that the user can go forward with there investments. There are several simulated forex trading trainings that are present online. These will guide the users in a step by step fashion to practice the actual methodologies that are involved in the forex market before actually investing any amount of money. This will help the users to understand what the market is without the risk of losing any money at all.

In general Forex trading trainings are available over the internet and thorough many agencies for those who seek.

About The Author

For your free course teaching you exactly how to succeed with forex trading using simple and effective forex trading systems simply go to http://forex-trading-platform.org

Mini Forex Trading - Practice For The Big League

By John Howard

Mini forex trading can be rightly described as an innovative method of trading in which you can make money by trading the currencies of different countries. Both individuals and large scale financial institutions like banks can involved in this business of currency trading. It requires extreme awareness about the changes in the international commerce and the other factors that may lead to depreciation of the value of the currencies of different countries.

It works in the same pattern of a stock exchange. People invest in currencies with an expectation to sell them when market fluctuates favourably. The trade of currency market is always fluctuating with fluctuations in international commerce.

Currency trading is normally conducted in pairs of currency of two different countries. Most probably these currencies compete with each other in international market. This pairing of currency is commonly known as crosses among the traders or investors in currency trading. The most popular pairing or crosses of the present forex trading are the USD/EUR and the USD/GDP. These popular pairs are known as majors by the investors considering the high profit rate involved in the trading of these pairs.

Making money from investing in currency is not an easy thing as many of us think. Till recently global currency market was not open to the small investors and individuals. Only reserve banks and other larger industrial concerns were only permitted to invest in currencies considering the element of high risk and expertise required for trading currencies.

In the currency trading market forex accounts are known in two names; mini forex trading account and regular forex trading account. As the very name suggests mini forex accounts are meant for small investors and individuals who like to participate in the international currency trading. It will give individuals and small scale investors a chance to experiment with currency trading without making huge investment in the currency trading market.

In mini forex trading contracts will normally be small than a typical currency trading. Normally it will be one tenth of the regular currency trading contract.

The main advantage of investing in this type of currency investment is that the person investing in the currency marketing will get a chance to test various currencies trading system without risking much of his capital. When he understands the technicalities and techniques of currency trading he will be able to upgrade him to typical currency accounts.

About The Author

For your free course teaching you exactly how to succeed with forex trading using simple and effective forex trading systems simply go to http://forex-trading-platform.org

Investing In The Forex Market Using A Hedge Strategy

By Yo Fujikawa

The FreedomRocks System is a long-term Forex investment strategy. As you understand the profit components explained below, the reasons for this long-term viewpoint will become apparent. As you read the descriptions of each component below, recognize that the first 2 components will virtually always be profitable. This fact alone puts FreedomRocks in a class by itself.

The FreedomRocks Investment Strategy represents the state-of-the-art in technology and financial portfolio modeling. It requires no charts or graphs, it calculates what you need to do and when you need to do it, it structures your trading so you will buy low and sell high, and it allows you to select the amount of daily interest you will earn dependent upon your tolerance for risk. Most importantly, you”ll place all the trades in your own brokerage account, so you will always have 100% control over your own money and accounts.

Investors using the FreedomRocks strategy realize profits in 3 very distinct ways as illustrated by the following formula:

Trading (Buying Low / Selling High) - Always profitable

FreedomRocks investors will make (on average) 2-5 trades per week (depending on overall market volatility). Since we always sell at a higher rate than we buy, those trades will always be profitable.

Interest - Virtually always profitable

Barring any significant shifts in world interest rates, FreedomRocks investors will net a positive rate of interest each day on their portfolios. You can determine, in advance, the approximate amount of daily interest you will receive by using our Portfolio Allocator (based upon today’’s approximate interest rates). This money is deposited into your account by your broker each day. You are normally paid triple the daily interest amount on Wednesdays to compensate for the weekends.

Market Fluctuation - Can be positive or negative

This component is completely subject to the normal (and sometimes extreme) movements in the Forex market. It cannot be predicted with any degree of accuracy. In the long run, statisticians would tell us this should average out to zero. In the short run, however, market fluctuations can and will cause extreme movements (in both directions) in your account equity. We provide guidelines to help minimize these movements, but there are no guarantees. Over time, Trading profits and Interest profits will continue to build. The Market Fluctuation will either be positive or negative.

Features of FreedomRocks

*Structures your trading so you buy low / sell high
*Has no charts or graphs to read
*Tells you exactly what to do and when to do it
*Allows you to practice making live trades in the market, without risking a penny
*Depending upon your tolerance for risk, it allows you to select virtually any interest rate you desire on your portfolio
*You place all the trades in your account so you have 100% control over your money

About The Author

Yo Fujikawa is a forex trader that specializes in hedge trading and teaching the FreedomRocks system. For more information about the foreign exchange market and FreedomRocks try visiting http://www.smartforexinvestor.com

Learn Forex Trading The Right Way!

By John Howard

Forex is nothing but the foreign exchange market where money itself is being bought and sold. Learning Forex trading means understanding what forex is and how to make use of the forex market to earn good profits by investing proper amounts. In order to learn forex the following are the things that are to be understood:

First off, in the Forex market there are three levels. We have the brokerage accountants, the real accountants and the students. The brokerage accountants are the brokers who let the buyers and the sellers to trade there currencies. They mediate between two firms or individuals. They are the Market Makers who will set the currency values and will help the traders to trade. The real accountants are the clients who are investing in the market in order to try to get some profits from the same. The students are beginners who are trying to understand the market with the help of training courses, simulators and the like.

Forex Market should not be confused with the stock market. Stock market is one where users deal with stocks and try to make profits with the increase in the stock values, forex deals with making profits with the increase in the currencies. It is more of an objective market. In the forex market if the participants want to change or manipulate the values of the currencies for certain purposes, they can do so by operating with billions of dollars or any other currency. Since it operates on such high values the manipulation of a single participant in the market is not a possibility. But the liquidity of this market allows both sides of traders to open and close the situations. The time that a trader will occupy a position is highly arbitrary and is dependent upon the strategies that he follows through out the trading.
It is also important to note the fluctuations in the currency values.

Another important term which we”ll come across when we are learning about forex trading is Margin Trading. Margin Trading is where traders trade with borrowed amounts. It allows traders to start trading with lesser capitals than what is normally allowed. It reduces the overhead expenses of having to transfer money and enables the traders to open there positions with lesser amounts of U.S dollars thus buying and selling other currencies. In forex it is not necessary to actually buy some currencies to sell it later. It is enough for the traders to actually open the positions for buying and selling without having any. But even to open positions it is necessary to invest a certain amount in dollars. The major currencies that are traded in the forex are euro, yen, pound, franc all of which are traded against dollars.

These are the basics that need to be understood to learn forex.

About The Author

For your free course teaching you exactly how to succeed with forex trading using simple and effective forex trading systems simply go to http://forex-trading-platform.org