Monday, May 3, 2010

Risks Inherent to Forex

High Risk Investment

Trading foreign exchange on margin carries a high level of risk, and may not be suitable for all investors. Before deciding to trade foreign exchange you should carefully consider your investment objectives, level of experience, and risk appetite. The possibility exists that you could sustain a loss of some or all of your initial investment and therefore you should not invest money that you cannot afford to lose. You should be aware of all the risks associated with foreign exchange trading, and seek advice from an independent financial advisor if you have any doubts.

Trade with a Strategy

Trading successfully is by no means a simple matter. It requires time, market knowledge and market understanding and a large amount of self restraint.

Anyone who says you can consistently make money in foreign exchange markets is being untruthful. Foreign exchange by nature, is a volatile market. The practice of trading it by way of margin increases that volatility exponentially. We are therefore talking about a very 'fast market' which is naturally inconsistent. Following that precept, it is logical to say that in order to make a successful trade, a trader has to take into account technical and fundamental data and make an informed decision based on his perception of market sentiment and market expectation. Timing a trade correctly is probably the most important variable in trading successfully but invariably there will be times where a traders' timing will be off. Don't loose heart if you loose on some trades. Experienced and seasoned traders do not expect to generate returns on every trade.

Let's enumerate what a trader needs to do in order to put the best chances for profitable trades on his side:


Trade with money you can afford to lose:

Trading forex markets is speculative and can result in loss, it is also exciting, exhilarating and can be addictive. The more you are 'involved with your money' the harder it is to make a clear-headed decision. Money you have earned is precious, but money you need to survive should never be traded.


If in doubt, stay out:


If you're unsure about a trade and find you're hesitating, stay on the sidelines.


Trade logical transaction sizes:

Margin trading allows the forex trader a very large amount of leverage, trading at full margin capacity can make for some very large profits or losses on an account. Scaling your trades so that you may re-enter the market or make transactions on other currencies is generally wiser. In short, don't trade amounts that can potentially wipe you out and don't put all your eggs in one basket.


Identify the state of the market:

What is the market doing? Is it trending upwards, downwards, is it in a trading range. Is the trend strong or weak, did it begin long ago or does it look like a new trend that's forming. Getting a clear picture of the market situation is laying the groundwork for a successful trade.


Determine what time frame you're trading on:

Many traders get in the market without thinking when they would like to get out, after all the goal is to make money. This is true but when trading, one must extrapolate in his mind's eye the movement that one expects to happen. Within this extrapolation, resides a price evolution during a certain period of time. Attached to this is the idea of exit price. The importance of this is to mentally put your trade in perspective and although it is clearly impossible to know exactly when you will exit the market, it is important to define from the outset if you'll be 'scalping' (trying to get a few points off the market) trading intra-day, or going longer term. This will also determine what chart period you're looking at. If you trade many times a day, there's no point basing your technical analysis on a daily graph, you'll probably want to analyse 30 minute or hour graphs. Additionally it is important to know the different time periods when various financial centers enter and exit the market as this creates more or less volatility and liquidity and can influence market movements.


Time your trade:


You can be right about a potential market movement but be too early or too late when you enter the trade. Timing considerations are twofold, an expected market figure like CPI, retail sales or a federal reserve decision can consolidate a movement that's already underway. Timing your move means knowing what's expected and taking into account all considerations before trading. Technical analysis can help you identify when and at what price a move may occur.


Gauge market sentiment:

Market sentiment is what most of the market is perceived to be feeling about the market and therefore what it is doing or will do. This is basically about trend. You may have heard the term 'the trend is your friend', this basically means that if you're in the right direction with a strong trend you will make successful trades. This of course is very simplistic, a trend is capable of reversal at any time. Technical and fundamental data can indicate however if the trend has begun long ago and if it is strong or weak.


Market expectation:

Market expection relates to what most people are expecting as far as upcoming news is concerned. If people are expecting an interest rate to rise and it does, then there usually will not be much of a movement because the information will already have been 'discounted' by the market, alternatively if the adverse happens, markets will usually react violently.


Use what other traders use:

In a perfect world, every trader would be looking at a 14 day RSI and making trading decisions based on that. If that was the case, when RSI would go under the 30 level, everyone would buy and by consequence the price would rise. Needless to say, the world is not perfect and not all market participants follow the same technical indicators, draw the same trendlines and identify the same support & resistance levels. The great diversity of opinions and techniques used translates directly into price diversity. Traders however have a tendency to use a limited variety of technical tools. The most common are 9 and 14 day RSI, obvious trendlines and support levels, fibonnacci retracement, MACD and 9, 20 & 40 day exponential moving averages. The closer you get to what most traders are looking at, the more precise your estimations will be. The reason for this is simple arithmetic, larger numbers of buyers than sellers at a certain price will move the market up from that price and vice-versa.

Use of a Margin (Can work "for" or "against" you)

Trading on a margined basis in foreign exchange is not a complicated concept as some may make it out to be. The easiest way to view margin trading is like this:

Essentially when a trader trades on margin he is using a free short-term credit allowance from the institution that is offering the margin. This short-term credit allowance is used to purchase an amount of currency that greatly exceeds the account value of the trader. Let's take the following example:

Example:
Trader X has an account with EUR 50'000 with ACM. He trades ticket sizes of 1'000'000 EUR/USD. This equates to a margin ratio of 5% (50'000 is 5% of 1'000'000). How can trader x trade 20 times the amount of money he has at his disposal? The answer is that he temporarily receives the necessary credit to make the transaction he is interested in making. Without margin, trader X would only be able to buy or sell tickets of 50'000 at a time.

Margin serves as collateral to cover any losses that you might incur. Since nothing is actually being purchased or sold for delivery, the only requirement, and indeed the only real purpose for having funds in your account, is for sufficient margin.

We do not recommend trading with full 1% margin capacity as this engages a large amount of risk. Ultimately the choice is left to the trader to make transactions that meet his appetite for risk.

The important difference in Speculating or Investing

It is very important that the individual wanting to trade foreign exchange be aware of the very marked difference between speculation and investment. Foreign exchange trading is by nature a speculative occupation. Foreign exchange markets are amongst the most volatile markets in the world. When traded on a margined basis they effectively become the most volatile in the world.

Day trading in foreign exchange can be extremely profitable and high-risk profile traders can generate huge percentage returns even overnight. Day trading is however a mentally and psychologically challenging activity and is by no means meant for everyone. Day trading is essentially speculation and day traders essentially only do that: day trading. Most people who trade foreign exchange are not professional day traders however.

Often the contractors of foreign exchange brokerage services are professionals in some capacity or other. These people do not day trade but take the occasional position from time to time. This is also speculation and should not be confused with making an investment.

The conclusion here is that the nature of foreign exchange trading not lend itself as much to investment as it does to speculation and hedging (hedging may be performed in forward instruments). It is possible in a sense to make an investment in foreign exchange over a long-term period but this necessitates a large account value and low leveraging.

Forex Trading - Market Dynamics

The breadth, depth, and liquidity of the market are truly impressive. It has been estimated that the world's most active exchange rates like EURUSD and USDJPY can change up to 18,000 times during a single day.

Somewhere on the planet, financial centers are open for business, and banks and other institutions are trading the dollar and other currencies, every hour of the day and night, aside from possible minor gaps on weekends. In financial centers around the world, business hours overlap; as some centers close, others open and begin to trade.

The foreign exchange market follows the sun around the earth. Each business day arrives first in the Asia-Pacific financial centers; first Wellington, New Zealand, then Sydney, Australia, followed by Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Singapore. A few hours later, while markets remain active in those Asian centers, trading begins in Bahrain and elsewhere in the Middle East. Later still, when it is late in the business day in Tokyo, markets in Europe open for business. Subsequently, when it is early afternoon in Europe, trading in New York and other U.S. centers starts. Finally, completing the circle, when it is middle or late afternoon in the United States, the next day has arrived in the Asia-Pacific area, the first markets there have opened, and the process begins again.


1. Spot rate

A spot transaction is a straightforward (or outright) exchange of one currency for another. The spot rate is the current market price or 'cash' rate. Spot transactions do not require immediate settlement, or payment 'on the spot'. By convention, the settlement date, or value date, is the second business day after the deal date on which the transaction is made by the two parties.


2. Bid & ask

In the foreign exchange market (and essentially in all markets) there is a buying and selling price. It is important to perceive these prices as a reflection of market condition.

A market maker is expected to quote simultaneously for his customers both a price at which he is willing to buy (the bid) and a price at which he is willing to sell (the ask) standard amounts of any currency for which he is making a market.

Generally speaking the difference between the bid and ask rates reflect the level of liquidity in a certain instrument. On a normal trading day, the major currency pairs EURUSD, USDJPY, USDCHF and GBPUSD are traded by a multitude of market participant every few seconds. High liquidity means that there is always a seller for your buy and a buyer for your sell at actual prices.


3. Base currency and counter currency

Every foreign exchange transaction involves two currencies. It is important to keep straight which is the base currency and which is the counter currency. The counter currency is the numerator and the base currency is the denominator. When the counter currency increases, the base currency strengthens and becomes more expensive. When the counter currency decreases, the base currency weakens and becomes cheaper. In telephone trading communications, the base currency is always stated first. For example, a quotation for USDJPY means the US dollar is the base and the yen is the counter currency. In the case of GBPUSD (usually called 'cable') the British pound is the base and the US dollar is the counter currency.


4. Quotes in terms of base currency

Traders always think in terms of how much it costs to buy or sell the base currency. When a quote of 0.9150 / 53 is given that means that a trader can buy EUR against USD at 0.9153. If he is buying EURUSD for 1'000'000 at that rate he would have USD 915'300 in exchange for his million Euro. Of course traders are not actually interested in exchanging large amounts of different currency, their main focus is to buy at a low rate and sell at higher one.


5. Basis points or 'pips'


For most currencies, bid and offer quotes are carried down to the fourth decimal place. That represents one-hundredth of one percent, or 1/10,000th of the counter currency unit, usually called a 'pip'. However, for a few currency units that are relatively small in absolute value, such as the Japanese yen, quotes may be carried down to two decimal places and a 'pip' is 1/100th of the terms currency unit. In foreign exchange, a 'pip' is the smallest amount by which a price may fluctuate in that market.


6. Euro cross & cross rates


Euro cross rates are currency pairs that involve the Euro currency versus another currency. Examples of Euro crosses are EURJPY, EURCHF and GBPEUR. Currency pairs that involve neither the Euro nor the US dollar are called cross rates. Examples of cross rates are GBPJPY and CHFJPY. Of course hundreds of cross rates exist involving exotic currency pairs but they are often plagued by low liquidity. Ever since the Euro the number of liquid cross rates have decreased and have been replaced (to a certain extent) by Euro crosses.

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Forex Trading - Main Markets

Foreign exchange is traded essentially in two distinctive ways. Over an organized exchange and 'over the counter'. Exchange traded foreign exchange represents a very small portion of the total foreign exchange market the great majority of foreign exchange deals being traded between banks and other market participants 'over the counter'.


1. Exchange traded currencies

In the case of an organized exchange like the Chicago Mercantile exchange (CME) in the US, standardized currency contract sizes that represent a certain monetary value are traded in the International money market (IMM). A central clearing house organizes matching of transactions between counter-parties.


2. Forex market

In comparison the over the counter market is traded around the world by a multitude of participants and price quality, reputation and trading conditions determine who a participant wishes to trade with. It is probably the most competitive market in the world and brokers must insure they live up to the highest standards of service and be compliant with market standards and practices if they want to acquire new customers and retain their existing ones. In 1998 a survey under the auspices of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), global turnover of reporting dealers was estimated at about USD 1.49 trillion per day. In comparison, currency futures turnover was estimated at USD 12 billion.

Among the various financial centers around the world, the largest amount of foreign exchange trading takes place in the United Kingdom, even though that nation's currency, the British pound is less widely traded in the market than several others. The United Kingdom accounts for about 32 percent of the global total; the United States ranks a distant second with about 18 percent, and Japan is third with 8 percent.

Who participate in Forex Trading?

In the last years, the foreign exchange market has expanded from one where banks would execute transactions between themselves to one in which many other kinds of financial institutions like brokers and market-makers participate including non-financial corporations, investment firms, pension funds and hedge funds.

Its' focus has broadened from servicing importers and exporters to handling the vast amounts of overseas investment and other capital flows that currently take place. Lately foreign exchange day trading has become increasingly popular and various firms offer trading facilities to the small investor.

Foreign exchange is an 'over the counter' (OTC) market, that means that there is no central exchange and clearing house where orders are matched. Geographic trading 'centers' exist around the world however and are: (in order of importance) London, New York, Tokyo, Singapore, Frankfurt, Geneva & Zurich, Paris and Hong Kong. Essentially foreign exchange deals are made between participants on the basis of trust and reputation to deliver on an agreement. In the case of banks trading with one another, they do so solely on that basis. In the retail market, customers demand a written legally accepted contract between themselves and their broker in exchange of a deposit of funds on which basis the customer may trade.

Some market participants may be involved in the 'goods' market, conducting international transactions for the purchase or sale of merchandise. Some may be engaged in 'direct investment' in plant and equipment, or may be in the 'money market,' trading short-term debt instruments internationally. The various investors, hedgers, and speculators may be focused on any time period, from a few minutes to several years. But, whether official or private, and whether their motive be investing, hedging, speculating, arbitraging, paying for imports, or seeking to influence the rate, they are all part of the aggregate demand for and supply of the currencies involved, and they all play a role in determining the exchange rate at that moment.