Online Forex Tutorial

Fundamental Analysis & Fundamentals Trading Strategies

2008-06-26T17:52:00.000-07:00

In the equities market, fundamental analysis looks to measure a company's true value and to base investments upon this type of calculation. To some extent, the same is done in the retail forex market, where forex fundamental traders evaluate currencies, and their countries, like companies and use economic announcements to gain an idea of the currency’s true value.

All of the news reports, economic data and political events that come out about a country are similar to news that comes out about a stock in that it is used by investors to gain an idea of value. This value changes over time due to many factors, including economic growth and financial strength. Fundamental traders look at all of this information to evaluate a country's currency.

Given that there are practically unlimited forex fundamentals trading strategies based on fundamental data, one could write a book on this subject. To give you a better idea of a tangible trading opportunity, let’s go over one of the most well-known situations, the forex carry trade. (To read some frequently asked questions about currency trading, see Common Questions About Currency Trading.)

A Breakdown of the Forex Carry Trade
The currency carry trade is a strategy in which a trader sells a currency that is offering lower interest rates and purchases a currency that offers a higher interest rate. In other words, you borrow at a low rate, and then lend at a higher rate. The trader using the strategy captures the difference between the two rates. When highly leveraging the trade, even a small difference between two rates can make the trade highly profitable. Along with capturing the rate difference, investors also will often see the value of the higher currency rise as money flows into the higher-yielding currency, which bids up its value.

Real-life examples of a yen carry trade can be found starting in 1999, when

Japan

decreased its interest rates to almost zero. Investors would capitalize upon these lower interest rates and borrow a large sum of Japanese yen. The borrowed yen is then converted into U.S. dollars, which are used to buy U.S. Treasury bonds with yields and coupons at around 4.5-5%. Since the Japanese interest rate was essentially zero, the investor would be paying next to nothing to borrow the Japanese yen and earn almost all the yield on his or her U.S. Treasury bonds. But with leverage, you can greatly increase the return.

For example, 10 times leverage would create a return of 30% on a 3% yield. If you have $1,000 in your account and have access to 10 times leverage, you will control $10,000. If you implement the currency carry trade from the example above, you will earn 3% per year. At the end of the year, your $10,000 investment would equal $10,300, or a $300 gain. Because you only invested $1,000 of your own money, your real return would be 30% ($300/$1,000). However this strategy only works if the currency pair’s value remains unchanged or appreciates. Therefore, most forex carry traders look not only to earn the interest rate differential, but also capital appreciation. While we’ve greatly simplified this transaction, the key thing to remember here is that a small difference in interest rates can result in huge gains when leverage is applied. Most currency brokers require a minimum margin to earn interest for carry trades.

However, this transaction is complicated by changes to the exchange rate between the two countries. If the lower-yielding currency appreciates against the higher-yielding currency, the gain earned between the two yields could be eliminated. The major reason that this can happen is that the risks of the higher-yielding currency are too much for investors, so they choose to invest in the lower-yielding, safer currency. Because carry trades are longer term in nature, they are susceptible to a variety of changes over time, such as rising rates in the lower-yielding currency, which attracts more investors and can lead to currency appreciation, diminishing the returns of the carry trade. This makes the future direction of the currency pair just as important as the interest rate differential itself. (To read more about currency pairs, see Using Currency Correlations To Your Advantage, Making Sense Of The Euro/Swiss Franc Relationship and Forces Behind Exchange Rates.)

To clarify this further, imagine that the interest rate in the U.S. was 5%, while the same interest rate in Russia was 10%, providing a carry trade opportunity for traders to short the U.S. dollar and to long the Russian ruble. Assume the trader borrows $1,000 US at 5% for a year and converts it into Russian rubles at a rate of 25 USD/RUB (25,000 rubles), investing the proceeds for a year. Assuming no currency changes, the 25,000 rubles grows to 27,500 and, if converted back to U.S. dollars, will be worth $1,100 US. But because the trader borrowed $1,000 US at 5%, he or she owes $1,050 US, making the net proceeds of the trade only $50.

However, imagine that there was another crisis in Russia, such as the one that was seen in 1998 when the Russian government defaulted on its debt and there was large currency devaluation in

Russia

as market participants sold off their Russian currency positions. If, at the end of the year the exchange rate was 50 USD/RUB, your 27,500 rubles would now convert into only $550 US (27,500 RUB x 0.02 RUB/USD). Because the trader owes $1,050 US, he or she will have lost a significant percentage of the original investment on this carry trade because of the currency’s fluctuation - even though the interest rates in Russia were higher than the U.S.

Another good example of forex fundamental analysis is based on commodity prices. (To read more about this, see Commodity Prices And Currency Movements.)

You should now have an idea of some of the basic economic and fundamental ideas that underlie the forex and impact the movement of currencies. The most important thing that should be taken away from this section is that currencies and countries, like companies, are constantly changing in value based on fundamental factors such as economic growth and interest rates. You should also, based on the economic theories mentioned above, have an idea how certain economic factors impact a country's currency. We will now move on to technical analysis, the other school of analysis that can be used to pick trades in the forex market.

source : investopedia.com

Forex History and Market Participants

2008-06-24T20:04:00.000-07:00

Given the global nature of the forex exchange market, it is important to first examine and learn some of the important historical events relating to currencies and currency exchange before entering any trades. In this section we’ll review the international monetary system and how it has evolved to its current state. We will then take a look at the major players that occupy the forex market - something that is important for all potential forex traders to understand.

The History of the Forex
Gold Standard System
The creation of the gold standard monetary system in 1875 marks one of the most important events in the history of the forex market. Before the gold standard was implemented, countries would commonly use gold and silver as means of international payment. The main issue with using gold and silver for payment is that their value is affected by external supply and demand. For example, the discovery of a new gold mine would drive gold prices down.

The underlying idea behind the gold standard was that governments guaranteed the conversion of currency into a specific amount of gold, and vice versa. In other words, a currency would be backed by gold. Obviously, governments needed a fairly substantial gold reserve in order to meet the demand for currency exchanges. During the late nineteenth century, all of the major economic countries had defined an amount of currency to an ounce of gold. Over time, the difference in price of an ounce of gold between two currencies became the exchange rate for those two currencies. This represented the first standardized means of currency exchange in history.

The gold standard eventually broke down during the beginning of World War I. Due to the political tension with Germany, the major European powers felt a need to complete large military projects. The financial burden of these projects was so substantial that there was not enough gold at the time to exchange for all the excess currency that the governments were printing off.

Although the gold standard would make a small comeback during the inter-war years, most countries had dropped it again by the onset of World War II. However, gold never ceased being the ultimate form of monetary value. (For more on this, read The Gold Standard Revisited, What Is Wrong With Gold? and Using Technical Analysis In The Gold Markets.)

Bretton Woods System
Before the end of World War II, the Allied nations believed that there would be a need to set up a monetary system in order to fill the void that was left behind when the gold standard system was abandoned. In July 1944, more than 700 representatives from the Allies convened at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to deliberate over what would be called the Bretton Woods system of international monetary management.

To simplify, Bretton Woods led to the formation of the following:

A method of fixed exchange rates;
The U.S. dollar replacing the gold standard to become a primary reserve currency; and
The creation of three international agencies to oversee economic activity: the International Monetary Fund (IMF), International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT).

One of the main features of Bretton Woods is that the U.S. dollar replaced gold as the main standard of convertibility for the world’s currencies; and furthermore, the U.S. dollar became the only currency that would be backed by gold. (This turned out to be the primary reason that Bretton Woods eventually failed.)

Over the next 25 or so years, the U.S. had to run a series of balance of payment deficits in order to be the world’s reserved currency. By the early 1970s, U.S. gold reserves were so depleted that the U.S. treasury did not have enough gold to cover all the U.S. dollars that foreign central banks had in reserve.

Finally, on August 15, 1971, U.S. President Richard Nixon closed the gold window, and the U.S. announced to the world that it would no longer exchange gold for the U.S. dollars that were held in foreign reserves. This event marked the end of Bretton Woods.

Even though Bretton Woods didn’t last, it left an important legacy that still has a significant effect on today’s international economic climate. This legacy exists in the form of the three international agencies created in the 1940s: the IMF, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (now part of the World Bank) and GATT, the precursor to the World Trade Organization. (To learn more about Bretton Wood, read What Is The International Monetary Fund? and Floating And Fixed Exchange Rates.)

Current Exchange Rates
After the Bretton Woods system broke down, the world finally accepted the use of floating foreign exchange rates during the

Jamaica

agreement of 1976. This meant that the use of the gold standard would be permanently abolished. However, this is not to say that governments adopted a pure free-floating exchange rate system. Most governments employ one of the following three exchange rate systems that are still used today:

Dollarization;
Pegged rate; and
Managed floating rate.

Dollarization
This event occurs when a country decides not to issue its own currency and adopts a foreign currency as its national currency. Although dollarization usually enables a country to be seen as a more stable place for investment, the drawback is that the country’s central bank can no longer print money or make any sort of monetary policy. An example of dollarization is El Salvador's use of the U.S. dollar. (To read more, see Dollarization Explained.)

Pegged Rates
Pegging occurs when one country directly fixes its exchange rate to a foreign currency so that the country will have somewhat more stability than a normal float. More specifically, pegging allows a country’s currency to be exchanged at a fixed rate with a single or a specific basket of foreign currencies. The currency will only fluctuate when the pegged currencies change.

For example, China pegged its yuan to the U.S. dollar at a rate of 8.28 yuan to US$1, between 1997 and July 21, 2005. The downside to pegging would be that a currency’s value is at the mercy of the pegged currency’s economic situation. For example, if the U.S. dollar appreciates substantially against all other currencies, the yuan would also appreciate, which may not be what the Chinese central bank wants.

Managed Floating Rates
This type of system is created when a currency’s exchange rate is allowed to freely change in value subject to the market forces of supply and demand. However, the government or central bank may intervene to stabilize extreme fluctuations in exchange rates. For example, if a country’s currency is depreciating far beyond an acceptable level, the government can raise short-term interest rates. Raising rates should cause the currency to appreciate slightly; but understand that this is a very simplified example. Central banks typically employ a number of tools to manage currency.

Market Participants
Unlike the equity market - where investors often only trade with institutional investors (such as mutual funds) or other individual investors - there are additional participants that trade on the forex market for entirely different reasons than those on the equity market. Therefore, it is important to identify and understand the functions and motivations of the main players of the forex market.

Governments and Central Banks
Arguably, some of the most influential participants involved with currency exchange are the central banks and federal governments. In most countries, the central bank is an extension of the government and conducts its policy in tandem with the government. However, some governments feel that a more independent central bank would be more effective in balancing the goals of curbing inflation and keeping interest rates low, which tends to increase economic growth. Regardless of the degree of independence that a central bank possesses, government representatives typically have regular consultations with central bank representatives to discuss monetary policy. Thus, central banks and governments are usually on the same page when it comes to monetary policy.

Central banks are often involved in manipulating reserve volumes in order to meet certain economic goals. For example, ever since pegging its currency (the yuan) to the U.S. dollar, China has been buying up millions of dollars worth of U.S. treasury bills in order to keep the yuan at its target exchange rate. Central banks use the foreign exchange market to adjust their reserve volumes. With extremely deep pockets, they yield significant influence on the currency markets.

Banks and Other Financial Institutions
In addition to central banks and governments, some of the largest participants involved with forex transactions are banks. Most individuals who need foreign currency for small-scale transactions deal with neighborhood banks. However, individual transactions pale in comparison to the volumes that are traded in the interbank market.

The interbank market is the market through which large banks transact with each other and determine the currency price that individual traders see on their trading platforms. These banks transact with each other on electronic brokering systems that are based upon credit. Only banks that have credit relationships with each other can engage in transactions. The larger the bank, the more credit relationships it has and the better the pricing it can access for its customers. The smaller the bank, the less credit relationships it has and the lower the priority it has on the pricing scale.

Banks, in general, act as dealers in the sense that they are willing to buy/sell a currency at the bid/ask price. One way that banks make money on the forex market is by exchanging currency at a premium to the price they paid to obtain it. Since the forex market is a decentralized market, it is common to see different banks with slightly different exchange rates for the same currency.

Hedgers
Some of the biggest clients of these banks are businesses that deal with international transactions. Whether a business is selling to an international client or buying from an international supplier, it will need to deal with the volatility of fluctuating currencies.

If there is one thing that management (and shareholders) detest, it is uncertainty. Having to deal with foreign-exchange risk is a big problem for many multinationals. For example, suppose that a German company orders some equipment from a Japanese manufacturer to be paid in yen one year from now. Since the exchange rate can fluctuate wildly over an entire year, the German company has no way of knowing whether it will end up paying more euros at the time of delivery.

One choice that a business can make to reduce the uncertainty of foreign-exchange risk is to go into the spot market and make an immediate transaction for the foreign currency that they need.

Unfortunately, businesses may not have enough cash on hand to make spot transactions or may not want to hold massive amounts of foreign currency for long periods of time. Therefore, businesses quite frequently employ hedging strategies in order to lock in a specific exchange rate for the future or to remove all sources of exchange-rate risk for that transaction.

For example, if a European company wants to import steel from the U.S., it would have to pay in U.S. dollars. If the price of the euro falls against the dollar before payment is made, the European company will realize a financial loss. As such, it could enter into a contract that locked in the current exchange rate to eliminate the risk of dealing in U.S. dollars. These contracts could be either forwards or futures contracts.

Speculators
Another class of market participants involved with foreign exchange-related transactions is speculators. Rather than hedging against movement in exchange rates or exchanging currency to fund international transactions, speculators attempt to make money by taking advantage of fluctuating exchange-rate levels.

The most famous of all currency speculators is probably George Soros. The billionaire hedge fund manager is most famous for speculating on the decline of the British pound, a move that earned $1.1 billion in less than a month. On the other hand, Nick Leeson, a derivatives trader with England’s Barings Bank, took speculative positions on futures contracts in yen that resulted in losses amounting to more than $1.4 billion, which led to the collapse of the company.

Some of the largest and most controversial speculators on the forex market are hedge funds, which are essentially unregulated funds that employ unconventional investment strategies in order to reap large returns. Think of them as mutual funds on steroids. Hedge funds are the favorite whipping boys of many a central banker. Given that they can place such massive bets, they can have a major effect on a country’s currency and economy. Some critics blamed hedge funds for the Asian currency crisis of the late 1990s, but others have pointed out that the real problem was the ineptness of Asian central bankers. (For more on hedge funds, see Introduction To Hedge Funds - Part One and Part Two.)Either way, speculators can have a big sway on the currency markets, particularly big ones.

Now that you have a basic understanding of the forex market, its participants and its history, we can move on to some of the more advanced concepts that will bring you closer to being able to trade within this massive market. The next section will look at the main economic theories that underlie the forex market.

source : www.investopedia.com

Foreign Exchange Risk and Benefits

2008-06-24T19:51:00.001-07:00

In this section, we'll take a look at some of the benefits and risks associated with the forex market. We'll also discuss how it differs from the equity market in order to get a greater understanding of how the forex market works.

The Good and the Bad
We already have mentioned that factors such as the size, volatility and global structure of the foreign exchange market have all contributed to its rapid success. Given the highly liquid nature of this market, investors are able to place extremely large trades without affecting any given exchange rate. These large positions are made available to forex traders because of the low margin requirements used by the majority of the industry's brokers. For example, it is possible for a trader to control a position of US$100,000 by putting down as little as US$1,000 up front and borrowing the remainder from his or her forex broker. This amount of leverage acts as a double-edged sword because investors can realize large gains when rates make a small favorable change, but they also run the risk of a massive loss when the rates move against them. Despite the foreign exchange risks, the amount of leverage available in the forex market is what makes it attractive for many speculators.

The currency market is also the only market that is truly open 24 hours a day with decent liquidity throughout the day. For traders who may have a day job or just a busy schedule, it is an optimal market to trade in. As you can see from the chart below, the major trading hubs are spread throughout many different time zones, eliminating the need to wait for an opening or closing bell. As the

U.S.

trading closes, other markets in the East are opening, making it possible to trade at any time during the day.

Time Zone	Time (ET)
Tokyo Open	7:00 pm
Tokyo Close	4:00 am
London Open	3:00 am
London Close	12:00 pm
New York Open	8:00 am
New York Close	5:00 pm

While the forex market may offer more excitement to the investor, the risks are also higher in comparison to trading equities. The ultra-high leverage of the forex market means that huge gains can quickly turn to damaging losses and can wipe out the majority of your account in a matter of minutes. This is important for all new traders to understand, because in the forex market - due to the large amount of money involved and the number of players - traders will react quickly to information released into the market, leading to sharp moves in the price of the currency pair.

Though currencies don't tend to move as sharply as equities on a percentage basis (where a company's stock can lose a large portion of its value in a matter of minutes after a bad announcement), it is the leverage in the spot market that creates the volatility. For example, if you are using 100:1 leverage on $1,000 invested, you control $100,000 in capital. If you put $100,000 into a currency and the currency's price moves 1% against you, the value of the capital will have decreased to $99,000 - a loss of $1,000, or all of your invested capital, representing a 100% loss. In the equities market, most traders do not use leverage, therefore a 1% loss in the stock's value on a $1,000 investment, would only mean a loss of $10. Therefore, it is important to take into account the risks involved in the forex market before diving in.

Differences Between Forex and Equities
A major difference between the forex and equities markets is the number of traded instruments: the forex market has very few compared to the thousands found in the equities market. The majority of forex traders focus their efforts on seven different currency pairs: the four majors, which include (EUR/USD, USD/JPY, GBP/USD, USD/CHF); and the three commodity pairs (USD/CAD, AUD/USD, NZD/USD). All other pairs are just different combinations of the same currencies, otherwise known as cross currencies. This makes currency trading easier to follow because rather than having to cherry-pick between 10,000 stocks to find the best value, all that FX traders need to do is “keep up” on the economic and political news of eight countries.

The equity markets often can hit a lull, resulting in shrinking volumes and activity. As a result, it may be hard to open and close positions when desired. Furthermore, in a declining market, it is only with extreme ingenuity that an equities investor can make a profit. It is difficult to short-sell in the

U.S.

equities market because of strict rules and regulations regarding the process. On the other hand, forex offers the opportunity to profit in both rising and declining markets because with each trade, you are buying and selling simultaneously, and short-selling is, therefore, inherent in every transaction. In addition, since the forex market is so liquid, traders are not required to wait for an uptick before they are allowed to enter into a short position - as they are in the equities market.

Due to the extreme liquidity of the forex market, margins are low and leverage is high. It just is not possible to find such low margin rates in the equities markets; most margin traders in the equities markets need at least 50% of the value of the investment available as margin, whereas forex traders need as little as 1%. Furthermore, commissions in the equities market are much higher than in the forex market. Traditional brokers ask for commission fees on top of the spread, plus the fees that have to be paid to the exchange. Spot forex brokers take only the spread as their fee for the transaction. (For a more in-depth introduction to currency trading, see Getting Started in Forex and A Primer On The Forex Market.)

By now you should have a basic understanding of what the forex market is and how it works. In the next section, we'll examine the evolution of the current foreign exchange system.

Source : investopedia.com

What is Forex Trading?

2008-06-24T06:35:00.000-07:00

The foreign exchange market is the "place" where currencies are traded. Currencies are important to most people around the world, whether they realize it or not, because currencies need to be exchanged in order to conduct foreign trade and business. If you are living in the U.S. and want to buy cheese from

France

, either you or the company that you buy the cheese from has to pay the French for the cheese in euros (EUR). This means that the U.S. importer would have to exchange the equivalent value of U.S. dollars (USD) into euros. The same goes for traveling. A French tourist in

Egypt

can't pay in euros to see the pyramids because it's not the locally accepted currency. As such, the tourist has to exchange the euros for the local currency, in this case the Egyptian pound, at the current exchange rate.

The need to exchange currencies is the primary reason why the forex market is the largest, most liquid financial market in the world. It dwarfs other markets in size, even the stock market, with an average traded value of around U.S. $2,000 billion per day. (The total volume changes all the time, but as of April 2004, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) reported that the forex market traded U.S. $1,900 billion per day.)

One unique aspect of this international market is that there is no central marketplace for foreign exchange. Rather, currency trading is conducted electronically over-the-counter (OTC), which means that all transactions occur via computer networks between traders around the world, rather than on one centralized exchange. The market is open 24 hours a day, five and a half days a week, and currencies are traded worldwide in the major financial centers of London, New York, Tokyo, Zurich, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, Singapore, Paris and Sydney - across almost every time zone. This means that when the trading day in the U.S. ends, the forex market begins anew in Tokyo and Hong Kong. As such, the forex market can be extremely active any time of the day, with price quotes changing constantly.

Spot Market and the Forwards and Futures Markets
There are actually three ways that institutions, corporations and individuals trade forex: the spot market, the forwards market and the futures market. The forex trading in the spot market always has been the largest market because it is the "underlying" real asset that the forwards and futures markets are based on. In the past, the futures market was the most popular venue for traders because it was available to individual investors for a longer period of time. However, with the advent of electronic trading, the spot market has witnessed a huge surge in activity and now surpasses the futures market as the preferred trading market for individual investors and speculators. When people refer to the forex market, they usually are referring to the spot market. The forwards and futures markets tend to be more popular with companies that need to hedge their foreign exchange risks out to a specific date in the future.

What is the spot market?
More specifically, the spot market is where currencies are bought and sold according to the current price. That price, determined by supply and demand, is a reflection of many things, including current interest rates, economic performance, sentiment towards ongoing political situations (both locally and internationally), as well as the perception of the future performance of one currency against another. When a deal is finalized, this is known as a "spot deal". It is a bilateral transaction by which one party delivers an agreed-upon currency amount to the counter party and receives a specified amount of another currency at the agreed-upon exchange rate value. After a position is closed, the settlement is in cash. Although the spot market is commonly known as one that deals with transactions in the present (rather than the future), these trades actually take two days for settlement.

What are the forwards and futures markets?
Unlike the spot market, the forwards and futures markets do not trade actual currencies. Instead they deal in contracts that represent claims to a certain currency type, a specific price per unit and a future date for settlement.

In the forwards market, contracts are bought and sold OTC between two parties, who determine the terms of the agreement between themselves.

In the futures market, futures contracts are bought and sold based upon a standard size and settlement date on public commodities markets, such as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. In the

U.S.

, the National Futures Association regulates the futures market. Futures contracts have specific details, including the number of units being traded, delivery and settlement dates, and minimum price increments that cannot be customized. The exchange acts as a counterpart to the trader, providing clearance and settlement.

Both types of contracts are binding and are typically settled for cash for the exchange in question upon expiry, although contracts can also be bought and sold before they expire. The forwards and futures markets can offer protection against risk when trading currencies. Usually, big international corporations use these markets in order to hedge against future exchange rate fluctuations, but speculators take part in these markets as well. (For a more in-depth introduction to futures, see Futures Fundamentals.)

Note that you'll see the terms: FX, forex, foreign-exchange market and currency market. These terms are synonymous and all refer to the forex market.

Source : www.investopedia.com

Introduction to Currency Trading

2008-06-24T06:04:00.000-07:00

The foreign exchange market (forex or FX for short) is one of the most exciting, fast-paced markets around. Until recently, forex trading in the currency market had been the domain of large financial institutions, corporations, central banks, hedge funds and extremely wealthy individuals. The emergence of the internet has changed all of this, and now it is possible for average investors to buy and sell currencies easily with the click of a mouse through online brokerage accounts.

Daily currency fluctuations are usually very small. Most currency pairs move less than one cent per day, representing a less than 1% change in the value of the currency. This makes foreign exchange one of the least volatile financial markets around. Therefore, many currency speculators rely on the availability of enormous leverage to increase the value of potential movements. In the retail forex market, leverage can be as much as 250:1. Higher leverage can be extremely risky, but because of round-the-clock trading and deep liquidity, foreign exchange brokers have been able to make high leverage an industry standard in order to make the movements meaningful for currency traders.

Extreme liquidity and the availability of high leverage have helped to spur the market's rapid growth and made it the ideal place for many traders. Positions can be opened and closed within minutes or can be held for months. Currency prices are based on objective considerations of supply and demand and cannot be manipulated easily because the size of the market does not allow even the largest players, such as central banks, to move prices at will.

The forex market provides plenty of opportunity for investors. However, in order to be successful, a currency trader has to understand the basics behind currency movements.

The goal of this forex tutorial is to provide a foundation for investors or traders who are new to the foreign currency markets. We'll cover the basics of exchange rates, the market's history and the key concepts you need to understand in order to be able to participate in this market. We'll also venture into how to start trading foreign currencies and the different types of strategies that can be employed.

source : investopedia.com