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FOREX: Starting your own trading

Thursday, June 17th, 2010

The presented article is intended for those who just turned their eyes toward FOREX. Beginning traders who are still learning the basics of the foreign exchange market may also find something of interest here. While experienced traders wont gain anything worth their time reading this article.

Basically there are 4 steps which can be defined as must do for those who wish to start trading FOREX. Though, their order is not particularly important, the more important part is their content, to which the great attention and responsibility must be paid.

First step is finding a right FOREX broker which will be your main tool in trading. You can have a great strategy, good technical analysis skills or an outstanding intuition but you will eventually fail if you choose a bad broker. A good FOREX broker is one that will not still your money, will be doing real trading with your positions, supports your preferred depositwithdraw methods and has fast and helpful user support service. It is nice if a broker is registered with some sort of governmental financial commission. One of the most important aspects of the broker is its trading platform but for a new trader this part is not so important as for expert traders. Still youll probably want to trade with some powerful and informative platform as a MetaTrader or its analogs. For new traders the more important is a demo account which can be used to trade virtual money while you are training your FOREX skills. If you are new trader, start only with the demo account! Dont lose your money on your first mistakes!

Second step is learning the basics of FOREX trading. If you already found your FOREX broker, you will easily get all information from its website or user support. There are many articles and websites dedicated to FOREX basics in the World Wide Web. All you need to do is just google for forex trading basics and youll find everything you wanted and even more. This step shouldnt be underestimated, because trying to trade without even understanding how the market works is not only very risky, it will also become boring very soon.

Third step is about education. FOREX trading education is not similar to any other education you probably have got in your life. FOREX market is very chaotic, so is the education there are no fixed rules and all time laws, it is unstable and dynamical. So, to be on the top you must learn new things about FOREX regularly and constantly. Try to read as many books, articles other traders opinions as you can. The more you learn, the more educated you will be. And with good FOREX education you will be able to create very sophisticated and effective trading strategies.

Fourth step is a final one; at least I consider it to be a final one. To achieve the successful results in the FOREX market you need to develop your own strategies. While you are learning youll be satisfied with known strategies and probably even FOREX signals. But true goal which leads to successful FOREX trading is to develop your own strategies. Not one strategy, but to follow the market day by day, developing new strategies and improving those which began to fail. And this comes not only to the trading strategy (this part is obvious), but also to the money management strategy (this part is often underestimated). While you gain experience in trading youll inevitably build such strategies that will fit your trading style, you character and your life as best as they can. And after that, trading will become a real pleasure, which will eventually lead to your financial freedom.

Comments on Forex Trading Account Sizes, Lots and Margin Calls.

Thursday, April 8th, 2010

Comments on Forex Trading Account Sizes, Lots and Margin Calls.

Forex trading is one of the best business opportunities you can think of joining these days. No other market in the world allows the Leverage that the profitable world of currency-trading does. Leverage is all about margin trading. In the Forex market, it is essentially the ratio of the amount used in a trade to the required security deposit needed, by the particular broker you chose to use, for that trade.

Normally, for most brokerages, a margin deposit of just 1,000 allows you to control a 100,000 position in the Forex market. That’s 100:1 leverage, or 1%. Or, said in a different way, a regular full-sized account, sometimes referred to as a 100k account, allows you to trade with lot sizes equal to 100,000. Each lot is worth 100,000 in currency. So It would only require 1,000 to trade one lot.

This great feature in Forex trading is what makes this market the hottest market to trade in right now. The Forex broker has given you a loan of 99,000 pounds secured only by your 1,000! This is a huge loan and, as you may know by now, this is what allows traders to make extraordinary incomes in this market. And, as you also are probably used to hearing , “leverage is a two-edged sword” , it is what can cause you to lose a lot of money if you trade without rules or Stop-loss orders.

But just as an example, let’s say you were a person that likes to trade with reckless abandon, i.e., with no strategy, no common sense, no money- management principles, etc. Thats never recommended for anyone, but being a Forex trader has such great advantages, that even someone with a trading mind like the one described before, will never lose more than what he has placed into a trade.

Unlike Futures (Commodity Trading), the market that most people associate with High leverage, you can never have a debit balance when trading Forex.

So, despite the greater leverage associated with FX trading, it is still arguably less risky than futures trading. Futures markets are often prone to sudden and dramatic moves, against which you cant protect yourself, even by trading with protective stops. Your position may be liquidated at a loss, and youll be liable for any resulting deficit in the account. But because of the Forex markets great liquidity and 24-hour, continuous trading, dangerous trading gaps and limit moves are very unprobable. Orders are executed quickly, without slippage or partial fills, which is just great.

And as it was not enough, there are no margin calls, for your protection, the forex broker’s trading platform will automatically close out some or all of your open positions if your account equity, meaning the total floating value of the account, falls below the level required to hold the positions. Think of this as a final, automatic stop, always working on your behalf to prevent a debit balance.