Thursday, June 15, 2017

Influence of global events on the Forex market

The foreign exchange market (Forex), the daily turnover of which amounts to billions of US dollars, provides millions of traders with an opportunity to earn on currency rate fluctuations of various countries. The distinct feature of any financial market is its reaction to significant events that lead to price fluctuations of financial instruments and allow to earn on the difference between the Ask and Bid prices of an asset.
By trading in the Forex market, traders open positions, relying on technical and/or fundamental analyses of the market. If technical analysis forecasts the further price behavior exclusively on the basis of the analysis of price charts history, fundamental analysis studies the factors that determine the movement in the Forex market.

Factors affecting the Forex market

The volatility of the Forex market depends on the impact of various global factors that can be divided into two large groups:
  • Economic;
  • Geopolitical.

Economic factors affecting the currency exchange rate of a particular country:

  • Indicator of economic growth (GDP);
  • Inflation level and inflation expectations;
  • State of the trade balance;
  • Monetary policy of the Central Bank;
  • Unemployment rate, etc.
Any event occurring in the economy of the world's largest powers, instantly affects the Forex market. Thus, when getting involved in currency trading, a trader needs to study and analyze the most important indicators of the world economy, follow the news about the decisions of central banks regarding their monetary policy. Important economic factors confirm or reverse the trend for a long time, while retracements occur under the influence of less significant and unexpected news.
You can learn about the release dates of important news from the economic calendar.

Geopolitical factors affecting the currency exchange rate:

  • Political events;
  • Natural disasters;
  • Wars, terrorist attacks, etc.
Important geopolitical events lead to significant currency exchange rates fluctuations and often become the reason for the reversal of a long-term trend and the formation of a new one. Unlike economic news, the release of which is known beforehand, most geopolitical events, such as terrorist attacks, natural disasters, defaults, etc., are unexpected and literally destroy the currency market, causing exchange rates to rise or fall. At the same time, the effect from the release of such news quickly loses its power and, as a rule, the new trend does not last long. In such cases, traders open positions for a short period of time waiting for the next market retracement.
The Forex market is dependent on many interrelated factors that reflect the economic state of various countries. The knowledge of these factors allows a trader to quickly orient and make proper decisions at the right moment, as well as to assess the time and strength of the influence of fundamental factors on the market trend.

Friday, June 9, 2017

Forex Brokers


The growing interest in Forex market contributes to the emergence of various Forex brokers each of which is featured by its own characteristics and offered services.

What Services Do Forex Brokers Offer?

Though Forex brokers offer different services or the same service with different conditions, there are certain factors that are usually provided by most Forex brokers. For instance, numerous brokers offer leverage but the ratio may differ highly ranging between 1:100 and 1:400. Below the services that are usually offered by most reliable Forex brokers are mentioned.
  • Customer support: Providing traders with 24 hour technical support is of vital importance. This helps them arrange their trade properly, ask for help, get advice from specialists.
  • Daily market analysis: Every day brokers should provide technical and fundamental analysis that will help traders be informed of the latest market fluctuations and news, directly affecting their trade. The other privilege for traders is that they do not have to search for market analysis on other websites. Both daily analysis and trading platform are simply available in one place to make the trade rather simple and comfortable.
  • Unique trading methods and innovations: In order traders can diversify their trading strategies and the used trading instruments, brokers are trying to offer new approaches and trading methods. Each trader seeks for new opportunities, new instruments and new methods that can increase their interest towards trading and raise chances of making a high profit.

What Innovations Do Forex Brokers Offer?

Forex Brokers create and offer new instruments and trading methods. Usually brokers try to offer their own trading platforms, designed according to traders' demands and suggestions. The most recent innovation in this field that has aroused great interest among not only traders but also investors, economists and portfolio managers is Personal Composite Instrument (PCI) creating through GeWorko Method. The method is designed for effective pair (spread) trading and portfolio trading and analysis. It is realized as a whole technology that provides all conditions for traders to make a high profit with the possible lowest risks.
Offering unique services is quite difficult, and not all companies can provide that. However, innovation - the main thing that can attract traders, many of whom are looking for new and exciting services.
IFC Markets is a leading innovative financial company, offering private and corporate investors wide set of trading and analytical tools. The company provides its clients with Forex and CFD trading through its own-generated trading platform NetTradeX, which is available on PC, iOS, Android and Windows Mobile. The company also offers MetaTrader 4 platform available on PC, Mac OS, iOS, Android, Windows Mobile and Smartphone. You may compare the advantages of both platforms.

Tuesday, June 6, 2017

Uncertainty in stock markets is growing | Weekly Market Overview IFC Ma...

Margin trading in the Forex market

Margin trading is the process of trading assets with the use of borrowed funds provided to a trader by a brokerage company for a certain amount of money (margin). Margin trading or trading with leverage allows to trade in the Forex market without having a large amount of capital.

Leverage

Depending on the market you trade in (stock or currency), brokerage companies may offer leverage from 1:1 to 1:1000, i.e., a trader gets a loan of the same amount he owns or a sum 1000 times exceeding his own capital. In the Forex market, the size of leverage is usually from 1:100 to 1:500. The provision of a loan by a dealing company allows to perform speculative operations in the market with large amounts of money. Meanwhile, if a trader makes a large profit using the credit which exceeds his own funds by several times, the profit will belong only to him, and in case of unsuccessful transactions, the loss may not exceed the size of his own funds, that is to say a trader will not be in debt to a brokerage company.

Margin lending conditions

  • Funds or other assets, which were deposited on the account of a brokerage company, serve as a pledge for margin trading;
  • During the trading session, the credit is provided for free. A special fee (swap) is charged for transferring the position to the next day.

The size of margin

The size of margin depends on the market segment, the liquidity of traded instruments and the brokerage company. In currency market, the margin does not usually exceed 2%, while in the stock market it may reach 50%.
If the loss of your open positions draws near the margin size, the broker will offer to deposit the necessary sum of money (the requirement to provide additional funds is called Margin Call or “risk warning”), otherwise the positions will be forcibly closed (Stop out).

Positive and negative sides of margin trading

An absolute advantage of margin trading is the opportunity to make a large profit with a small initial capital on a trading account.
The negative side of margin trading is the great risk - the bigger the leverage, the higher the risk of losing funds in case the market moves “against you”.
No matter how attractive high leverage may seem, do not use the maximum possible leverage. It should be also noted that in case of transferring a position to the next day, you will have to pay swap for the whole volume of the position, that is why it is better to close all the positions by the end of the day.