January 8, 2008

Forex Trading - Understanding Commissions, Spreads and Trading Costs

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The forex market is quickly becoming one of the most popular markets for trading.

Not only are the experienced traders looking to this market to maximize their trading returns, but many new, individual investors are now able to trade the Forex market - just as they do stocks and futures.

More and more individuals are seeing Forex not only as a new way to diversify their portfolio, but are also finding that it is becoming the most profitable component of their investments.

And that’s because of the many advantages Forex offers over other markets like stocks or commodities. Here’s what you will typically see advertized about Forex:

- Unparallelled liquidity. It is the largest financial market in the world by far. Almost $2 trillion being traded daily!

- Excellent leverage potential. Individual investors have access to leverage of 100:1 and even 200:1

Tip! LIQUIDITY: Because the Forex Market is so large, it is also extremely liquid. This means that with a click of a mouse you can instantaneously buy and sell at will.

- No Commissions (more on this later on)

- Low trading costs.

And yes, the Forex market really does offer all these advantages.

But the last two points above talk about costs, and that’s what we’d like to focus on in this article.

Like any trading, there are costs involved, and, while these may be much lower than they used to be, it is important to understand what those are.

Tip! Trading options. Not all forex brokers offer the same types of platforms, spreads or leverage.

Let’s start by looking at stock trading, something that most of us investors are pretty familiar with.

When trading stocks, most investors will have a trading account with a broker somewhere and will have investment funds deposited in that account.

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The broker will then execute the trades on behalf of the account holder, and of course, in return for providing that service, the broker will want to be compensated.

With stocks, typically, the broker will earn a commission for executing the trade. They will charge either a fixed dollar amount per trade, or a dollar amount per share, or (most commonly) a scaled commission based on how big your trade is.

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And, they will charge it on both sides of the transaction. That is to say, when you buy the stock you get charged commission, AND then when you sell that same stock you get charged another commission.

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With Forex trading, the brokers constantly advertise “no commission”. And, of course that’s true - except for a few brokers, who do charge a commission similar to stocks.

But also, of course, the brokers aren’t performing their trading services for free. They too make money.

The way they do that is by charging the investor a “spread”. Simply put, the spread is the difference between the bid price and the ask price for the currency being traded.

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The broker will add this spread onto the price of the trade and keep it as their fee for trading.

So, while it isn’t a commission per se, it behaves in practically the same way. It is just a little more hidden.

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The good news though is that typically this spread is only charged on one side of the transaction. In other words, you don’t pay the spread when you buy AND then again when you sell. It is usually only charged on the “buy” side of the trades.

So the spread really is your primary cost of trading the Forex and you should pay attention to the details of what the different brokers offer.

The spreads offered can vary pretty dramatically from broker to broker. And while it may not seem like much of a difference to be trading with a 5 pip spread vs a 4 pip spread, it actually can add up very quickly when you multiply it out by how many trades you make and how much money you’re trading. Think about it, 4 pips vs 5 pips is a difference of 25% on your trading costs.

Tip! Considering that forex trading consists of many aspects, someone may have lack of time to learn forex trading without any clue about which ones is important and which is not.

The other thing to recognize is that spreads can vary based on what currencies you’re trading and what type of account you open.

Tip! Selecting a Forex broker.

Most brokers will give you different spreads for different currencies. The most popular currency pairs like the EURUSD or GBPUSD will typically have the lowest spreads, while currencies that have less demand will likely be traded with higher spreads.

Be sure to think about what currencies you are most likely to be trading and find out what your spreads will be for those currencies.

Also, some brokers will offer different spreads for different types of accounts. A mini account, for example may be subject to higher spreads than a full contract account.

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And finally, because the spreads really are the difference between bid prices and ask prices as determined by the free market, it is important to recognize that they are not “guaranteed”. Most brokers will tell you that there may be times during periods of low demand, or very active trading when the spreads widen and you will be charged that wider spread.

These do tend to be rarer situations because the Forex market really is so large and demand and supply are generally quite predictable, but they do occur, especially with some of the lesser traded currencies. So it’s important to be aware of that.

In summary then, when trading Forex, understand that the “spread” is truly your most important consideration for trading costs.

Spreads can vary significantly between brokers, account types and currencies traded. And small differences in the spread can really add up to thousands of dollars in trading costs over even just a few months.

Tip! The first and the most value added a resource of forex trading is through book reading. Forex and investing categorized books are availabe in countless numbers in many bookstore and online bookstore.

So be sure to understand what currencies you are going to be trading, how frequently, and in what type of account and use those factors to help decide which broker can offer you the best trading costs.

About The Author
Rich Cochrane specializes in forex trading strategies and researching low cost trading alternatives. For more information on how to save on your forex trading and pocket more pips http://www.forexdiscountbroker.com

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Ten Top Money Making Strategies For 2008

What does 2008 bring to the average American? Does it fill you with dread or with a promise of better things to come? If learning ten new ways to make money sounds like what you may be interested in, do read on. This article will highlight ten top ways that you can make money in 2008 to generate some extra income and hopefully one of them would prove successful for you to carry out on a more regular basis.

Firstly, start clearing your house and have a garage sale. If you are like most consumer minded people, you would find that your house has gathered lots of clutter and unwanted things over the last year and a great way to clear your house and to make some money from it is to sell it at your garage sale. If you are slightly more gutsy you can try opening an account on ebay and selling your wares there.

Secondly, start small and start giving tuition to your neighbour0s kid. Teach some simple things like English or simple low level maths. Some people have actually created industries around such teaching jobs so you might want to consider the extra income that you could make from this.

Thirdly, you might consider doing a newspaper delivery round via your bicycle and this might spark off larger ideas. Many important people started doing business when they were younger doing newspaper runs and got fitter that way. Skills that can be learnt in this endeavour include distance analysis and cost efficiency and time estimation all of which are great skills that any entrepreneur later might use in any trading endeavour.

Fourthly, you might consider making money online via forex trading or otherwise known as FX Trading. In this new year, you would want to start reading all you can on forex trading both in terms of trading strategy and also in terms of the psychology of trading. Most people generally can pick up the various fundamental trading and technical trading strategies necessary but it is always the psychology of trading that will trip people up. How many people can stomach a falling market and buy in that situation? This is what trading psychology is all about and is one key to success in online trading.

Fifthly, if you have decided online trading is for you, you might wish to examine the world of stock trading. This instrument deals with company forecasts and market psychology. You would have to learn how to read balance sheets, insomuch as to tell if the Company is doing well or not and thereafter learn technical analysis to determine what the trading public0s sentiment is with regards to the particular stock you are watching.

Sixthly, if you are risk adverse, you would want to learn the strategy otherwise known as index fund dollar cost averaging. Rather than putting money in a bank account where interest may be low depending on what bank account you are depositing in, fundamental analysis guru Benjamin Graham noted that after doing extensive back research all the way to the Great Depression, that investing in index funds on a monthly basis would yield returns that would beat saving in the bank and this is also known as defensive investing and is what I would recommend before taking any excess cash for active investing.

Seventhly, start examining your hobbies with an idea to profit. For example if you are interested in stamps, spend some time pouring over pricing guides and ebay auctions to learn all you can about what you are interested in and then start planning to become a trader of whatever collectible item that you are interested in. There are lots of collectors on ebay and this market is potentially huge. Who knows, you might have the next highly prized item lying around your house.

Eighth, as a variation of the above idea, spend some time gathering all your hobby related books and considering letting others know about your hobby by blogging. Making money by blogging in recent times has become rather fashionable with online blogging superstars that can be found by doing a quick search on google with the search terms 0Pro blogger0. Making money by blogging requires some planning of content and site structure and this planning phase is critical to the success of your blog. Learn what niches are ripe for the picking and avoid niches where there are too many competitors.

Ninth, if you are a consultant or make money via the provision of services, a critical technique to making more this year is to start spending time giving free talks in your locality to trade associations and bodies and helping them along with their activities. Above all these promotional activities, the key to making money with the provision of services is to develop trust with your customers at the same time you do work for them.

Tenth, if you are not in the habit of tithing, start the habit of giving money away to the poor. People gain a sense of fulfillment when giving to their church, their charity and it is this sense of fulfillment that drives rich people like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet to make more money. Joy, peace and fulfillment are things which cannot be bought with money, but can provide the unseen impetus to propel you to greater financial achievement.

In conclusion, I hope you have benefited from this ten tips to make more money in 2008. Powerful ideas only materialize when combined with action now! Carpe Diem and here0s wishing you all the best in this new year.

About the author

Joel Teo is the owner of the Personal Finance Directory at www.Massive-Profits-Online.com which is an online Finance Resource to help you attain financial success in your life and become happier and wealthier in all ways.

Full Article At: KnowHow-Now.com Articles

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