A brief look at Foreign Exchange

The foreign exchange (currency or forex or FX) market exists wherever one currency is traded for another. It is one of the largest financial markets in the world, and includes trading between large banks, central banks, currency speculators, multinational corporations, governments, and other financial markets and institutions. The average daily trade in the global forex and related markets currently is over US$ 3 trillion.

Currency exchange is very attractive for both the corporate and individual traders who make money on the Forex - a special financial market assigned for the foreign exchange. The following features make this market different in compare to all other sectors of the world financial system:

• heightened sensibility to a large and continuously changing number of factors;
• accessibility to all traders in the major currencies;
• guaranteed quantity and liquidity of the major currencies;
• increased consideration for several currencies, round-the clock business hours which enable traders to deal after normal hours or during national holidays in their country finding markets abroad open and
• extremely high efficiency relative to other financial markets.

History

Currency trading has a long history and can be traced back to the ancient Middle East and Middle Ages when foreign exchange started to take shape after the international merchant bankers devised bills of exchange, which were transferable 3rd-party payments that allowed flexibility and growth in foreign "exchange market" trading and market deals.

The modern foreign exchange market characterized by the consequent periods of increased volatility and relative stability formed itself in the twentieth century. By the mid-1930s London became to be the leading center for foreign exchange and the British pound served as the currency to trade and to keep as a reserve currency. Because in the old times foreign exchange was traded on the telex machines, or cable, the pound has generally the nickname “cable”. In 1930, the Bank for International Settlements was established in Basel, Switzerland, to oversee the financial efforts of the newly independent countries, emerged after the World War I, and to provide monetary relief to countries experiencing temporary balance of payments difficulties.

After the World War II, where the British economy was destroyed and the United States was the only country unscarred by war, U.S. dollar became the prominent currency of the entire globe. Nowadays, currencies all over the world are generally quoted against the U.S. dollar.

Market participants

Unlike a stock market, where all participants have access to the same prices, the forex market is divided into levels of access. At the top is the inter-bank market, which is made up of the largest investment banking firms. Within the inter-bank market, spreads, which are the difference between the bid and ask prices, are razor sharp and usually unavailable, and not known to players outside the inner circle. As you descend the levels of access, the difference between the bid and ask prices widens (from 0-1 pip to 1-2 pips for some currencies such as the EUR). This is due to volume. If a trader can guarantee large numbers of transactions for large amounts, they can demand a smaller difference between the bid and ask price, which is referred to as a better spread. The levels of access that make up the forex market are determined by the size of the “line” (the amount of money with which they are trading). The top-tier inter-bank market accounts for 53% of all transactions. After that there are usually smaller investment banks, followed by large multi-national corporations (which need to hedge risk and pay employees in different countries), large hedge funds, and even some of the retail forex market makers. According to Galati and Melvin, “Pension funds, insurance companies, mutual funds, and other institutional investors have played an increasingly important role in financial markets in general, and in FX markets in particular, since the early 2000s.” (2004) In addition, he notes, “Hedge funds have grown markedly over the 2001–2004 period in terms of both number and overall size” Central banks also participate in the forex market to align currencies to their economic needs.

Trading Features

The main trading centers are in London, New York, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Singapore, but banks throughout the world participate. Currency trading happens continuously throughout the day; as the Asian trading session ends, the European session begins, followed by the North American session and then back to the Asian session, excluding weekends.

There is little or no 'inside information' in the foreign exchange markets. Exchange rate fluctuations are usually caused by actual monetary flows as well as by expectations of changes in monetary flows caused by changes in GDP growth, inflation, interest rates, budget and trade deficits or surpluses, large cross-border M&A deals and other macroeconomic conditions. Major news is released publicly, often on scheduled dates, so many people have access to the same news at the same time. However, the large banks have an important advantage; they can see their customers' order flow.

Currencies are traded against one another. Each pair of currencies thus constitutes an individual product and is traditionally noted XXX/YYY, where YYY is the ISO 4217 international three-letter code of the currency into which the price of one unit of XXX is expressed (called base currency). For instance, EUR/USD is the price of the euro expressed in US dollars, as in 1 euro = 1.3045 dollar. Out of convention, the first currency in the pair, the base currency, was the stronger currency at the creation of the pair. The second currency, counter currency, was the weaker currency at the creation of the pair.

The factors affecting XXX will affect both XXX/YYY and XXX/ZZZ. This causes positive currency correlation between XXX/YYY and XXX/ZZZ.

Factors Affecting Forex

• Interest Rate Volatility
• Business Internationalization
• Increasing of Corporate Interest
• Inflation levels
• Political Conditions
• Market Psychology
  
• Increasing of traders Sophistication
• Developments in Telecommunications
• Computer n Programming development

How does one Profit in Forex???

Very simple and obvious: buy cheap and sell for more! The profit is generated from the fluctuations (changes) in the currency exchange market.

The nice thing about the FOREX market, is that regular daily fluctuations, say - around 1%, are multiplied by 100! (in general, Easy-ForexT offers trading ratios from 1:50 to 1:200). If, for example, the exchange rate of "your" pair of currencies increased by 0.6% in the last 4 hours, your profit will be 60% on your investment! Such can happen in one business day, or in a few hours, even minutes.

Moreover, you cannot lose more than your "margin"! You may profit unlimited amounts, but you never lose more than what you initially risked and invested.

You can implement your choice (the pair of currencies, the volume amount) under any direction to which the market is moving, and yet make profit. It does not matter whether the exchange rate is going up or down: you can always decide to buy Euro and sell dollar, or vice versa - buy dollar and sell Euro. You don't have to physically possess certain currencies in order to perform "buy" or "sell" with them.

Further reading

Wiki link

The Foreign Exchange Theory--Google book

Forex Market--A PPT

Market forex

Technical Analysis of Forex Market

Forex Market-- A deeper look