subject: The Forex Market: Always Open and Always Trading [print this page] Forex trading is the exchanging of money and currencies around the world. Most nations around the world are involved to some degree in the forex trading market. In forex, money is purchased and sold based on the perceived value of a currency at one particular point in time. As many currencies are not worth much, they're not going to be exchanged heavily. These currencies are illiquid and are often dangerous to trade. Popular currency pairs include the EUR/USD and the USD/JPY. These currencies move frequently and are traded heavily by both institutions and traders.
Forex trading takes place daily, where almost two trillion dollars is traded. This allows for a fast moving trading envrionment to exist where money can easily be converted from one currency to the next. Traders love this because often long trends emerge in currency pairs.
Currencies from every country around the world are traded on the forex market. Each currency has its own three-letter symbol that represents the country and the currency being traded. For example, the Japanese yen is the JPY, the Euro is the EUR, and the United Stated dollar is USD. The spreads, which essentially is the fee you pay for purchasing a currency pair, differ from one pair to the next. You need to be aware of these as many illiquid currency pairs have wider spreads when compared to the popular pairs.
The four most heavily traded currencies are the Euro, the US dollar, the Japanese Yen, and the British pound. The trades happen all day, all night, twenty four hours a day. As one sessions opens for the day, another is closing. It is a fast paced trading environment that you shoudl always monitor when you have a trade open. Forex can be very rewarding for the trader looking for an active market.
