Online forex

Financial Collaborative Trading Networks Shahin Shojai Capco Journal of Financial Transformation, Vol. 1, pp. 30-37, April 2001

2008-08-28T21:01:00.000-07:00

Abstract:
This paper reviews the growth of the online business-to-business marketplaces and proposes that intense competition between and among horizontal hubs and vertical exchanges will lead to consolidation. Financial collaborative trading networks (CTNs) would follow as a consequence. CTNs allow collaboration among providers to ensure that customers receive only the best service from network members. To become best-of-breed in their core services, many financial institutions will outsource their non-core services to business service providers (BSPs). BSPs focus on providing best-of-breed back- and middle-office management, freeing institutions to focus on meeting client needs. The ability to outsource will significantly lower barriers to entry into this industry. Consequently, most large financial institutions will find themselves competing with many new financial services industry entrants.

Accepted Paper Series

Choosing a Forex Broker By Grace Cheng, Copyright Grace Cheng

2008-07-08T16:31:00.000-07:00

As you may already know, foreign exchange (Forex/FX) is an unregulated market that is not traded on an exchange, which means that prices you see and get from one broker could vary from those of another broker. There are mainly two types of brokers. One type is an ECN (Electronic Communications Network) and another a Market-Maker.

Market-makers "make" or set the prices on their systems based on what they think is best for themselves as the counter-party. This is because every time you sell, they must buy, and when you buy, they must sell to you. This is why they can give you a fixed spread since they are setting both the bid and the ask price. Many of them will then try to "hedge" or "cover" your order by passing it on to someone else; however, some may decide to hold your order, and thus trade against you. This can result in a conflict of interest between the retail trader (you) and the market-maker.

ECNs, on the other hand, pass on prices from several banks and market-makers, as well as from the other traders in the ECN, and display the best bid/ask prices based on these input. This is why sometimes you can get no spread on ECNs, especially in very liquid currency pairs. How do ECNs make money then? They do so by charging you a fixed commission for each transaction.

Here are some of the pros and cons of ECNs and market-makers:

Market-Makers

Pros:

Usually give free charting software and news feed

Prices can be "smoother" and less volatile than ECN prices (this can be a con if you are scalping or trading very short term)

Often have a more user-friendly trading and analysis interface

Cons:

They may trade against you. In that case, there will be a conflict of interest between you and them

The price they offer you may be worse than what you could get on an ECN

It is possible that they may trigger stops or not let your trade reach your profit target levels by manipulating prices

During news, there will usually be a large amount of slippage; their systems may also lock up or not allow order placing during times of high volatility

Many of them discourage scalping and put scalpers on "manual execution" which means their orders may not get filled at the price they want

Examples of some market-makers:

http://www.goforex.net/forex-broker-list.htm#MM

ECNs

Pros:

You can usually get better bid/ask prices since they come from several sources

Variable spreads between bid and ask may give no spread or tiny spreads at times

If they are a true ECN, they will not be trading against you but will pass on your orders to a bank or another customer on the other end of the transaction.

You will be able to offer a price between the bid and ask with a chance of it getting filled

If they support Stop-Limit orders, you can prevent slippage during news by making sure that your order either gets filled at the price you want or not at all

Prices may be more volatile which will be better for scalping

Cons:

Many do not offer integrated charting

Many do not offer integrated news

Many of the trading platforms are less user-friendly

Because of variable spreads (between bid and ask,) it may be more difficult to calculate stop loss and profit target in pips beforehand.

Examples of some ECNs:

http://www.goforex.net/forex-broker-list.htm#ECN

Summary

It is important that you carefully look into the pros and cons of each broker before choosing the one which best suits your needs. You may also wish to have several broker accounts to mitigate the risks, and so that you can compare bid/ask prices and trade on the broker with the best prices for the direction you wish to trade. Because of the unregulated nature of forex, US brokers are not required to keep your money in an untouchable account that only you can have access to if they were to collapse. As customers of Refco (was one of the world's largest brokers) found out, their unprotected accounts made them unsecured creditors, and thus are less likely to get their money back than those who had given secured loans to Refco. What this means is that the customers' money was used to pay other creditors.

The moral of the story is this:

Deposit as little money with your broker as you need for trading, and withdraw your profits when they exceed a certain amount. Keep the rest of your trading capital in your own bank accounts which are probably government-insured.

Grace Cheng's Blog

Essential Elements of a Successful Trader by Jimmy Young EURUSDTrader

2008-07-08T16:27:00.000-07:00

Courage Under Stressful Conditions When the Outcome is Uncertain

All the foreign exchange trading knowledge in the world is not going to help, unless you have the nerve to buy and sell currencies and put your money at risk. As with the lottery “You gotta be in it to win it”. Trust me when I say that the simple task of hitting the buy or sell key is extremely difficult to do when your own real money is put at risk.

You will feel anxiety, even fear. Here lies the moment of truth. Do you have the courage to be afraid and act anyway? When a fireman runs into a burning building I assume he is afraid but he does it anyway and achieves the desired result. Unless you can overcome or accept your fear and do it anyway, you will not be a successful trader.

However, once you learn to control your fear, it gets easier and easier and in time there is no fear. The opposite reaction can become an issue – you’re overconfident and not focused enough on the risk you're taking.

Both the inability to initiate a trade, or close a losing trade can create serious psychological issues for a trader going forward. By calling attention to these potential stumbling blocks beforehand, you can properly prepare prior to your first real trade and develop good trading habits from day one.

Start by analyzing yourself. Are you the type of person that can control their emotions and flawlessly execute trades, oftentimes under extremely stressful conditions? Are you the type of person who’s overconfident and prone to take more risk than they should? Before your first real trade you need to look inside yourself and get the answers. We can correct any deficiencies before they result in paralysis (not pulling the trigger) or a huge loss (overconfidence). A huge loss can prematurely end your trading career, or prolong your success until you can raise additional capital.

The difficulty doesn’t end with “pulling the trigger”. In fact what comes next is equally or perhaps more difficult. Once you are in the trade the next hurdle is staying in the trade. When trading foreign exchange you exit the trade as soon as possible after entry when it is not working. Most people who have been successful in non-trading ventures find this concept difficult to implement.

For example, real estate tycoons make their fortune riding out the bad times and selling during the boom periods. The problem with trying to adapt a 'hold on until it comes back' strategy in foreign exchange is that most of the time the currencies are in long-term persistent, directional trends and your equity will be wiped out before the currency comes back.

The other side of the coin is staying in a trade that is working. The most common pitfall is closing out a winning position without a valid reason. Once again, fear is the culprit. Your subconscious demons will be scaring you non-stop with questions like “what if news comes out and you wind up with a loss”. The reality is if news comes out in a currency that is going up, the news has a higher probability of being positive than negative (more on why that is so in a later article).

So your fear is just a baseless annoyance. Don’t try and fight the fear. Accept it. Have a laugh about it and then move on to the task at hand, which is determining an exit strategy based on actual price movement. As Garth says in Waynesworld “Live in the now man”. Worrying about what could be is irrational. Studying your chart and determining an objective exit point is reality based and rational.

Another common pitfall is closing a winning position because you are bored with it; its not moving. In Football, after a star running back breaks free for a 50-yard gain, he comes out of the game temporarily for a breather. When he reenters the game he is a serious threat to gain more yards – this is indisputable. So when your position takes a breather after a winning move, the next likely event is further gains – so why close it?

If you can be courageous under fire and strategically patient, foreign exchange trading may be for you. If you’re a natural gunslinger and reckless you will need to tone your act down a notch or two and we can help you make the necessary adjustments. If putting your money at risk makes you a nervous wreck its because you lack the knowledge base to be confident in your decision making.

Patience to Gain Knowledge through Study and Focus

Many new traders believe all you need to profitably trade foreign currencies are charts, technical indicators and a small bankroll. Most of them blow up (lose all their money) within a few weeks or months; some are initially successful and it takes as long as a year before they blow up. A tiny minority with good money management skills, patience, and a market niche go on to be successful traders. Armed with charts, technical indicators, and a small bankroll, the chance of succeeding is probably 500 to 1.

To increase your chances of success to near certainty requires knowledge; acquiring knowledge takes hard work, study, dedication and focus. Compile your knowledge base without taking any shortcuts, thereby assuring a solid foundation to build upon.

Jimmy Young

Download Foreign Exchange and Money Market Transactions E-B

2008-07-08T16:23:00.000-07:00

Foreign Exchange and Money Market Transactions - UBS

Triennial Central Bank Survey of Foreign Exchange and Derivatives Market Activity in 2007 – Final results December 2007

2008-07-08T16:17:00.000-07:00

Every three years, the BIS coordinates a global central bank survey of foreign exchange and derivatives market activity on behalf of the Markets Committee and the Committee on the Global Financial System. The objective of the survey is to provide comprehensive and internationally consistent information on turnover and amounts of contracts outstanding in these markets. The exercise also serves as a benchmark for the semiannual OTC derivatives market statistics, which are limited to banks and dealers in the most important financial centres.

The 2007 survey is the seventh one coordinated by the BIS. The first three surveys were limited to the foreign exchange markets (1989, 1992, 1995). Subsequently both the foreign exchange and the derivatives markets have been surveyed (1998, 2001, 2004, 2007). In addition, in 2007 data on credit default swaps were collected for the first time. For the survey, each participating central bank collects data from the banks and dealers in its jurisdiction and calculates aggregate national data. These are provided to the BIS, which compiles global aggregates. The number of participating countries has increased over time.

The 2007 survey

In April 2007, central banks and monetary authorities from 54 countries and jurisdictions collected data on turnover in traditional foreign exchange markets (those for spot, outright forwards and swaps) and in the OTC currency and interest rate derivatives markets. Preliminary results on daily turnover were published in September 2007, and an analysis of the results for the traditional foreign exchange markets was included in the December 2007 issue of the BIS Quarterly Review. The 2007 survey also covered data on amounts outstanding and gross market values of OTC foreign exchange, interest rate, equity, commodity and credit derivatives (including credit default swaps) at the end of June 2007 whose preliminary results were released in November 2007. The full report on the Triennial Central Bank Survey was published by the BIS in December 2007.

Foreign Exchange Market From Wikipedia

2008-07-08T16:12:00.000-07:00

The foreign exchange (currency or forex or FX) market exists wherever one currency is traded for another. It is by far the largest market in the world, in terms of cash value traded, and includes trading between large banks, central banks, currency speculators, multinational corporations, governments, and other financial markets and institutions. Retail traders (small speculators) are a small part of this market. They may only participate indirectly through brokers or banks and may be targets of forex scams.

Market size and liquidity

The foreign exchange market is unique because of:

its trading volume,

the extreme liquidity of the market,

the large number of, and variety of, traders in the market,

its geographical dispersion,

its long trading hours - 24 hours a day (except on weekends).

the variety of factors that affect exchange rates,

Average daily international foreign exchange trading volume was $1.9 trillion in April 2004 according to the BIS study Triennial Central Bank Survey 2004

$600 billion spot

$1,300 billion in derivatives, ie

$200 billion in outright forwards
$1,000 billion in forex swaps
$100 billion in FX options.

Exchange-traded forex futures contracts were introduced in 1972 at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and are actively traded relative to most other futures contracts. Forex futures volume has grown rapidly in recent years, but only accounts for about 7% of the total foreign exchange market volume, according to The Wall Street Journal Europe (5/5/06, p. 20).

**Top 10 Currency Traders**
Rank	Name	% of volume
1	Deutsche Bank	17.0
2	UBS	12.5
3	Citigroup	7.5
4	HSBC	6.4
5	Barclays	5.9
6	Merrill Lynch	5.7
7	J.P. Morgan Chase	5.3
8	Goldman Sachs	4.4
9	ABN AMRO	4.2
10	Morgan Stanley	3.9

The ten most active traders account for almost 73% of trading volume, according to The Wall Street Journal Europe, (2/9/06 p. 20). These large international banks continually provide the market with both bid (buy) and ask (sell) prices. The bid/ask spread is the difference between the price at which a bank or market maker will sell ("ask", or "offer") and the price at which a market-maker will buy ("bid") from a wholesale customer. This spread is minimal for actively traded pairs of currencies, usually only 1-3 pips. For example, the bid/ask quote of EUR/USD might be 1.2200/1.2203. Minimum trading size for most deals is usually $1,000,000.

These spreads might not apply to retail customers at banks, which will routinely mark up the difference to say 1.2100 / 1.2300 for transfers, or say 1.2000 / 1.2400 for banknotes or travelers' cheques. Spot prices at market makers vary, but on EUR/USD are usually no more than 5 pips wide (i.e. 0.0005). Competition has greatly increased with pip spreads shrinking on the majors to as little as 1 to 1.5 pips.

Trading characteristics

There is no single unified foreign exchange market. Due to the over-the-counter (OTC) nature of currency markets, there are rather a number of interconnected marketplaces, where different currency instruments are traded. This implies that there is no such thing as a single dollar rate - but rather a number of different rates (prices), depending on what bank or market maker is trading. In practice the rates are often very close, otherwise they could be exploited by arbitrageurs.

**Top 6 Most Traded Currencies**
Rank	Currency	ISO 4217 Code	Symbol
1	United States dollar	USD	$
2	Eurozone euro	EUR	€
3	Japanese yen	JPY	¥
4	British pound sterling	GBP	£
5-6	Swiss franc	CHF	-
5-6	Australian dollar	AUD	$

The main trading centers are in London, New York, and Tokyo, but banks throughout the world participate. As the Asian trading session ends, the European session begins, then the US session, and then the Asian begin in their turns. Traders can react to news when it breaks, rather than waiting for the market to open.

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, 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. Trading legend Richard Dennis has accused central bankers of leaking information to hedge funds. [1]

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 currency is expressed. For instance, EUR/USD is the price of the euro expressed in US dollars, as in 1 euro = 1.2045 dollar.

On the spot market, according to the BIS study, the most heavily traded products were:

EUR/USD - 28 %

USD/JPY - 17 %

GBP/USD (also called cable) - 14 %

and the US currency was involved in 89% of transactions, followed by the euro (37%), the yen (20%) and sterling (17%). (Note that volume percentages should add up to 200% - 100% for all the sellers, and 100% for all the buyers). Although trading in the euro has grown considerably since the currency's creation in January 1999, the foreign exchange market is thus still largely dollar-centered. For instance, trading the euro versus a non-European currency ZZZ will usually involve two trades: EUR/USD and USD/ZZZ. The only exception to this is EUR/JPY, which is an established traded currency pair in the interbank spot market.

Market participants

According to the BIS study Triennial Central Bank Survey 2004

53% of transactions were strictly interdealer (ie interbank);

33% involved a dealer (ie a bank) and a fund manager or some other non-bank financial institution;

and only 14% were between a dealer and a non-financial company.

Banks

The interbank market caters for both the majority of commercial turnover and large amounts of speculative trading every day. A large bank may trade billions of dollars daily. Some of this trading is undertaken on behalf of customers, but much is conducted by proprietary desks, trading for the bank's own account.

Until recently, foreign exchange brokers did large amounts of business, facilitating interbank trading and matching anonymous counterparts for small fees. Today, however, much of this business has moved on to more efficient electronic systems, such as EBS, Reuters Dealing 3000 Matching (D2), the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Bloomberg and TradeBook(R). The broker squawk box lets traders listen in on ongoing interbank trading and is heard in most trading rooms, but turnover is noticeably smaller than just a few years ago.

Commercial Companies

An important part of this market comes from the financial activities of companies seeking foreign exchange to pay for goods or services. Commercial companies often trade fairly small amounts compared to those of banks or speculators, and their trades often have little short term impact on market rates. Nevertheless, trade flows are an important factor in the long-term direction of a currency's exchange rate. Some multinational companies can have an unpredictable impact when very large positions are covered due to exposures that are not widely known by other market participants.

Central Banks

National central banks play an important role in the foreign exchange markets. They try to control the money supply, inflation, and/or interest rates and often have official or unofficial target rates for their currencies. They can use their often substantial foreign exchange reserves, to stabilize the market. Milton Friedman argued that the best stabilization strategy would be for central banks to buy when the exchange rate is too low, and to sell when the rate is too high - that is, to trade for a profit. Nevertheless, central banks do not go bankrupt if they make large losses, like other traders would, and there is no convincing evidence that they do make a profit trading.

The mere expectation or rumor of central bank intervention might be enough to stabilize a currency, but aggressive intervention might be used several times each year in countries with a dirty float currency regime. Central banks do not always achieve their objectives, however. The combined resources of the market can easily overwhelm any central bank. Several scenarios of this nature were seen in the 1992-93 ERM collapse, and in more recent times in South East Asia.

Investment Management Firms

Investment Management firms (who typically manage large accounts on behalf of customers such as pension funds, endowments etc.) use the Foreign exchange market to facilitate transactions in foreign securities. For example, an investment manager with an international equity portfolio will need to buy and sell foreign currencies in the spot market in order to pay for purchases of foreign equities. Since the forex transactions are secondary to the actual investment decision, they are not seen as speculative or aimed at profit-maximisation.

Some investment management firms also have more speculative specialist currency overlay units, which manage clients' currency exposures with the aim of generating profits as well as limiting risk. The number of this type of specialist is quite small, their large assets under management (AUM) can lead to large trades.

Hedge Funds

Hedge funds, such as George Soros's Quantum fund have gained a reputation for aggressive currency speculation since 1990. They control billions of dollars of equity and may borrow billions more, and thus may overwhelm intervention by central banks to support almost any currency, if the economic fundamentals are in the hedge funds' favor.

Retail Forex Brokers

Retail forex brokers or market makers handle a minute fraction of the total volume of the foreign exchange market. According to CNN, one retail broker estimates retail volume at $25-50 billion daily, [2]which is about 2% of the whole market. CNN also quotes an official of the National Futures Association "Retail forex trading has increased dramatically over the past few years. Unfortunately, the amount of forex fraud has also increased dramatically."

All firms offering foreign exchange trading online are either market makers or facilitate the placing of trades with market makers.

In the retail forex industry market makers often have two separate trading desks- one that actually trades foreign exchange (which determines the firm's own net position in the market, serving as both a proprietary trading desk and a means of offsetting client trades on the interbank market) and one used for off-exchange trading with retail customers (called the "dealing desk" or "trading desk").

Many retail FX market makers claim to "offset" clients' trades on the interbank market (that is, with other larger market makers), e.g. after buying from the client, they sell to a bank. Nevertheless, the large majority of retail currency speculators are novices and who lose money [3], so that the market makers would be giving up large profits by offsetting. Offsetting does occur, but only when the market maker judges its clients' net position as being very risky.

The dealing desk operates much like the currency exchange counter at a bank. Interbank exchange rates, which are displayed at the dealing desk, are adjusted to incorporate spreads (so that the market maker will make a profit) before they are displayed to retail customers. Prices shown by the market maker do not neccesarily reflect interbank market rates. Arbitrage opportunities may exist, but retail market makers are efficient at removing arbitrageurs from their systems or limiting their trades.

A limited number of retail forex brokers offer consumers direct access to the interbank forex market. But most do not because of the limited number of clearing banks willing to process small orders. More importantly, the dealing desk model can be far more profitable, as a large portion of retail traders' losses are directly turned into market maker profits. While the income of a marketmaker that offsets trades or a broker that facilitates transactions is limited to transaction fees (commissions), dealing desk brokers can generate income in a variety of ways because they not only control the trading process, they also control pricing which they can skew at any time to maximize profits.

The rules of the game in trading FX are highly disadvantageous for retail speculators. Most retail speculators in FX lack trading experience and and capital (account minimums at some firms are as low as 250-500 USD). Large minimum position sizes, which on most retail platforms ranges from $10,000 to $100,000, force small traders to take imprudently large positions using extremely high leverage. Professional forex traders rarely use more than 10:1 leverage, yet many retail Forex firms default client accounts to 100:1 or even 200:1, without disclosing that this is highly unusual for currency traders. This drastically increases the risk of a margin call (which, if the speculator's trade is not offset, is pure profit for the market maker).

According to the Wall Street Journal (Currency Markets Draw Speculation, Fraud July 26, 2005) "Even people running the trading shops warn clients against trying to time the market. 'If 15% of day traders are profitable,' says Drew Niv, chief executive of FXCM, 'I'd be surprised.' " [4]

In the US, "it is unlawful to offer foreign currency futures and option contracts to retail customers unless the offeror is a regulated financial entity" according to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission [5]. Legitimate retail brokers serving traders in the U.S. are most often registered with the CFTC as "futures commission merchants" (FCMs) and are members of the National Futures Association (NFA). Potential clients can check the broker's FCM status at the NFA. Retail forex brokers are much less regulated than stock brokers and there is no protection similar to that from the Securities Investor Protection Corporation. The CFTC has noted an increase in forex scams [6].

Speculation

Controversy about currency speculators and their effect on currency devaluations and national economies recurs regularly. Nevertheless, many economists (e.g. Milton Friedman) argue that speculators perform the important function of providing a market for hedgers and transferring risk from those people who don't wish to bear it, to those who do. Other economists (e.g. Joseph Stiglitz) however, may consider this argument to be based more on politics and a free market philosophy than on economics.

Large hedge funds and other well capitalized "position traders" are the main professional speculators.

Currency speculation is considered a highly suspect activity in many countries. While investment in traditional financial instruments like bonds or stocks often is considered to contribute positively to economic growth by providing capital, currency speculation does not, according to this view. It is simply gambling, that often interferes with economic policy. For example, in 1992, currency speculation forced the Central Bank of Sweden to raise interest rates for a few days to 150% per annum, and later to devalue the krona. Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad is one well known proponent of this view [7]. He blamed the devaluation of the Malaysian ringgit in 1997 on George Soros and other speculators.

Gregory Millman reports on an opposing view, comparing speculators to "vigilantes" who simply help "enforce" international agreements and anticipate the effects of basic economic "laws" in order to profit.

In this view, countries may develop unsustainable financial bubbles or otherwise mishandle their national economies, and forex speculators only made the inevitable collapse happen sooner. A relatively quick collapse might even be preferable to continued economic mishandling. Mahathir Mohamad and other critics of speculation are viewed as trying to deflect the blame from themselves for having caused the unsustainable economic conditions.