What is a Currency?

Currency refers to a monetary unit that is the principle method of exchange of goods and services used by a country. Most countries have their own currency. In the Forex markets, each currency is given a three letter code in English. The following is a list of some of the World's most traded currencies:

EUR	The Euro - The official currency unit for the European Union. Includes the following 13 countries: Austria, Belgium, Finland France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain.
USD	The United States Dollar
JPY	The Japanese Yen
GBP	The Great British Pound, also known as the Sterling
CHF	The Swiss Franc
AUD	The Australian Dollar
CAD	The Canadian Dollar
DKK	The Danish Krone
HKD	The Hong Kong Dollar
HUK	The Hungarian Forint
MXN	The Mexican Peso
NOK	The Norwegian Krone
NZD	The New Zealand Dollar
PLN	The Polish Zloty
SEK	The Swedish Krone
SGD	The Singapore Dollar
TRY	The Turkish Lira
ZAR	The South African Rand

The first seven currencies listed (EUR, USD, JPY, GBP, CHF, AUD and CAD) are known as the majors. They represent an overwhelming percentage of all the total trades in foreign exchange. It is said that approximately 90% of all trades involves the USD as one of the currency pairs.

Other local currencies include:

BHD	The Bahraini Dinar
CYP	The Cyprus Pound
INR	The Indian Rupee
JOD	The Jordanian Dinar
KWD	The Kuwaiti Dinar
LBP	The Lebanese Pound
LKR	The Sri Lanka Rupee
OMR	The Omani Riyal
PKR	The Pakistan Rupee
QAR	The Qatar Riyal
SAR	The Saudi Arabia Riyal
THB	The Thai Baht

Not all currencies are allowed to be fully floated by their governments, and hence real FX trading is really performed against those currencies that have a full floating exchange rate mechanism – this means that the market determines the strength or weakness of a currency without or with minimum government intervention.

How Does Forex Currency Trading Work?

If you didn’t know this already, The word “Forex” stands for: Foreign Exchange. The Foreign Exchange is the exchange of one currency for another . Hence, Forex currency trading is the exchange of a foreign currency . The Forex trader makes his or her profits from timing the market as to get the most he possibly can of one currency by exchanging it for another.

It hasn’t always been so easy for the independent trader to get into the Forex trading market. Before the barriers were broken down and tossed aside in the Forex market, smaller investors who wanted to compete in Forex currency trading couldn’t.

For years, the Forex market was only for the banks to make their profits, the little guy just didn’t have the tools or the funding to play in this game.

By now, when you surf the Internet and see the word Forex, you have no doubt, come across the term “currency pairs” as well . All you need to know is that Forex trading is about trading currency pairs . You are taking pairs of currency – and they are always in pairs, never singles – and you’re either buying those currencies or you’re selling them.

There are some currency pairs that are traded more often than others, otherwise know as “majors.” If you are serious about becoming a successful Forex trader you will need to know alot about these currency pairs.

You should learn as much as you can about all of the currency pairs but, try to focus on the “majors” or the ones that are traded most often, trade only those currencies you have become knowledgeable enough to trade .

Your strategy should be to buy the currency that is making it’s move higher then the other currency. It’s sort of like a horse race . When you bet on a horse at the track, you take a look at it’s history, the competition and then bet on the one you think will win. The same principle applies to Forex currency trading. Pick the currency pairs that are going to make you a winner.

How do you know which currency is going to come in the winner? Study, you’ll have to study your charts and trends until your eyes burn. A strong trend is what the banks knew and followed in the beginning when other smaller investors weren’t trading and the trend is what you need to follow as well in Forex currency trading.

Beginner Forex Currency Trading: What Is It All About?

For a beginner forex currency trading may seem to be a whole new world but in fact the basics are quite easy to learn. You just need to understand the buzz words and trading terms and grasp a basic understanding of how the markets work.

Making big money in a short time is what forex currency trading is all about! It is possible for investors to make a lot of money very fast because the rates of exchange on the foreign market can rise and fall quickly. This means of course that it is risky and there is also a chance of losing a lot, just like most things in life that have the potential of big returns.

As you will know if you have ever exchanged currency for a vacation, the rates are constantly changing. For example you may change $100 into another currency planning to travel, and then find that you do not need it and change it back. The rate will probably have changed in the meantime and you may even have made a profit.

Forex traders deal in currencies hoping to make a profit all of the time, but instead of changing money at the bank they use a broker. Most transactions these days are handled online. In many ways it is not so different from stock trading. There is the same potential to trade in margins where a small balance held by your broker can control much larger deals.

One difference from stock exchange trading is that forex traders are not limited to dealing in their own country. You can trade any two currencies regardless of where you live. This also means that the market is international. Because of time zone differences, it is open 24 hours a day from Monday morning in Australia to Friday afternoon in New York.

Each currency is represented by 3 letters: USD for the US dollar, GBP for the British pound, EUR for the Euro, JPY for the Japanese Yen, CHF for the Swiss franc, CAD for the Canadian dollar, AUD for the Australian dollar etc. The exchange rate between two currencies may be expressed like this: USD/CHF 1.14. This means that to buy one US dollar you will need 1.14 Swiss francs.

If you want to start out in forex trading you will need to look for a broker or investment management company that you trust. It is worth shopping around and checking online forums for recommendations. Check out how long the company has been in business and what your rights and liabilities will be. Read all of the fine print.

You will probably also want to use a bot to do your trading for you. This is automated forex trading software that can trade 24 hours a day according to rules that you set for it. There is usually a demo option so that you can test out the whole system for a while before you let it trade with real money. There are many forex robots on the market and most of them come with full instructions for beginner forex currency trading.

Important Notice: Learn forex trading before you start trading forex. Do you know as much as 70% of forex trader are losing money in the forex market.

Give yourself an advantage by learning the best forex trading courses and strategies from the masters. If you want to be the other 30% of forex traders who are making millions of dollars trading forex at home, then make sure you read and learn the below learn forex trading articles and lessons.