Forex Market History
This brief Forex market history will give you some insight into how this market has evolved.
The Forex market, as we know it, was established in 1971 when floating exchange rates for currencies began to appear. Prior to that, international agreements, including the gold exchange standard of 1876 and the Bretton Woods Agreement of 1945 prevented speculation in the currency markets.
With international trade expanding rapidly after the second world war and the massive movements of capital across international borders, the foreign exchange rates established by the Bretton Woods Agreement became unstable and the agreement was finally abandoned in 1971.
By 1973, international currencies began to float in value, driven mainly by the forces of supply and demand. The ensuing deregulation resulted in much more open trade and led to an increase in currency speculators.
With the growth of the computer age in the 1980's, currency movement across borders became a 24 hour-per-day business, trading through the various time zones. Major banks created dealing rooms where massive amounts of the world's various currencies could be traded in a matter of minutes.
Today, electronic brokers trade the Forex market. Single trades of tens of millions of dollars are carried out within seconds. Most of these transactions are conducted to speculate on the market, with the aim of making money from money. These brokers, or Market Makers, are allowed to divide the large inter-bank units into smaller lots and allow private investors, smaller banks, hedge funds, etc. to buy and sell into the market. These brokers negotiate buy/sell prices between each other, thereby having the ability to set market prices for the rest of us.
Generally, the market is divided into the Asian, European and American sessions. The trading week begins in Asia on their Monday morning, and continues until the close of the American market on it's Friday afternoon. 24 hours a day, 5-1/2 days per week.
Because there is no central exchange for Forex, exact figures on any aspect of it are hard to come by, but it is estimated by the Bank for International Settlements (or BIS) that the average daily turnover of the Forex market in April 2006 was $2.7 trillion USD. This figure includes the spot market (the one we trade), swap market, futures and options. In other words, the Forex market is more than 10 times the size of the daily turnover of all the world’s stock markets combined.
Forex is a group of interconnected marketplaces where currency instruments are traded. Each marketplace is at liberty to set it's own exchange rate, which means that your dealer may be showing you different prices than the guy up the street would. The reality is, the prices are usually very close from broker to broker.
Inside information in the foreign exchange markets is virtually non existent. Changes in exchange rates are usually caused by actual money flows. Expectations of changes in this flow, caused by changes in GDP growth, inflation, interest rates, budget and trade deficits or surpluses, etc. are major price drivers. This information is released publicly, usually on specific dates at specific times. Since so many people have access to the same news at the same time, any "insider advantage" is unlikely. The large banks do have an important advantage though, they can see their customer's order flow.
Currencies are traded against one another. Therefore, a trade will consist of two currencies, or a pair, such as EUR/USD, USD/JPY, GBP/USD, etc. The first currency of the pair is the base, and the second is known as the counter currency. Prices are expressed in terms of how much of the second, or counter, currency is needed to make up one unit of the base currency. For example, if the price quoted for EUR/USD is 1.3145, this is the price of one Euro expressed in US dollars, ie. 1 Euro=1.3145 US dollar.
We buy or sell the pair, at the market price, with an expectation the price will move higher or lower, towards our target.
