Forex Glossery

ADX (Average Directional Index) — standard technical indicator that measures the strength of a trend.

Ask (Offer) — price of the offer, the price you buy for.

Aussie — a Forex slang name for the Australian dollar.

Bank Rate — the percentage rate at which central bank of a country lends money to the country's commercial banks.

Bid — price of the demand, the price you sell for.

Broker — the market participating body which serves as the middleman between retail traders and larger commercial institutions.

Cable — a Forex traders slang word GBP/USD currency pair.

Carry Trade — in Forex, holding a position with a positive overnight interest return in hope of gaining profits, without closing the position, just for the central banks interest rates difference.

CCI (Commodity Channel Index) — a cyclical technical indicator that is often used to detect overbought/oversold states of the market.

CFD — a Contract for Difference — special trading instrument that allows financial speculation on stocks, commodities and other instruments without actually buying.

Commission — broker commissions for operation handling.

CPI — consumer price index the statistical measure of inflation based upon changes of prices of a specified set of goods.

EA (Expert Advisor) — an automated script which is used by the trading platform software to manage positions and orders automatically without (or with little) manual control.

ECN Broker — a type of Forex brokerage firm that provide its clients direct access to other Forex market participants. ECN brokers don't discourage scalping, don't trade against the client, don't charge spread (low spread is defined by current market prices) but charge commissions for every order.

ECB (European Central Bank) — the main regulatory body of the European Union financial system.

Fed (Federal Reserve) — the main regulatory body of the United States of America financial system, which division — FOMC (Federal Open Market Committee) — regulates, among other things, federal interest rates.

Fibonacci Retracements — the levels with a high probability of trend break or bounce, calculated as the 23.6%, 32.8%, 50% and 61.8% of the trend range.

Flat (Square) — neutral state when all your positions are closed.

Fundamental Analysis — the analysis based only on news, economic indicators and global events.

Gap — a difference between the previous period's close price and the next period's open price. In Forex usually only occurs during weekends — between the Friday's close and the Monday's open price.

GDP (Gross Domestic Product) — is a measure of the national income and output for the country's economy; it's one of the most important Forex indicators.

GTC (Good Till Canceled) — order to buy or sell of a currency with a fixed price or worse. The order is alive (good) until execution or cancellation.

Hedging — maintaining a market position which secures the existing open positions in the opposite direction.

Jobber — a slang word for a trader which is aimed toward fast but small and short-term profit from an intra-day trading. Jobber rarely leaves open positions overnight.

Kiwi — a Forex slang name for the New Zealand currency — New Zealand dollar.

Leading Indicators — a composite index (year 1992 = 100%) of ten most important macroeconomic indicators that predicts future (6-9 months) economic activity.

Limit Order — order for a broker to buy the lot for fixed or lesser price or sell the lot for fixed or better price. Such price is called limit price.

Liquidity — the measure of markets which describes relationship between the trading volume and the price change.

Long — the position which is in a Buy direction. In Forex, the primary currency when bought is long and another is short.

Loss — the loss from closing long position at lower rate than opening or short position with higher rate than opening, or if the profit from a position closing was lower than broker commission on it.

Lot — definite amount of units or amount of money accepted for operations handling (usually it is a multiple of 100).

Margin — money, the investor needs to keep at broker account to execute trades. It supplies the possible losses which may occur in margin trading.

Margin Account — account which is used to hold investor's deposited money for FOREX trading.

Margin Call — demand of a broker to deposit more margin money to the margin account when the amount in it falls below certain minimum.

Market Order — order to buy or sell a lot for a current market price.

Market Price — the current price for which the currency is traded for on the market.

Momentum — the measure of the currency's ability to move in the given direction.

Moving Average (MA) — one of the most basic technical indicators. It shows the average rate calculated over a series of time periods. Exponential Moving Average (EMA), Weighted Moving Average (WMA) etc. are just the ways of weighing the rates and the periods.

Offer (Ask) — price of the offer, the price you buy for.

Open Position (Trade) — position on buying (long) or selling (short) for a currency pair.

Order — order for a broker to buy or sell the currency with a certain rate.

Pivot Point — the primary support/resistance point calculated basing on the previous trend's High, Low and Close prices.

Pip (Point) — the last digit in the rate (e.g. for EUR/USD 1 point = 0.0001).

Profit (Gain) — positive amount of money gained for closing the position.

Principal Value — the initial amount of money of the invested.

Realized Profit/Loss — gain/loss for already closed positions.

Resistance — price level for which the intensive selling can lead to price increasing (up-trend).

RSI (Relative Strength Index) — indicator that measures of the power of direction price movement by comparing the bullish and bearish portions of the trend.

Scalping — a style of trading notable by many positions that are opened for extremely small and short-term profits.

Settled (Closed) Position — closed positions for which all needed transactions has been made.

Slippage — execution of order for a price different than expected (ordered), main reasons for slippage are — "fast" market, low liquidity and low broker's ability to execute orders.

Spread — difference between ask and bid prices for a currency pair.

Standard Lot — 100,000 units of the base currency of the currency pair, which you are buying or selling.

Stop-Limit Order — order to sell or buy a lot for a certain price or worse.

Stop-Loss Order — order to sell or buy a lot when the market reaches certain price. It is used to avoid extra losses when market moves in the opposite direction. Usually is a combination of stop-order and limit-order.

STP (Straight Through Processing) — an order processing that doesn't require any manual intervention and is fully automatic. In fact, 99.9% of all on-line Forex brokers support order handling with STP.

Support — price level for which intensive buying can lead to the price decreasing (down-trend).

Swap — overnight payment for holding your position. Since you are not physically receiving the currency you buy, your broker should pay you the interest rate difference between the two currencies of the pair. It can be negative or positive.

Technical Analysis — the analysis based only on the technical market data (quotes) with the help of various technical indicators.

Trend — direction of market which has been established with influence of different factors.

Unrealized (Floating) Profit/Loss — a profit/loss for your non-closed positions.

Useable Margin — amount of money in the account that can be used for trading.

Used Margin — amount of money in the account already used to hold open positions open.

Volatility — a statistical measure of the number of price changes for a given currency pair in a given period of time.

VPS (Virtual Private Server) — virtual environment hosted on the dedicated server, which can be used to run the programs independent on the user's PC. Forex traders use VPS to host trading platforms and run expert advisors without unexpected interruptions.

Risk and Reward Forex Calculator

The risk and reward calculator will help you to calculate the position's best targets and their respective reward-to-risk ratios based on the Fibonacci retracements from the local peak and bottom. It's a powerful tool to determine the potential risks before entering any positions.

The price needs to be inside the wave for you to use this calculator properly. Here are the two variants of the wave you can work with — bullish and bearish:
ABC Waves

The current price is C; A is the beginning of the wave (bottom for bullish and peak for bearish); B is the local maximum (for bullish wave) or minimum (for bearish wave).

Fibonacci retracements (0.382 and 0.618) are calculated to form the entry, target and stop-loss levels. It's better to enter positions only if the current price (C) is close to 0.382 Fibonacci level.

Forex Broker

FXcast is a unique Forex broker registered on Antigua and Barbuda and is an accredited member of GDCA. All traders can benefit from the MetaTrader 4 platform that allows using custom indicators and automated expert advisors. FXcast also supports almost all possible ways to deposit and withdraw trading funds — everything for the trader's comfort.

* 100% security on customer segregated funds for each account size.
* Spreads — from 2 pip on EUR/USD.
* Open account in just five minutes.
* $10 to open a real trading account.
* Professional user support.
* Phone contact available.
* Trade more than 35 currency pairs.
* Fund account via WebMoney, c-gold, Moneybookers, Liberty Reserve, wire transfer, credit cards, StrictPay, AlertPay or Solidtrustpay.
* No slippage, even in volatile market.
* Guaranteed order execution.
* Live support during trading session.
* MetaTrader 4 trading platform.
* Segregated secure accounts available for big traders.
* Multilingual site and support.
* Partnership program available.

FXcast is very easy to start with: register via their website, update your personal identification information and enjoy trading.

You can also read an interesting interview with the FXcast broker about their vision of the Forex trading and some issues related to this broker specifically: Interview with FXcast.

Forex Beginners

Here you will find the Forex e-books that provide the basic information on Forex trading. You can learn basic concepts of the Forex market, the technical and fundamental analysis. While all these e-books are recommended for every new Forex trader, they won't be very useful to the very experienced traders.

Almost all Forex e-books are in .pdf format. You'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open these e-books. Some of the e-books (those that are in parts) are zipped.

If you are the copyright owner of any of these e-books and don't want me to share them, please, contact me and I will gladly remove them.

Candlesticks For Support And Resistance — The basics of trading with candlesticks charts by John H. Forman.

Online Trading Courses — Course #1 lesson #1 by Jake Bernstein.

Commodity Futures Trading for Beginners — by Bruce Babcock.

Hidden Divergence — by Barbara Star, Ph.D.

Peaks and Troughs — by Martin J. Pring.

Reverse Divergences And Momentum — by Martin J. Pring.

Strategy:10 — Low-risk, high-return forex trading by W. R. Booker & Co.

The NYSE Tick Index And Candlesticks — by Tim Ord.

Trend Determination — A quick, accurate and effective methodology by John Hayden.

The Original Turtle Trading Rules — by OrignalTurtles.org.

Introduction to Forex — by 1st Forex Trading Academy. This trading course intends to provide to all of the students analytical tools on the trading system and methodologies. In this respect, the purpose of the course is to provide an overview of the many strategies that are being used in Forex market and to discuss the steps and tools that are needed in order to use these strategies successfully.

The Six Forces of Forex — by Scott Owens. A small e-book covering the basic and the main problems of Forex trading.

Study Book for Successful Foreign Exchange Dealing — by Royal Forex.

Forex. On-Line Manual for Successful Trading — an introduction into every aspect of the Forex trading including detailed descriptions of the technical and fundamental analysis techniques, by unknown author.

18 Trading Champions Share Their Keys to Top Trading Profits — as the name suggests, the book shares the secrets of the 18 prominent traders with the Forex beginners, by FWN.

The Way to Trade Forex — a 1st chapter of the book that will show you not only Forex basics but also some unusual techniques and strategies that can work for the newbie traders, by Jay Lakhani.

The Truth About Fibonacci Trading — the basic facts and information about Fibonacci levels and their application to the Forex trading, by Bill Poulos.

Quick Guide to Forex Trading — a 2008 edition of the Forex guide for the beginners and private traders issued by Easy-Forex.

Chart Patterns and Technical Indicators — an explanation of the most popular chart patterns and some technical indicators, by unknown author.

Forex Psychology

Controlling one's emotions is vital for every Forex trader. Here you will find the free e-books about Forex trading psychology and emotion control in the financial trading. You will learn how to calm yourself and set the long-term goals in your trading. Recommended for all traders.

Almost all Forex e-books are in .pdf format. You'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open these e-books. Some of the e-books (those that are in parts) are zipped.

If you are the copyright owner of any of these e-books and don't want me to share them, please, contact me and I will gladly remove them.

A Course in Miracles — A Christian view on the probability by unknown author.

Thoughts on Trading — Some general thoughts about financial trading by Joe Ross.

Calming The Mind So That Body Can Perform — by Robert M. Nideffer, Ph.D.

Emotion Free Trading — "How to consistently act in your own best interest with your off-the-floor trading!" by Larry Levin.

Lifestyles of the Rich and Pipped — by Rob Booker & Kim Shaftner, M.D.

The Miracle of Discipline — by W.R. Booker & Co.

Zoom in on Personal Trading Behavior And Profit from It — by Linda Bradford Raschke.

The Woodchuck and the Possum — by Rob Booker.

25 Rules Of Forex Trading Discipline — by Douglas E. Zalesky.

Stop Losses Are For Sissies — by W. R. Brooker & Co. — a rather descriptive evidence of how important stop losses in Forex trading are.

Your Personality and Successful Trading — by Windsor Advisory Services — describes and discusses almost all psychological and emotional aspects of financial trading.

Trading as a Business — a book about develping a psychological attitutde toward the trading, creating a trading strategy and following it, while treating trading as a business, by unknown author.

The 7 Deadly Sins of Forex (and How to Avoid Them) — this book by Marc Low lists 7 most popular emotional and psychological pitfalls that wipe clean the accounts of even the talented Forex traders.

Forex İnformation

FOREX — the foreign exchange (currency or forex, or FX) market is the biggest and the most liquid financial market with the daily volume of more than $3.2 trillion. Trading on this market involves buying and selling world currencies taking the profit from the exchange rates difference. Forex trading can yield high profits, but it is also very risky. Everyone can participate in Forex trading via the Forex brokers.

Don’t forget to check and bookmark my Forex blog to get the latest updates about Forex market and this site’s content. You can also join a friendly Forex traders community at the Forex Forum.