Spot forex vs currency futures

Retail forex traders are generally only able to trade the currency pairs offered by their broker. If their broker does not offer cross trading in the cross currency pairs they desire directly, they will need to execute two transactions using the U. Dollar pair for each currency to establish the desired cross currency position. Many online brokers do not offer pricing in exotic currencies. Currency futures contracts generally have set trading amounts or lots that vary among the specific currency pairs available for trading on a particular exchange for delivery on standardized dates, usually quarterly.

In addition, exchange rates for the currency pairs can vary by a minimum amount known as a tick size. Table 1: CME currency future pairs, lot sizes, lot currency, quotation conventions and tick sizes as of June The Interbank forex market remains a generally unregulated over the counter market that operates between financial institutions and their clients that can be situated in different legal jurisdictions. Participants in this market are typically finance professionals who are not seen as requiring regulation to protect.

Nevertheless, this lack of regulation and transparency means quotes given to clients by market makers and dealing desks can be substantially different from the exchange rate levels actually prevailing in the professional forex market. Some steps have been taken in recent years to regulate transactions by retail forex traders made via the online forex brokers that operate over the Internet. This was considered a necessary protection due to the fact that these brokers are typically dealing with the general public who may not have acquired professional expertise.

Such regulation has thus far targeted things like prohibiting hedged trading and reducing high leverage ratios. Despite exceptions of that type, this growing currency market still remains relatively unregulated outside of jurisdictions like the United States where such protective regulations have been enacted. Some online forex brokers refuse to accept potential clients residing in regulated jurisdictions.

In contrast, trading in the currency futures markets takes place on an exchange that is generally highly regulated by a financial regulatory body within the country it is located in. This means that dealing exchange rates and quotations all need to be in line with the current market, in which pricing is fully transparent both to clients and market makers. Currency futures trading volumes are also recorded and can be reviewed to provide positioning data to analysts.

Traders or hedgers who need to trade exact amounts might do better trading the spot forex market with Interbank counterparties or trading micro lots via an online forex broker than with futures contracts. Basically, if precise amounts of currency are required for a forex transaction, the fixed denomination of a futures contract or contracts may not suffice or it may exceed the amount required.

Most Interbank and retail forex transactions are free of fees for a spot FX trade other than the quoted dealing spread. Nevertheless, all forex futures transactions involve additional costs, such as exchange fees and brokerage charges.


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Price differentials between the spot and futures markets may offer a quick currency trader some modest arbitrage opportunities. Of course, they do need to remember to add or subtract the swap points for the futures contract delivery date to the forex spot rate in order to compute a comparable exchange rate between the markets. Dollar, and this arbitrage can be done between crosses quoted on futures exchanges and in the FX spot market.

Some professional traders also use currency futures as a hedging vehicle. Don't forget, leverage can work for you and against you, so be careful and don't abuse it.

Currency futures definition

The Forex market experiences large moves almost daily. There is always a currency pair trending strongly which means very frequent trading opportunity. The CME is one of the largest exchanges in the world and is very well capitalized. I actually began my trading career on the Currency floor of the CME and understand the power of a central exchange. Because there is a central exchange, we can see trading volume and open interest easily and everyone has access to it. The CME actually has double regulation. They are also a publicly traded company so they have another level of regulation that comes with that structure.

The Difference Between Trading Spot Forex and Currency Futures - Forex Training Group

As with other Futures markets, the Forex Futures are traded in the trading pit but also on the Globex system. There is no broker on the other side of your trade. Instead, when you buy, your order is matched up with a seller like you, not a broker. This leads to a more balanced and free market for the retail trader. The CME is: www. Lots of game playing can go on in the Spot Forex market with certain brokers. Remember, many are market makers for the most part. Here is an email from a student that I unfortunately receive too often:. I took the eurgbp trade today. I got stopped out even though price never hit my stop!


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  8. I have an inquiry in with the broker. Anyway, I'm attaching my trade. Yes, this can happen so you need to be careful. As you can see, this trader took up his complaint with the broker.

    What Are Forex Futures?

    This, my friends, is like asking the bank robber if they robbed the bank. Given the pros and cons of these two gateways to trading global currency markets, what do we do? Because the broker is on the other side of your trade in Spot, it is not a good idea to try and risk 5 pips to make Especially if you put your stop loss order in the market for this trade.


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    More often than not, you will get stopped out of this trade quickly because of the spreads created by the broker; this is easy money for them. Instead, when trading the Spot market, we never go down lower than a minute chart. This forces us to find demand support and supply resistance levels that provide opportunities for us to risk 15 pips or so to make 50 or more.

    Most of our Spot Forex trading opportunities in the Forex XLT have us risking 15 — 25 pips to make at least or much more. This accomplishes two things. First, it helps solve the problem of getting stopped out by the broker who controls the spread. While they can move the market a bit and try to stop you out, they can't move their market too far away from the real market or they run the risk of losing big. Another important point to remember with the Euro buy setup from the XLT above is that when we Online Trading Academy traders buy at demand, we are forcing the broker to sell at demand and they certainly don't want to do that.

    This is why they widen the spread so much at the significant demand and supply levels. Second, by staying away from the very micro time frames and only using the minute chart or higher, we are now able to take advantage of the huge moves that happen in the market almost on a daily basis. Even if the brokers were not an issue, you are still better off trading the Forex markets for the larger moves because this is where the large and quality opportunities are. So, what about short-term trading in Forex?

    This is where the Forex Futures come in. Currency futures trade in a completely different manner than the cash foreign exchange market where trading is done primarily in the spot and forward markets over an electronic and telephone network. The currency futures market has grown considerably since their introduction on the International Monetary Market division of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange in the early s. Before the rise of online retail forex trading in recent years, trading currency futures on the Chicago IMM was one of the few ways that individuals could trade currencies in smaller amounts.

    A currency futures contract consists of a standardized agreement to make the delivery of one currency and receive another currency at some fixed upcoming point in time at a rate determined by the market. Put simply, a currency futures contract is a forex forward contract with a standard delivery date and standard contract sizes traded on a centralized exchange.

    Is Forex a Derivative?

    Unlike a regular spot forex transaction, where the delivery date typically occurs two business days from the transaction date, currency futures contracts on the IMM have quarterly delivery dates occurring on the third Wednesday of the month. For example, a British Pound Sterling versus the U. Also, since the exchange where the futures contracts trade is in the United States, the contracts are bought and sold in U. Trading in currency futures was initiated by the International Monetary Market which began in on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

    These futures became popular with commodities traders as a way to speculate on exchange rate movements. The futures concept is also very familiar to commodities traders since they are used to a farmer selling a crop before a harvest, for example.