What is Foreign Exchange Market
Posted by Santu amin in FOREX
Foreign Exchange is a currency market where the trading of one currency against another takes place. It is often referred to as Forex or FX.
The foreign exchange market is the largest most liquid and most influential market in the world. It is a truly 24 hour global market, it trades from 9pm GMT Sunday until 10pm GMT Friday and trades in excess of $1.5 trillion dollars a day, Making it far bigger than the combined total of all the worlds stock exchanges.
Participants in Forex include central banks, corporations, individual investors and speculators, and hedge funds. With the advent of electronic trading platforms, self-directed investors and smaller financial firms now have access to the same liquidity as larger market participants.
Trading, or speculation, makes up 95% of the daily volume. The other 5% of daily volume consists of governments and commercial companies converting one currency into another from buying and selling goods and services.
51% of the market is in spot FX transactions, followed by 32% in currency swap transactions. Forward outright FX transactions represent another 5% of this daily turnover. Options on inter-bank FX transactions making up another 8%.
