Covering the basics of the forex market

The foreign exchange, or forex, market is relatively young, having begun in the early 1970s after the United States dropped the gold standard and national currencies started to fluctuate widely. For about 30 years prior to that, most nations had agreed to keep their currency values stable in relation to the U.S. dollar, making a forex market unnecessary. With that no longer the case, banks quickly realized that a profit could be made in “buying” currency when it was devalued and “selling” it after it strengthened, just like any other commodity.

Today, the forex market handles about $1.9 trillion in transactions every day, and it runs 24 hours a day, five days a week. (With nations around the world involved, it’s always daytime somewhere.) The most traded currencies are the U.S. dollar, the euro, Japanese yen, British pound, Swiss franc and Australian dollar.

The forex market is overwhelmingly dominated by international banks, government banks, investment banks, corporations, and hedge funds. In fact, individual traders account for only about 2 percent of the market. Nonetheless, a lot of people do try their hand at it, with varying degrees of success.

In the forex market, transactions are always handled in pairs: You buy one currency and sell another one. The idea is to make a trade when you believe the currency you’re buying is going to go up in value compared to the one you’re selling. Then, if it turns out your prediction was correct, you do another trade in the reverse direction -- selling the currency you originally bought and buying the one you sold -- in order to reap the profits.

For example, let’s say the market reports this: GBP/EUR 1.2200. That means the cost of buying one British pound is 1.22 euros. If you believed that course was going to change, and the euro was going to become more valuable than the pound, you might sell 100,000 pounds, buy 100,000 euros, and wait. Then let’s say a few weeks later, the exchange rate fluctuates to this: EUR/GBP 1.3100. Sure enough, the euro is now worth 1.31 pounds, a profit of 0.11 per unit.

The forex market is vast and daunting and mostly inhabited by giant organizations. But it can be navigated by individuals who have studied the finer points and who want to take a risk on something potential profitable. And since the whole world uses money, the trading of that money is always going to be a major force in the financial world.

A forex demo shows you how it works before you jump into it for real

Before airplane pilots actually fly on their own, they usually practice in simulators that re-create what flying will be like without any actual risk. Since currency trading is as dangerous financially as flying is physically, it makes sense that there would be a forex demo available, too.

A forex demo is a smart way for a new investor to start. Reading books and taking online courses can teach you the basics, but the best way to learn anything is to get some hands-on experience. However, with forex, hands-on experience could mean losing your shirt. So a demo gives you real-world training with no actual money being involved.

Usually, the demonstration comes courtesy of a brokerage or other financial Web site that has an interest in currying your favor. The plan is that once you’ve tested your skills in the demo, you’ll get into the real thing and take advantage of the paid services the demo provider has to offer -- forex signals, managed accounts, automated trading, etc. The demo is like a free sample, offered in the hopes that you’ll enjoy it so much that you buy something, too.

For that reason, be should be highly suspicious of any Web site that wants to charge for a demo. Considering there are literally dozens of sites that offer free demonstrations, there is absolutely no reason that you should pay for it.

When you sign up for a forex demo, you’re given a username and password and shown how to use the demo system. Sometimes it involves downloading a piece of software unique to the company; other times it’s simply done over the Internet. (Some demos require Macromedia Flash, which most browsers have installed, but which you’ll need the latest version of.) You determine how much imaginary money you want to start with, and off you go!

Once you’re signed in to the forex demo, you do all the things you would do if it were a real-world situation: reading the charts, following the trends, visiting online forums to get other traders’ opinions, and making trades. The trades are recorded in the forex demo only and don’t go anywhere into the actual market since there’s no real money involved. When the market changes, the program determines how much you’d have gained or lost based on the decisions you made. You’re able to say, “Whew! Good thing this was only for practice!” or “Too bad this wasn’t real!” And once you’ve gained some expertise using the forex demo, you can move on to the real thing and start making some money for real.