Eaglesteam
New Member
New forex accounts are opened as margin accounts, letting clients buy or sell currency pairs with total trade size that is much larger than the money used to fund the account. U.S. brokers typically allow individuals to open accounts for as low as $100 to $500 while offering up to 50:1 margin [2], providing significant leverage – which is another way of saying your trade size will be larger than the current account balance.
A $500 account at a 50:1 margin broker, for example, lets the forex trader place long and short bets up to $25,000, or 2.5 times the mini lot size. Leverage can be risky, with the power to wipe out accounts overnight, but high margin makes sense because currencies tend to move slowly in quiet times and carry little default risk, meaning the dollar or euro is unlikely to go to zero. Even so, forex volatility can escalate to historic levels during crisis periods, like the wild British pound and euro gyrations in 2016 after Brits voted to leave the European Union.
Unlike stockbrokers, forex brokers charge no interest for using margin, but positions held overnight will incur rollover credits or debits [4], determined by the relationship between interest rates in the currencies that comprise the pair. Total trade value determines the credit or debit in this calculation, not just the portion in excess of the account balance. At the simplest level, the trader will get paid nightly when holding a long position in the higher interest bearing currency and will pay nightly when holding a long position in the lower interest bearing currency. Reverse this calculation when selling short.
A $500 account at a 50:1 margin broker, for example, lets the forex trader place long and short bets up to $25,000, or 2.5 times the mini lot size. Leverage can be risky, with the power to wipe out accounts overnight, but high margin makes sense because currencies tend to move slowly in quiet times and carry little default risk, meaning the dollar or euro is unlikely to go to zero. Even so, forex volatility can escalate to historic levels during crisis periods, like the wild British pound and euro gyrations in 2016 after Brits voted to leave the European Union.
Unlike stockbrokers, forex brokers charge no interest for using margin, but positions held overnight will incur rollover credits or debits [4], determined by the relationship between interest rates in the currencies that comprise the pair. Total trade value determines the credit or debit in this calculation, not just the portion in excess of the account balance. At the simplest level, the trader will get paid nightly when holding a long position in the higher interest bearing currency and will pay nightly when holding a long position in the lower interest bearing currency. Reverse this calculation when selling short.
