Newb questions on forex trading

D

djxput

Hi,

I've thought about trading forex but wanted to ask a few questions first.

I have an account with IB but from my understanding they require you trade 25k? to be able to trade forex. Is that correct?
I dont plan on starting out with 25k as I learn to trade forex.

I've read about Oanda; do they have any minimums for trading forex? Ive also signed up for their fxgame acct and have fooled around with that a little bit. I'm still unsure what I am doing exactly.

1. Is there a way you can get rid of the data between the days get tired of looking at .....................

2. Is there a easy way to figure out how much I am trading ie with the game account I type in like 10000 but I cant figure out how much I am actually trading. What does that 10000 represent. dollars?

3. Do I have to worry about excahnging curreny when trading forex? or can I go from the euro/usd to the usd/yen to the pound?

4. Are there any good sites I can read up on for newbs learning to trade the forex?

5. How do tax returns work for trading forex?

6. Are there any other good futures that I could trade besides the euro ie stuff that has alot of play at nitetime hours ie currencies?

thanks for the help
 
if you are trading overnight ...

why don't you practice following movements of
USD / EUR FX with small trades in mini gold ( YG )
the current lead month is DEC 2005 ... then
in a few months that will change to Feb 2006
you will not make or lose as much with mini gold
( YG ) but you might gain some "real time" real money experience ...

( there used to be a larger correlation between gold and Euro movements , but now that some traders are worried about inflation ... )

I am guessing the margin rate for night trading of

25K EUR ( IDEALPRO FX ) is $500-750
but you had best contact IB to get exact
margin rates if unable to figure this out
from their website


taxes are different for FX spot ( cash ) and futures
 
oh well I think they require you to trade 25k usd
quote from their website
"Forex Trading
(25,000 or USD equivalent minimum)"

honestly I have been fooling around with the ZG and YG (mini gold) and the mini gold has lousey spreads during nitetime trading ie looking at 4 tick spread here. 7:36 CST

I've been trading the YM but I rather look at other markets hence I was looking at the forex. Especially since it looks like it can get some action when normal markets are closed.
 
Why don't you just trade 1 contract EUR to start off? Initial margin is around 3500 per contract. Other pairs don't require as much but are generally less liquid especially at night.

YG just doesn't correlate as much lately with currencies, and the spread is pretty bad after hours.
 
ya I thought about just trading the EUR instead of going the whole forex route; thing is I am more of a swing trader. And I like to have more vehicles to trade incase I see something that looks promising to me.

Thats why I was thinking forex because at least if the EUR looked bland to trade (ie small range) then perhaps there was something else with more spunk.

Right now I have the CAD cad dollor, JPY and GBP up on my futures quote screen. (havnt traded these guys yet) just observing

Looks like the spread is 1, 1, and 5.

are there charts that one can see real time info on these futures? I know the euro/usd corelates to the EUR and I can see the chart in Oanada but what about these others? I cant stand using the IB charts or even trying to plug the data into somewhere to use.
 
Quote from djxput:

Hi,

I've thought about trading forex but wanted to ask a few questions first.

I have an account with IB but from my understanding they require you trade 25k? to be able to trade forex. Is that correct?
I dont plan on starting out with 25k as I learn to trade forex.

I've read about Oanda; do they have any minimums for trading forex? Ive also signed up for their fxgame acct and have fooled around with that a little bit. I'm still unsure what I am doing exactly.

1. Is there a way you can get rid of the data between the days get tired of looking at .....................

2. Is there a easy way to figure out how much I am trading ie with the game account I type in like 10000 but I cant figure out how much I am actually trading. What does that 10000 represent. dollars?

3. Do I have to worry about excahnging curreny when trading forex? or can I go from the euro/usd to the usd/yen to the pound?

4. Are there any good sites I can read up on for newbs learning to trade the forex?

5. How do tax returns work for trading forex?

6. Are there any other good futures that I could trade besides the euro ie stuff that has alot of play at nitetime hours ie currencies?

thanks for the help
More...
djxput I would be happy to help you out. Oanda would be a great choice, especially if you only had few thousand. You would not be able to manage that small of an amount if you had to trade in lots.
About getting rid of the weekend data, go to tools tab at top of platform and pull down 'user preference' window to change. Other than that, you should be able to find all other info on there site.
djxput I suppose gold must be trading in all markets too, if you need any 'calls' for these other products you can contact me.
DT
 
whats so bad about the spreads ?

just use limit orders ... between the spread if you
want to be NBBO

- I have been fooling around with the ZG and YG (mini gold) and the mini gold has lousy spreads during nitetime trading ie looking at 4 tick spread here. 7:36 CST-

ps ... I know IB charts are not as cute looking as some other vendors , but you can easily see trends
and watch volume info ... even with simple
5 minute bar charts !

:)
 
Quote from djxput:


I have an account with IB but from my understanding they require you trade 25k? to be able to trade forex. Is that correct?
I dont plan on starting out with 25k as I learn to trade forex.

3. Do I have to worry about excahnging curreny when trading forex? or can I go from the euro/usd to the usd/yen to the pound?

6. Are there any other good futures that I could trade besides the euro ie stuff that has alot of play at nitetime hours ie currencies?
More...

-25k is the minimum trade size, but with $/Euro you need 2% margin, i.e. you only need $500 to trade.

-With IB FX product we look at your true net cash position. Thus, you could buy Eur vs Usd, then buy Usd vs Yen, and be left with a Euro vs Yen position. The USD would net out.
With many FX brokers, the positions are counted seperately. So if you bot Eur/Usd, then you would need to sell Eur/Usd to close the position. This can result in higher costs if you trade multiple pairs.

-IB offer a number of products which trade in the US night, Australian SPI, Hong Kong HSI, Japanese TOPX, N225, SGX - Taiwan Index and Nikkei, etc.

- Also check out the new TWS 852. There are some big improvements in our charting - see release notes on the website
 
Is there a easy way to figure out how much I am trading ie with the game account I type in like 10000 but I cant figure out how much I am actually trading. What does that 10000 represent. dollars?
More...
1000 lots - .10 pip
10000 lots - 1.00 pip
100000 lots - 10.00 pip

So if you buy 1000 lots EUR/USD at 1.2200 and it goes to 1.2300, that's a 100 pips gain, you're up $10.00.

Oanda is great because you have infinite control over your position sizing. You could start w/1000 lots (kind of like paper-trading w/real money is the way I think of it), then increase your size/risk as you progress, maybe buying 2000 lots so you're at .20 a pip, then 5000 lots, .50 a pip, and so on.

H
 
Expect to lose your ass, and if you stick with it for another 5 years you may come up with a system that will adjust to your personality and make money......

....it a lonely way to the top, just get on trucking.
 
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