Fuuyoh.. what a topsy turvy day... Can't wait for US market to open tonight.. it's going to be another round of roller coaster.

Swap rates are only applicable if you leave your order overnight. Overnight means 5am Malaysian time. You will be given interest for buy orders and charged interest for sell orders. Swap rate is not charged at per second rates.

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Added on August 18, 2009, 11:30 amThat depends on the broker that you use. The broker that I use has controlled spreads and the EURUSD pair is controlled at 1-2 pips with the GPBUSD at 3-4 pips. The spread does not move much as they control it. Some brokers will raise their spread to 20-30 pips, which will eat into your profit.

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Added on August 18, 2009, 11:36 amYou got it the other way around. High spreads happen during peak activities so that the broker can earn more. It also happens during news breaks that would affect the market. If you are a broker, you would encourage more trading during low volume by reducing the spread, not increasing it. When breakout news happens, people will trade and that is the time to increase the spread to earn more for the broker. Do keep in mind that they broker only earns from the spread they charge you since they don't charge commissions for retail traders like us.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 18 2009, 11:36 AM

FXDD

I wasn't talking about swap rates. Read properly. I was correcting the fact that he said that "If you short high rate currency against low rate currency, you need to pay interest every seconds for oanda case." He called that a swap rate which is not the case. I was pointing out the fact that swap rates are applicable only when you leave an order open overnight. How it is calculated, that differs from broker to broker and it does not affect how swap rates are applied, just the amount differs.

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Added on August 18, 2009, 7:52 pmYour trade automatically closes when you lose all your free margin. For example if you have USD1000 in your account, you purchase a standard lot of EURUSD at 1.400 for USD700, that leaves USD300 in your account. Since each pip is USD10, once your order loses 30 pips (USD300) your order is closed since you have no free margin left to close. You will be left with USD700 in your account.

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Added on August 18, 2009, 7:54 pmWhen you leave a buy order overnight, you get paid interest. When you leave a sell order, you pay interest.

OK.. times up. 8pm. Time to prepare for US market opening.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 18 2009, 07:54 PM

Legally, there are no forex traders in Malaysia. Your account is still based off-shore outside of Malaysia and local companies cannot accept payment. But of course, there are some doing this 'under the table'. The easiest way is still to submit application on our own. It takes 1-2 days to get a live account and 1-2 days to TT the money over. All done online and without having to visit any office.

These are still just 'front office' for the brokers. Just like fxopen.com where they have so called local reps but then again, these are just local companies helping people to deposit/fund their fxopen accounts. Still no actual forex brokers in Malaysia yet.

TT can be done at any banks and even online thru maybank2u. There is no need for any people to help transfer fund unless it is a very small amount like USD10.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 19 2009, 12:28 PM

Ahh.. Singapore... the financial hub of SE Asia. Damn they are 10 years ahead.. sorry.. WE Malaysian's are 10 years behind when it comes to financial systems and policies.

If Oanda can only give you 1:50 leverage, that means a standard lot of EURUSD would cost around USD2800++. A 0.01 lot would still cost you USD28 to buy.

You have not even read up on what leverage is? Each transaction in forex is in 100,000 units. So if EURUSD is 1.4000, you will be buying 100K units at USD 1.4000 each = USD140,000.

With a leverage of 1:50, each lot size (1.0 lot) is then divided by 50 which equals to USD2,800. Since you are buying a 0.01 lot size, you are paying USD28 per 0.01 lot.

Understand now?

So when EURUSD goes up 1 pip = 1.4001, your worth is now USD140,010. So your 1 pip = USD10 on a standard lot size. On a 0.01 lot size, you just divide it by 100 and your 1 pip = 10 cents.

Please learn your basics before even looking at Oanda. Look at other standard brokers first. Oanda is popular because you can trace mini, micro and even Nano size lots which other traders do not.

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Added on August 20, 2009, 12:55 pmYou may have a smaller margin to purchase the lot but your free margin stays the same. The more lots you buy, the more you divide your free margin amongst those lots, the less free margin you have per lot. Once you lose all your free margin, your orders will automatically close. That is your risk. Remember, you do not lose your margin. YOu only lose your free margin.

Take USD5000 account. 1.0 lot of 1:50 is USD2800 (EURUSD 1.4000) You have USD2200 free margin. 1 pip = USD10 so you have 220 pips as your free margin. YOu can lose 220 pips before the broker auto close your account.

Take USD5000 account. 1.0 lot of 1:200 is USD700. You have USD4300 free margin. Here comes the fun part. Since you have so much free margin, why not buy 4 lots of 1:200 at USD2800. Same as the above? Same 220 pips free margin? Wrong. 220 divide by 4 orders. You have about 55pips per order. Once you lose 55 pips on each order, you wipe out your free margin and all 4 orders close.

So which is riskier? 1 lot with 220pips free margin or 4 lots with 55 pips free margin? Which order will close first if things go bad against you? Understand now?

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 20 2009, 12:55 PM

I've never seen any broker setting fixed margin. Purchasing 1.0 standard lot of 1.42 EU will cost a margin of 355 as you have shown using Oanda. FXCM will be the same. Imagine the amount of money they are losing if they allow you to purchase a USD355 lot for USD250. I think you are getting a little confused on this.

Yeap. You are definitely confused here. If you trade on leverage, then you use ratios like 400:1, 200:1. What you are trading in your FXCM account is trading on margin, which is expressed as a percentage of position size.

You cannot compare trading with margin and trading with leverage.

No I'm not confusing anybody. They are the same meaning, trading with money you don't have. However, the calculation is different between trading with leverage (ratio) and trading with margin (percentage).

Don't give me the shit as though I don't know what trading with leverage and margin is.

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Added on August 21, 2009, 9:18 amTHERE IS NO WORD PLAYING HERE. This is how a standard lot size is calculated at 100k units of currency. Please don't get confused with mini accounts and micro account and nano accounts. They trade at different currency size.

My example, if you were reading properly, said standard lot size, meaning 100K. It's sad that after 1 year of trading that you do not know what a standard lot size is. People, esp newbies who does not bother to learn about the basics will get confused with mini and micros accounts

Heck, some mini accounts are set to trade at 10K currency, so a mini lot of 1.0 with a leverage of 1:200 will cost USD70 and a 0.1 lot will cost USD7. Of course then your 1.0 mini lot pip is only USD1.

So tell me exactly which part of my exact words that you quoted that is wrong? I'm not responsible for people getting confused with other accounts. People who understands the fundamentals and basic would know what I'm talking about.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 21 2009, 09:18 AM

Not to forget now they even have NaaaaaaNooooo accounts. As long as we understand the basics, there should be no confusion. I don't even bother asking what type of account it is. All we need to know is the currency size per lot and the leverage ratio. Those with the basic knowledge will be able to figure out the rest from there. Next thing you know they'd come out with a pico account and let people trade in cents. Ahhahahahahaha....

Not just that but the USD index is way too high and the DJ performed 'unexpectedly' yesterday. We know they are all going pull out of USD. Parked the orders expecting the USD to fall and hit all of them, from EURUSD to USDCAD to GBPUSD to USDJPY. All of them just went wawawhomp across my ambush. No need to trade anymore for today.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 21 2009, 05:17 PM

But... you have to be careful as some broker will only allow you to withdraw back to your credit card if you use it to fund your account. Just like funding with Paypal and they'd only let you withdraw back to your paypal account.

Just go to the bank and do it with cash. Takes only 1 day since we are almost 1 day ahead of US.

Things like funding accounts are considered as cash advance since no goods/services were traded. You cannot consider that as purchase. The same like going to Genting and changing chips with credit card. It is considered as cash advance a the 5% cash advance fee.

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Added on August 25, 2009, 12:44 pmHowever, if I'm not mistaken, as a foreign account holder, we don't get any protection whatsoever. With 81 banks already 'kantoied' in US, anything can happen. The idea would be to withdraw wins and refund the accounts only against drawdowns.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 25 2009, 12:44 PM

Those charges only appear in your account later. You don't see it immediately like using TT to transfer money. It also depends on the broker as most will charge it as cash advance. Remember, the broker gets charged a certain percentage if it was a purchase.

What you need to understand is that it is normal to get charged cash advance. Lucky if you don't get it.

Some local companies can do some great mumbo jumbo with the cards too and convert cash advance to monthly repayment purchase and one time interest rate.

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Added on August 25, 2009, 2:16 pmThen the forex is not working for you. You should not be in the forex unless you can do about 15-20 'winning' trades and no losses on your demo account. Only then are you ready to be in the forex. That is why 95% are losing money with the other 5% laughing themselves to the bank with your money.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 25 2009, 02:16 PM

That is how people see it and that is how they all fall into the 95% trap. Your 60% winnings are just your chances but not your odds. Your 60% wins you USD100 but your 40% lost can be USD200. You are still in a loss.

There is only 1 measurement in forex and that is your P/L. You'd be surprised to find that the winners in this game has no losses because they will not trade if they are not 100% sure if they are going to win. Most people must place a trade no matter what and treat this like gamble. They think that if they don't trade, they are giving up chances to win, in fact they are just increasing their chances of losing. This is not Magnum4D.

Funniest thing is that they immediately think 'photoshop' when they see statements with no losses. Upon close inspection you can see a lot of cancelled trades in the statement and that already gives a clue on the typical winning strategy they use in their trading. No photoshop needed.

You can have a winning streak of 19 wins but a single lost can wipe you out. So the only way to win in forex is to have no losses at all.

I have a simple question. Forex is practically buy/sell currency with cash. It is a business like any other buy/sell business and actually better since you don't need to look for supplier and customer. The supply and demand is there. We just have to set the price. Would you start any business without first knowing how to make money out of it?

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 25 2009, 04:17 PM

Exactly. 'Nuff said.

I think this applies to all Maybank credit cards as a new security measure implemented for Maybank credit cards. You'd see the similar notification if you purchased GSC tickets online, informing customers paying with Maybank Credit Card to first register for the MSOS pin number with Maybank before proceeding with payment.

This post has been edited by sleepwalker: Aug 25 2009, 06:17 PM