Why Learn Currency Trading Price Movement News Impact?
Making money from forex trading requires knowing the basics of trading. A strong foundation in reading charts and trends is certainly required but to learn currency trading, however, a fundamental understanding of what news moves the market will help you immensely with timing market entry.
National and international news events can heavily influence price behavior in the forex market. The major financial news reports are especially impactful. Unexpected news stories can also generate movement in the market.
Catastrophic events such as earthquakes, hurricanes, and terrorist attacks have the potential to affect currency values. Since they are unpredictable there is little that you can do other than to play defense and use a stop loss.
A more predictable event would be the announcement that the Olympic Games will be held in a certain country. This could strengthen confidence in that country’s economy and lead to a rise in the value of its currency. At the same time the other major contenders for the Games may suffer a fall in currency values. So it is important for a trader to know when an announcement like that is expected, and which countries are involved.
Similarly, financial reports in many countries are released almost daily. Announcements focusing on gross domestic product, inflation, and interest rates are generally predictable and have an impact on currency prices..
Don’t make the mistake of trading on rumors. Other traders and the financial media may bet on a pending announcement but it would be unwise to enter the market before its known. Why?….because the speculation could be wrong and the market may have already incorporated this knowledge into the current price (in which case there won’t be much of a gain even though you are right).
A key point to remember is that you are trading a currency pair and not just one currency. If your country is one of the pair then you generally have easier access to the financial information. The information from the country in the other part of the currency pair may not have the information as forthcoming. This is especially true of the US dollar since it tends to dominate the forex news. It is even truer if you are trading the dollar against a minor currency. The lesson is that smart traders have to do their homework and ensure that their information is not one-sided to really learn currency trading.
Trading the news is part of fundamental analysis of the currency markets. For novices it may be too difficult and risky to try to anticipate market direction based on these announcements and other predictable events. The best practice would be to close any open positions when a pending announcement is about to happen. Overtime as you become more skilled in trading the news but stick with the basics and play defense to preserve your trading capital.
Monday, August 31st, 2009

