Currencies and gold
Pairs, pips, lots, trading sessions and the leverage limits that apply to retail clients.
Independent market education
About Forex Trading, Clearly Explained
The useful facts about forex trading are few and precise: what a pip is worth, how much margin a position locks up, when each market opens and what every trade really costs. TradoGlobal sets them out with the working shown, then applies the same method to gold, shares and crypto.
- Formulas printed on every calculator
- No accounts, deposits or signals
- Written for a horizon of years
How much leverage retail clients may use
Maximum ratios for retail CFD clients in the UK and EU. A lower cap means more of your own money behind each position.
Source: ESMA and FCA product intervention rules. See what these caps mean in margin
An information site, not a trading venue
TradoGlobal is not an exchange, a broker or a wallet. There is nothing here to sign up for, fund or download. We publish explanations and free calculators, nothing more. If a message, advert or app uses our name to offer trading, returns or "account recovery", it did not come from us: see how to spot trading scams.
Four numbers behind most currency maths
These conventions hold across almost every platform and pair. Once they are familiar, a price screen stops looking like noise.
100,000units of the base currency in one standard lot
0.0001one pip on most pairs; 0.01 on pairs quoted in yen
$10per pip on one standard lot when the US dollar is the quote currency
17:00New York time: the daily rollover, when overnight financing is applied
Forex is the exchange of one currency for another. Every price is a ratio: EUR/USD at 1.1650 means one euro buys 1.1650 dollars. The first currency is the base and the second is the quote, so buying the pair means holding euros funded by dollars. There is no central exchange; banks, dealers and brokers quote prices to one another around the clock from Sunday evening to Friday evening, New York time.
Moves are small in percentage terms, which is why positions are counted in lots and are usually leveraged. That leverage is the part most beginners underestimate. At 30:1, a 1% move against a position equals 30% of the margin behind it. Our forex guide walks through a full trade, and the position size calculator turns a stop-loss into a lot size.
Gold sits beside the currencies on most platforms as XAU/USD, priced in dollars per troy ounce, with a standard contract commonly set at 100 ounces. It behaves partly like a currency and partly like a commodity, and it tends to draw attention when real interest rates fall or confidence in paper money wobbles.
For a long-term investor, currencies matter even if you never place a trade. A US fund bought with pounds, or a salary paid in one currency and savings held in another, carries exchange-rate risk. Understanding the mechanics is the first step to measuring that risk instead of guessing at it.
Which markets are trading now
Your local time: –
Open or closed status is worked out in your browser from each market's regular session. Public holidays and early closes are not included, so treat it as a guide.
MarketNowRegular hours (local time)Guide
Spot goldXAU/USD–Sunday 18:00 to Friday 17:00, New York, with a daily one-hour breakGold margin maths
Tokyo stocksTokyo Stock Exchange–Monday to Friday 09:00 to 11:30 and 12:30 to 15:30, TokyoMarkets compared
Four markets, one careful method
Each market has its own conventions. We explain them in the same order every time: what you own, who holds it, what it costs and what can go wrong.
Shares and indices
What a share gives you, how exchanges and brokers fit together, and how an index is built.
Crypto and stablecoins
Ledgers, keys, networks and custody, with the risks stated before the possibilities.
Where gold fits in
Gold gets its own place on this site because it sits between two worlds. On a trading platform it looks like a currency pair, XAU/USD, quoted around the clock on weekdays. In a portfolio it behaves more like an insurance policy that pays no income: it earns no interest or dividend, so its appeal rises and falls with the return available on cash and bonds after inflation.
That makes the arithmetic of holding gold with leverage worth understanding in detail. A standard contract is commonly 100 troy ounces, so every one-dollar move in the price is worth $100 per lot. UK and EU retail clients may use no more than 20:1, and overnight financing applies to the full value of the position, not just the margin.
| Gold convention | Typical value |
|---|---|
| Symbol | XAU/USD |
| Unit of price | US dollars per troy ounce |
| Standard lot | 100 oz (check your provider) |
| Value of a $1 move, 1 lot | $100 |
| UK/EU retail leverage cap | 20:1 |
Work out the deposit a gold position needs with the margin calculator.
Calculators that show their working
Each tool runs in your browser, stores nothing and prints the formula it uses, so you can check the answer by hand.
Pip valueWhat a one-pip move is worth on your position, in US dollars.lots × 100,000 × pip size (÷ price if USD is base)Position sizeStart from the loss you accept and work back to a lot size.risk $ ÷ (stop in pips × pip value per lot)MarginHow much of your own money a leveraged position locks up.units × price ÷ leverageCrypto profitThe net result of a buy and a sell once both fees are taken.coins × sell price × (1 − fee) − amount invested
A sensible reading order
New to the subject? These five pages, read in order, cover the ground most people skip.
- Markets compared
See how the four markets differ before comparing any of them.
- Forex guide
Put pairs, pips, lots and margin together in one picture.
- Trading fees
Add up every cost before you count a single gain.
- Choosing a broker
Verify a provider's authorisation yourself, on the regulator's own register.
- Avoiding scams
Learn the patterns investment fraudsters rely on.
Why we write for the long view
Most trading content is built around the next few minutes. Ours is built around the next few years. That changes the questions worth asking: not "where will EUR/USD be at lunchtime?" but "what does holding this position overnight cost me every day?", "who actually holds my shares?" and "what happens to my coins if the platform fails?"
We never predict prices, rank real providers or tell you what to buy. We explain mechanisms, show arithmetic with clearly labelled illustrative numbers and point out the risks. Read who we are, how we research our content and the disclaimer, or browse the glossary and reader FAQ.
