Risks of forex trading

  • Small market movements can have a big impact. Most FX trading products are highly leveraged. You only pay a fraction of the value of your trade up-front, but you are still responsible for the full amount of the trade.
  • Exchange rates are very volatile. They tend to move around a lot even within very short periods of time. There are significant investment risks as currency fluctuations may move against you, causing you to lose money.
  • Currency markets are extremely difficult to predict. Many different factors affect exchange rates.
  • Limited protection from risk management systems. Stop loss orders will only cap your losses. You may also pay a premium price to guarantee your stop loss order.
  • Forex scams and fraud. Offers and advertisements that sound too good to be true probably are. Read what the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission has to say about foreign currency trading fraud.
  • Forex provider risks. If your FX provider becomes insolvent, you may not get your money back.
  • Trading delays can severely affect results. You may not be able to make trades when you’d like to, because of a lack of liquidity in the market, execution risk, or computer system problems.

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