market hours forex

market hours forex

Nature Of The Foreign Exchange Market

The Foreign Exchange Market is an over-the-counter (OTC) market, which means that there is no central exchange and clearing house where orders are matched. With different levels of access, currencies are traded in different market makers:

The Inter-bank Market - Large commercial banks trade with each other through the Electronic Brokerage System (EBS). Banks will make their quotes available in this market only to those banks with which they trade. This market is not directly accessible to retail traders.

The Online Market Maker - Retail traders can access the FX market through online market makers that trade primarily out of the US and the UK. These market makers typically have a relationship with several banks on EBS; the larger the trading volume of the market maker, the more relationships it likely has.

Market Hours

Forex is a market that trades actively as long as there are banks open in one of the major financial centers of the world. This is effectively from the beginning of Monday morning in Tokyo until the afternoon of Friday in New York. In terms of GMT, the trading week occurs from Sunday night until Friday night, or roughly 5 days, 24 hours per day.

Price Reporting Trading Volume

Unlike many other markets, there is no consolidated tape in Forex, and trading prices and volume are not reported. It is, indeed, possible for trades to occur simultaneously at different prices between different parties in the market. Good pricing through a market maker depends on that market maker being closely tied to the larger market. Pricing is usually relatively close between market makers, however, and the main difference between Forex and other markets is that there is no data on the volume that has been traded in any given time frame or at any given price. Open interest and even volume on currency futures can be used as a proxy, but they are by no means perfect.

About the Author

Action Forex provies forex analysis reports, live pivot points on majors and crosses, etc are provided with collection of carefully selected educational articles and free trading ebooks downloads.

Is Forex open 24 hours?

In stockmarket they only open like 6 hours per day, we exchange stocks in one market. I don't understand with Forex, how they process, are the exchanges of selling and buying transferable?

The FOREX Market never sleeps. A currency trader may take advantage of all market conditions at any time. There is no waiting for an opening bell. It is a 24-hour, continuous currency exchange that never closes (normal dealing hours of operation are Sunday 5:15 pm through Friday 4 pm Eastern standard time), you can trade whenever you want: morning, noon or night. This is a very big advantage compared to stock trading with limited trading hours.

The following schedule is based on Eastern Standard Time (GMT-5).

Forex market opens at 19:00 between Sunday and Thursday. Then at 21:00, Singapore and Hong Kong open. Between Sunday and Friday, European markets opens in Frankfurt at 2:00am. Then London opens at 3:00am. When Asian shift is almost finished, European markets are in full throttle at 16:00. At 7:00, European markets are almost finished. At 8:00, US market opens in New York. At 9:00am, New York Stock Exchange opens. At 17:00, Australia opens.

Forex market operates globally 24 hours a day, starting from the far east, in New Zealand (Wellington), passing the time zones in Sydney, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore, Moscow, Frankfurt-on-Main, London, then finishing the day in New York and Los Angeles.

[affmage source="amazon" results="8"]market hours forex[/affmage]
Forex Market Hours