About
GOLD
Gold has been used to store wealth for more than 3,000 years. Why? Because gold is very rare – and gold today is becoming ever-more difficult to find and mine.
Gold is six times more rare than platinum, and 18 times rarer than silver. Gold is also very nearly impossible to destroy. Unaffected by oxygen or hydrogen sulfide, gold cannot rust, tarnish or decay. Nor will gold melt below 1063 degrees Celsius. Gold is only dissolved by cyanide.
After 30 centuries of gold mining, new gold deposits are becoming ever harder to find. South Africa, the world’s largest gold producing nation, has seen its gold output more than halve in the last decade.
Since 2008, the cash cost of mining one ounce of gold has doubled for North American gold miners. The rate of inflation for gold miners’ all-in costs worldwide reached 27% last year.
The total amount of gold above-ground, however, is growing by just 1.6% per year.
Gold is six times more rare than platinum, and 18 times rarer than silver. Gold is also very nearly impossible to destroy. Unaffected by oxygen or hydrogen sulfide, gold cannot rust, tarnish or decay. Nor will gold melt below 1063 degrees Celsius. Gold is only dissolved by cyanide.
After 30 centuries of gold mining, new gold deposits are becoming ever harder to find. South Africa, the world’s largest gold producing nation, has seen its gold output more than halve in the last decade.
Since 2008, the cash cost of mining one ounce of gold has doubled for North American gold miners. The rate of inflation for gold miners’ all-in costs worldwide reached 27% last year.
The total amount of gold above-ground, however, is growing by just 1.6% per year.
Cryptocurrency
Although the cryptocurrency market is relatively new, it has experienced significant volatility due to huge amounts of short-term speculative interest. For example, between October 2017 and October 2018, the price of bitcoin rose as high as $19,378 and fell to lows of $5851. Other cryptocurrencies have been comparatively more stable, but new technologies are often likely to attract speculative interest.
The volatility of cryptocurrencies is part of what makes this market so exciting. Rapid intraday price movements can provide a range of opportunities to traders to go long and short. In early 2021, cryptocurrency such as bitcoin has rising up to $58,000, the highest a currency has ever rising.
The cryptocurrency market is usually available to trade 24 hours a day, seven days a week because there is no centralised governance of the market. Cryptocurrency transactions take place directly between individuals, on cryptocurrency exchanges all over the world. However, there may be periods of downtime when the market is adjusting to infrastructural updates, or ‘forks’.
Liquidity is the measure of how quickly and easily a cryptocurrency can be converted into cash, without impacting the market price. Liquidity is important because it brings about better pricing, faster transaction times and increased accuracy for technical analysis.
In general, the cryptocurrency market is considered illiquid because the transactions are dispersed across multiple exchanges, which means that comparatively small trades can have huge impact on market prices. This is part of the reason cryptocurrency markets are so volatile.
The volatility of cryptocurrencies is part of what makes this market so exciting. Rapid intraday price movements can provide a range of opportunities to traders to go long and short. In early 2021, cryptocurrency such as bitcoin has rising up to $58,000, the highest a currency has ever rising.
The cryptocurrency market is usually available to trade 24 hours a day, seven days a week because there is no centralised governance of the market. Cryptocurrency transactions take place directly between individuals, on cryptocurrency exchanges all over the world. However, there may be periods of downtime when the market is adjusting to infrastructural updates, or ‘forks’.
Liquidity is the measure of how quickly and easily a cryptocurrency can be converted into cash, without impacting the market price. Liquidity is important because it brings about better pricing, faster transaction times and increased accuracy for technical analysis.
In general, the cryptocurrency market is considered illiquid because the transactions are dispersed across multiple exchanges, which means that comparatively small trades can have huge impact on market prices. This is part of the reason cryptocurrency markets are so volatile.
FOREX TRADING
When traders choose which market to trade, they are looking for optimal trading conditions and the best chance of taking a profit.
While you can go short on other markets by using derivative products, short selling is an inherent part of trading forex. This is because you are always selling one currency (the quote currency) to buy another (the base currency). The price of a forex pair is how much one unit of the base currency is worth in the quote currency.
For example, in the forex pair GBP/EUR, GBP is the base currency and EUR is the quote currency. If GBP/EUR is trading at 1.12156, then one pound is worth 1.12156 euros. If you think that the pound is going to increase against the euro, you would buy the pair (going long). If you think that the pound will decrease in value against the euro, you would sell the pair (going short). Your profit or loss will depend on the extent to which you get your prediction right, meaning it is possible to profit whichever way the market moves.
The foreign exchange (FX) market is open 24 hours a day, five days a week – from 5pm EST Sunday to 4pm EST Friday*.
These long hours are because forex transactions are completed between parties directly, over the counter (OTC), rather than through a central exchange. As forex is a truly global market, you can always take advantage of different active session’s forex trading hours.
There are four major trading sessions each day, matching the opening hours of banks in London, New York, Sydney and Tokyo. There is a high volume of trades throughout each of these sessions, and especially when sessions overlap.
It is important to remember that the forex market’s opening hours will vary in March, April, October and November, as countries shift to daylight savings on different days.
While you can go short on other markets by using derivative products, short selling is an inherent part of trading forex. This is because you are always selling one currency (the quote currency) to buy another (the base currency). The price of a forex pair is how much one unit of the base currency is worth in the quote currency.
For example, in the forex pair GBP/EUR, GBP is the base currency and EUR is the quote currency. If GBP/EUR is trading at 1.12156, then one pound is worth 1.12156 euros. If you think that the pound is going to increase against the euro, you would buy the pair (going long). If you think that the pound will decrease in value against the euro, you would sell the pair (going short). Your profit or loss will depend on the extent to which you get your prediction right, meaning it is possible to profit whichever way the market moves.
The foreign exchange (FX) market is open 24 hours a day, five days a week – from 5pm EST Sunday to 4pm EST Friday*.
These long hours are because forex transactions are completed between parties directly, over the counter (OTC), rather than through a central exchange. As forex is a truly global market, you can always take advantage of different active session’s forex trading hours.
There are four major trading sessions each day, matching the opening hours of banks in London, New York, Sydney and Tokyo. There is a high volume of trades throughout each of these sessions, and especially when sessions overlap.
It is important to remember that the forex market’s opening hours will vary in March, April, October and November, as countries shift to daylight savings on different days.