Spread & Margin
Margin Requirements
Spread
You probably heard these terms often, but might never really understood the true meaning of these terms. When it comes to currency trading. You are trying to buy a currency and hope to sell it for higher which leads you into profit. The differences between the “Ask” and “Bid” prices is what’s known as the Spread.
“Ask” is a term used for your buying price base on the currency rate at that moment. “Bid” on the other hand refers to the selling price of the currency. The differences between the two is calculated by Pips. In Forex Trading, a wider spread means you have to buy higher and sell lower, which makes it a loss in this case. Your goal is to try to go for a lower spread because it means you will be buying for less and selling for more….in another words, you make a profit.
Margin
The “Margin” in Forex Trading is the minimum required balance to execute a trade and it works very differently to stock exchange. In spot Forex, you are given leverage options which you can trade and the amount you have in your account works like a collateral for the transaction.
Let’s just say you’re trading AUD/JPY at 100:1 leverage and you wanted to purchase $200,000. In this case the deposit or the margin required is 10% of $200,000 making it $2,000. Since there are no interest pay on the remaining 90%, it’s not too difficult to understand why Forex is one of the biggest trade in the world. However, you must also realize that the more leverage usually means more risks, because this is money you need to pay back.
Contract Sizes
In an effort to provide the best pricing and liquidity to our customers, the following table will apply for order size on Standard accounts. We subscribe to a certain Band of Liquidity from our six counter party Banks. This Band of Liquidity meets the needs for 99.9% of our customer trading volume. If customers desire to trade larger than 50 lots per click, they can simply click again for a second 50 lots.
Currencies
| Ticker | Spread* | Instant Execution | Mergin at 1:100 Leverage | Size of 1.0 Lot | Size of 1.0 Mini Lot |
| EURUSD | 2 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | EUR 100,000 | EUR 10,000 |
| USDCHF | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | USD 100,000 | USD 10,000 |
| GBPUSD | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | GBP 100,000 | GBP 10,000 |
| USDJPY | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | USD 100,000 | USD 10,000 |
| AUDUSD | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | AUD 100,000 | AUD 10,000 |
| USDCAD | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | USD 100,000 | USD 10,000 |
| EURCHF | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | EUR 100,000 | EUR 10,000 |
| EURJPY | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | EUR 100,000 | EUR 10,000 |
| EURGBP | 3 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | EUR 100,000 | EUR 10,000 |
| GBPJPY | 7 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | GBP 100,000 | GBP 10,000 |
| GBPCAD | 12 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | GBP 100,000 | GBP 10,000 |
| GBPAUD | 14pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | GBP 100,000 | GBP 10,000 |
| GBPNZD | 35 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | GBP 100,000 | GBP 10,000 |
| GBPCHF | 8 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | GBP 100,000 | GBP 10,000 |
| EURCAD | 10 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | EUR 100,000 | EUR 10,000 |
| EURAUD | 12 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | EUR 100,000 | EUR 10,000 |
| NZDUSD | 5 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | NZD 100,000 | NZD 10,000 |
| CHFJPY | 7 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | CHF 100,000 | CHF 10,000 |
| AUDJPY | 8 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | AUD 100,000 | AUD 10,000 |
| AUDNZD | 14 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | AUD 100,000 | AUD 10,000 |
| AUDCAD | 8 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | AUD 100,000 | AUD 10,000 |
| CADJPY | 5 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | CAD 100,000 | CAD 10,000 |
| CADCHF | 9 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | CAD 100,000 | CAD 10,000 |
| NZDCAD | 12 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | NZD 100,000 | NZD 10,000 |
| NZDCHF | 14 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | NZD 100,000 | NZD 10,000 |
| NZDJPY | 12 pips | 20 lots | 1000 $ | NZD 100,000 | NZD 10,000 |
Metals
Spot Gold and Silver
| Ticker |
spread* |
instant excecution | margin requirement
per standard lot |
| Gold | 50 | 20 lots | 1800 $ |
| Silver | 8 | 20 l0ts | 1800 $ |
* Spread may widden up to 100 for Gold and 12 for Silver In volatile market.
Future contracts
Light Sweet Crude Oil (# CL) and Natural Gas (# NG)
| Ticker |
Spread |
1 lot value | Commission per standard lot | Margin requirement
per standard lot |
| #CL | 80 | 1000 Barrel | 15 $ | 2500$ |
| #NG | 120 | 10000 MMBtu | 15 $ | 5000$ |