01 · Level 1What you press, what it costs, and where your money actually sits. Fifteen lessons, each one answering a question a first-time account holder asks.
Basics: how a trade and an account work
- 1.1
What happens when you press Buy
An order leaves your platform, gets filled at a price, becomes an open position, and ends when you close it. Four steps, and every cost attaches to one of them.
- 1.2
Pairs and quotes: what 1.0850 means
A quote is the price of the first currency in the second. The number you see moves in the last decimal place, and that place has a money value.
- 1.3
What a pip is worth in money
A pip is the smallest standard price step. What it is worth depends on lot size and the pair, so the same twenty-pip move pays differently on different trades.
- 1.4
Lots: standard, mini and micro
A lot is how much of the instrument one trade controls. Standard is 100,000 units, mini is a tenth of that, micro a hundredth.
- 1.5
The three costs: spread, commission, swap
You pay the spread on entry, commission on some account types, and swap for every night a position stays open. All three are known before you trade.
- 1.6
Overnight swap and swap-free accounts
Swap is the daily cost of holding a leveraged position. A swap-free account removes it and usually replaces it with another charge.
- 1.7
Leverage and margin: how much of the trade is yours
Leverage sets how large a position your deposit can hold. Margin is the part of your money locked against it while the trade is open.
- 1.8
Order types: market, limit, stop
A market order takes the current price. A limit waits for a better one. A stop triggers once price reaches a worse one.
- 1.9
Stop loss and take profit
Two instructions you attach to a position: one closes it at a loss you chose in advance, the other at a profit you chose in advance.
- 1.10
MT4, MT5 and cTrader: which to pick
The three platforms differ in instruments, order handling and how they report costs. The choice is reversible; the account type behind it is less so.
- 1.11
Trading from a phone
The phone app does everything the desktop one does except show you enough chart. What that changes about your decisions is the lesson.
- 1.12
Demo accounts: what they teach and where they lie
A demo teaches the platform and the arithmetic honestly. It cannot teach fills in a fast market, and it cannot teach how losing real money feels.
- 1.13
Account types: standard, raw spread, cent
The same trade costs different amounts on different account types. Raw spread accounts move the cost into commission rather than removing it.
- 1.14
Opening an account and passing verification
What documents a regulated broker has to ask for, why it has to ask, and the checks that hold an application up.
- 1.15
Deposits and withdrawals with local methods
Which local payment methods reach a broker, how long each leg takes, and why a withdrawal usually has to go back the way the deposit came.