• General

    Five forex websites I use daily

    With the abundance of financial websites and services for forex traders, one can get easily overwhelmed by all the information and opinions around. On top of that, there is constant distraction caused by the ads blinking in every corner possible and the risk of being exposed to content not relevant to your trades that might throw you out of emotional balance (like breaking news about accidents, crime, dramatic photos, etc.) Over the years, I followed each major financial website on the market for a while, especially websites for forex traders like fxstreet, dailyfx, etc., and I would like to share my opinion on what’s worth your time. But before we…

  • General

    Trading hours

    According to various online trend analyzing tools “forex trading hours”, “forex market hours” and “forex schedule today” are among the most often searched terms in Google related to trading. Since there are a few more nuances than just London open and New York open, I decided to post my take on this subject 🙂 . Best time to trade Forex The Electronic Communications Network (ECN) which connects market participants and facilitates the vast number of FX transactions is operating 24h a day starting from Monday 8:00 AM Sydney Time until Friday 5:00 PM New York time, except for a few bank holidays like New Year or Boxing Day. This constitutes…

  • Data sources

    Historical FX data

    FXTop – Historical data for fx pairs and price charts heading back to the 1950’s. Mataf – various forex tools and data sets, eg. I use Forex historical Volatility data for various calculations and simulations. Historical data download for Forex (FX) pairs, commodities, stocks and indexes (CFD) for any analysis in Excel. Wide range of time frames selection from monthly to 1 tick! Download forex historical data to a CSV file for free. Requires opening a Dukascopy Community account (it’s not a trading account).  How to download historical data for Forex, Commodities, Indices, Bonds, Stocks, ETFs, Crypto – step by step guide with pictures. Wondering where to get historical price…

  • Data sources

    CFTC data

    Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Commitments of Traders data plotted onto a chart. This chart includes large open positions (long and short) of institutional traders in the futures market. The data is collected by CFTC each Tuesday, but is published each Friday at 2:30 PM EST, so there is a certain lag.  How to use CFTC data in forex trading Large positions that fall into CFTC data reporting requirements usually need some time to build and square. Despite a lag, this data is still valuable as an indicator of sentiment. Extremes and flips in positioning can indicate change of a trend and a growing number of contracts can suggest strength…

  • Data sources

    Interesting links

    Links to interesting sites and services which I like visiting from time to time. If you have any suggestions regarding any links that could be added, please feel free to e-mail me. Current Market Valuation – an interesting score index for US stock market valuation – based on six valuation models ,the site is calculating whether the market is undervalued to overvalued. Updated daily. Longtermtrends – a website that compiles and compares various data, current as well as historical, and presents it in a form of charts (eg. M2 money supply vs inflation). The charts are available for six asset classes: Gold, Stocks, Bonds, Real Estate, Commodities, and Crypto. Worldometers…

  • Data sources

    Links to central banks live streams

    Direct links to sites with central bank’s press conference’s streams: The Federal Reserve: https://www.youtube.com/@federalreserve/streams or https://www.federalreserve.gov however, YouTube works better for me Very useful for beginners – how to read FOMC statements by The St. Louis Fed European Central Bank (ECB) (you have to accept cookies for streaming to work): https://www.ecb.europa.eu/home/html/index.en.html Bank of England: https://www.youtube.com/@bankofenglanduk/streams Doves and hawks at FOMC, ECB and BoE Bank of Canada: https://www.youtube.com/@bankofcanadaofficial/streams Bank of Japan: they do not seem to have a YouTube channel and do not provide any link to video streaming on their website. When I need to watch the market during their conferences, I run a search and usually there is someone like…

  • Data sources

    Economic data

    Reliable sources for various types of economic data, from most popular to less-known indicators, current as well as historical. If you have any suggestions regarding the links that could be added, please feel free to e-mail me. Worldwide economic data: Database of OECD statistical data:  like “Monthly comparative price levels” for most countries in the world. Allows for current and historical data filtering and download Bank for International Settlements  statistics – lots of data on financial transactions, both current and historical Trading Economics – independent internet service with a vast database of economical indicators and data from all over the world. Historical FX pairs price data-base for download. It includes…