Why Traders And Investors In The UK Are Very Lucky

There are lots of forex traders and stock market investors in the UK and it has to be said that these people are very lucky because they have an advantage over people from many other countries.

Let's start with forex traders first of all because it is often said that the most profitable periods of the day are the opening few hours of the London and European trading sessions. So this is a really convenient time of the day for UK traders because it is right at the start of the day.

If you are based in the US, however, this would be the middle of the night for you. Therefore you automatically miss out on these highly profitable trading sessions unless you are prepared to stay up all night.

Stock market investors are also very fortunate because they can make full use of spread betting facilities to go short on various stocks if they want to. The profits made from this form of speculation are also tax-free at the time of writing. Spread betting is prohibited in certain countries due to strict gambling laws so these people do not have this option available to them.

Of course it is still possible to go short in many cases by using options. However these instruments are often quite complex and can be quite hard to understand, particularly when compared to spread betting.

Forex traders in the UK can also open an account with a spread betting firm and trade the forex markets this way instead of using a traditional forex broker. In fact many traders prefer trading this way because they avoid paying tax on any profits that they make.

So the point is that people in the United Kingdom are very fortunate in many ways because they can trade forex at convenient times of the day, and they can short shares and trade various instruments tax-free.

The Best Websites For People To Learn Forex Trading

This is my first post on this new blog and I just want to talk about how you can learn to trade forex. There are lots of ways you can go about this. You can find a mentor, ie a professional trader who can teach you how they trade, you can read books or you can buy a few trading courses. However in this day and age most people like to visit websites because it is convenient, plus much of the information is absolutely free.

So which websites should you visit?

Well there are two good sites that I can particularly recommend. The first is a site called Babypips. This site is a complete resource for anyone wanting to learn the basics of forex trading because they start right at the beginning and walk you through step by step.

You will learn how the currency markets actually work and what causes the markets to move, and you will also other basics such as how you can sign up to a broker and start placing trades, and what the various terminology means.

You will then have the option to progress to different levels and learn about the more advanced subjects such as technical analysis (using charts to find trading set-ups), and how to spot the various different trading patterns.

It really is a complete education and as I've already mentioned, this information is completely free.

The second website I like is Forex Factory. This is primarily a forex trading forum where members can chat and exchange tips and strategies with each other all through the day.

There are various different sub-forums devoted to subjects such as brokers, systems and live trading thoughts. There is also a sub-forum specifically for newbies, so this alone is a great way of learning the required skills because there are lots of experienced traders on there ready to answer your questions.

There is also a decent news section on this site and a useful calendar on the home page which lists all of the economic data releases that are scheduled for each day. However it is the forum that will be most useful for those just starting out.