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Thursday, January 21, 2010

Quick Of Currency Options Trading For Beginners

By Eddie Lamb

There are many different kinds of currency options trading. If you are just entering Forex trading, you will want to research and understand how options trading works and the risks involved whan you trade options. There are over three billion options traded per year and, while there are some benefits to this type of trading, most Forex brokers do not allow traders to sell options contracts without a high level of capital for protection because of the risk involved. In other words, there is a lot of risk involved in this type of trading and you want to be really sure about how to be successful at it before you start.

Remember, we are talking about trading currency pairs. The most common options trading is called the "standard" or "vanilla" trading options. It is very straight forward and involves the face amount in dollars, a option put/call, and option expiration, a strike (that's what the trade will be) and an exercise. So, let's break this down to see what it means.

The put/call is the currency pair you will sell at the exchange rate in the future (expiration date). You "can" sell, but you aren't obligated to. The options are worthless if the put rate runs out of money. An expiration date on options trading is done in a week, a month, 3 months, 6 months, or 12 months.

When you see "European" exercise, the option can only be exercised, or sold on the date of expiration. If it is exercised, the option turns into a cash trade or SPOT and is completed at the strike price and settled on the SPOT value date.

An "American" exercise can take place at any time prior to the expiration date. These are valued differently than the European exercise using different numerical approximation methods or a binomial option-pricing model.

Options trading that have non-standard features are called "Exotic Options." These are very popular with the most popular being the "barrier" or "knock-out" option. These options have a barrier exchange rate (out-strike) and if the option is breached at any time during it's life (before the expiration date), it is killed.

Other types of options trading that you will hear about are Double Barrier options, Double Barrier Range Binary Options, Average Rate Options, Quantos Options (popular for hedging), Binary Options, and Compound Options (these are simply options on the options). You will find a lot of hybrids and variables that are traded as well, so this is not a complete list of the types of currency options that are being used.

The advantages that you will hear about with this type of trading is that trades provide more leveraging power which makes them cost efficient, they are lower risk because they cost less (the relativity argument), and they can be used to hedge against reversals that may occur in exchange rates.

Having a clear understanding of how currency options trading works, and the actual level of risk involved will be important when you are making the decision of whether or not to do options trading. Taking classes, participating in forums that are run by successful options traders, and learning the intricacies of this type of trading will be very helpful in your entry into this arena. - 23208

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