CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. Excess volatility increases risk further. Be cautious. Past performance is not an indication of future results.
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Panel by panel

What is forex, and which panel holds it? (Nigeria)

Not a definition to memorise — the places a platform keeps the market in, the order they open in, and what each states before a first click.

Forex is the market where one currency is exchanged for another, and the rate between them keeps changing. On a platform all of it arrives as one list of names with figures that move on their own.

The five panels a name passes through

Opened in this order, the market stops being abstract.

  1. The search box

    No platform shows the whole market. A search box adds a name to the list; what is not on it is missing from the screen, not from the market.

  2. The name itself

    A row reads EUR/USD: the first code is what is priced, the second what it is priced in. At 1.1000 a euro costs a dollar and ten cents.

  3. The chart of that one name

    Clicking a row points the chart at that name alone — the market did not change, the picture did. Its shapes belong to reading a chart.

  4. The details behind it

    Each name carries a properties screen: sizes and schedule, stated as figures. The one panel that answers instead of asking, and it takes no input.

  5. The ticket

    Everything above opens and closes with nothing at stake. The ticket is the first with consequences — on a demo account, virtual ones.

The details screen states the sizes

Beginners guess these figures; they are printed, on a screen nobody can edit (the words: trading words):

LineWhat it statesWhat it settles
Contract size100,000 units of the first currencynobody types the standard size
Smallest size accepted0.01 lot, a hundredth of itwhere the size box starts
Smallest price step1.1000 becoming 1.1001 — one pipabout 10 cents at 0.01 lot
Schedulethe days the name tradesweekdays round the clock, not weekends

Scale is set a level up, by the account the ticket points at: a Standard Cent account keeps the balance in cents, so $10 becomes about 1,000 small units and trades run 100 times smaller (account types).

What the screen does while the market rests

Overnight is the first surprise: figures move with nobody at the keyboard, because the desks quoting them sit in every time zone. The schedule line counts a weekday as one session, not a set of hours.

At the weekend the same screen looks faulty — figures stop changing, the last candle stops growing, nothing new appears. Nothing has dropped. When the list restarts, the first price of the week can sit a distance from the last price of the week before, drawn as a jump.

Where the row on the list comes from

Every figure beside a name is quoted by the company whose platform is open — a broker, which connects a screen to market prices. «The market» on any screen is one company’s view of it; an app and a website show the same list under different furniture.

What the ticket opens is not the currency in the name either: most everyday traders hold a CFD, a contract following the price of the pair. Expected direction, a gain; the other one, a loss. No panel knows which comes next, and neither do banks or experts — risk basics.

Questions asked with the list open

Is anything worth writing down during the tour?

The name watched, what its details screen states, and the time — three lines that make the next session a comparison, not a fresh start.

Only a few names sit on my list — where is the rest of the market?

Behind the search box. A platform shows what was switched on, so a short list says nothing about the market.

Which panel states how big one lot is?

The properties screen behind the name, not the ticket: 100,000 units of the first currency, 0.01 lot as the smallest size.

The whole list froze — has the connection dropped?

Check the day before the cable: this market rests at the weekend, and rest looks like a frozen screen.

Why does the chart start the week away from where it ended?

Prices kept being agreed elsewhere while the list stood still, and the chart draws the difference as a gap.

Can anything on the details screen be changed?

No. It describes the instrument, not the decision: size, direction and the protective exit are typed into the ticket.

Is money moving while a name is only being watched?

No. Prices update whether anyone watches; nothing moves until a ticket is confirmed.

How many names should stay on the list in the first week?

One is defensible: a single name watched for a week teaches more than ten glanced at.

Does the app show a different market from the website?

No — same names, same prices, labelled differently. Learn whichever screen you intend to keep.

The demo account

All five panels, virtual money behind them.

See the practice screen

Account types

The setting that rescales every figure here.

Compare account types

Your first trade

The same panels used once, in order.

Walk through a first trade

Watch a real list move without risking anything

A demo puts these panels on screen with virtual money: free, no time limit, a wrong click costing nothing. Demo results promise nothing about a real account.

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