A Brief Look At Forex Exchange Rates
The way to making profits on the foreign exchange or Forex market is to be able to buy and sell currencies in such a way that any fluctuations in their prices help earn you a tidy sum of money. Thus, knowing about the forex exchange rates is vital to your success in forex trading and though it may, on the face of it, appear to be a simple matter that anyone can learn, in fact it is not all that straightforward a matter and thus requires in depth knowledge before one is able to succeed in forex trading.
Rich History
Actually, the forex exchange rates have a rich history behind them and so you need to realize the importance of learning why things happen the way that they do on the forex market and also learn the right moves so that you can capitalize on such knowledge. So, to really understand forex exchange rates, you must first be sure of what they really are, and a definition of forex exchange rates would be that they are the value of one currency in relation to a second currency.
Thus, when the exchange rate between two currencies is stated as being a first currency fetching 1.20 of the second currency, then the forex exchange rates is 1:1.2. In addition, you also need to understand why currencies have different values and this can best be explained by the fact that after the valuation of currencies moved away from ‘gold standards', the prices of currencies began to be pegged against the US dollar, and other currencies fluctuated upwards or downwards in relation to this currency in a range of not more than a single percent.
Thus, this was the beginning of forex exchange rates and it was referred to as fixed exchange rate, though because of changes in the way trade is carried out in the present times, both the gold standard and fixed exchange rates have been abandoned and instead the forex exchange rates are now known as fluctuating exchange rates.
In effect it means that today forex exchange rates are influenced by the market forces and when demand for a particular currency exceeds its supply then the forex exchange rates would be higher for the currency being demanded, and the opposite would happen should demand slacken off.
Now that the dollar is the base currency in forex trading, the US government simply prints more dollars and then sells off these dollars to different countries in the form of debts, though because of rising oil prices and stronger world economies, the US dollar is currently losing its once vice-like grip as the predominant currency of the world which is eroding the exchange rates of the dollar and also those of the US's closest trading allies.
