I’m beginning to think that’s Graeme Irvine’s mantra.

He’s the business columnist on Longer Life’s Bourse page, and I’ll leave it to you to discover his reasons for this four-word chant. Amidst Graeme’s siren calls, I’ve taken notice of his recent daily listings of silver transfers. It seems that HSBC-Hong Kong is in the process of accumulating a substantially high percentage of the current market inventory. The range is something like 60%, an achievement I find as breathtaking as it is intriguing.

Why would that much of the world’s investment-grade silver be moved to one depository? So far, I’ve not been able to find anyone willing to provide an answer. The accumulation is public knowledge, so I’m not suspecting a conspiracy.

I think most investors recall the Hunt brothers’ clumsy attempt to corner the silver market three decades ago — driving their Texan empire from billionaire to bankrupt within eight years — and wouldn’t think of trying to duplicate that stunt.

Super-investor Warren Buffet is, of course, much more sophisticated. His acquisition of 130million ounces of silver approximately nine years ago was made in tranches calculated to coincide with the market rather than drive it. All outward appearances indicate that he has no clandestine intentions; instead, he’s simply substantiating his confidence in the metal and possible lack thereof in the long-term strength of the dollar.

Perhaps the HSBC-Hong Kong hoarding is a result of an announcement made in June 2005 by the United Kingdom’s Barclay’s Bank in which they filed their intent with the USA’s Securities & Exchange Commission to establish an Exchange Trading Fund (‘ETF’) for silver. Specifically, the applicant is a Barclay’s subsidiary, iShares Silver Trust, and the process gained momentum in January 2006 when the SEC approved their listing on the American Stock Exchange.

The Silver ETF is meeting with strong resistance, most notably by the Silver Users Association (SUA), who represent entities who make, sell and distribute products related to silver. Their complaint is that in order to support the ETF, so much silver would have to be taken out of the marketplace and held in reserve that its membership would be burdened by the metal’s higher cost. As the SUA membership processes 80% of all silver produced in the USA, they represent a significant voice in this matter.

Ted Butler is one of the most respected silver analysts in the world. His opinion is that, no matter what the outcome of the Barclay’s application, the entire episode is a positive development for silver investors.

First, let him explain how Exchange Trading Funds for commodities operate, and then describe how the Barclay’s proposal is being positioned:

“In order to establish a commodity ETF, a financial institution buys and stores a quantity of the commodity in question and then issues shares of common stock at a fixed unit of conversion to represent fractional ownership of that commodity. In the case of silver, Barclays would buy the metal, in industry standard 1000oz bars, have them stored in London and elsewhere, and issue common stock shares in a ratio of one share of stock for every ten ounces of silver. The shares would then be traded on a recognized stock exchange, hence the name, exchange traded fund. In the case of the Barclay’s Silver ETF … they’ve even decided on the stock symbol, SLV. The amount of silver bought and stored would increase and decrease depending upon the investment demand for the shares, similar to how the gold ETFs currently function.”

The practicalities of a silver ETF include:

- Stock certificates are certainly easier for the investor to store than the metal itself, and

- The ‘common stock’ format allows more categories of investors the eligibility to participate.

What is interesting about the Barclay’s proposal is that its goal is to put 130million ounces of silver into reserve, the exact level of Warren Buffet’s holdings. Could they be using that precedent as a model? Burton notes that even though Buffet was careful not to disrupt the market, the price of silver still doubled during that accumulation. Furthermore, Burton says, “I see nothing in the Barclays prospectus suggesting such buying restraint, either in time or price.”

So, Butler reasons, this makes the situation most favorable for involved investors:

“This silver ETF announcement is a true win-win for silver investors. (If) their silver ETF becomes effective, the impact on the price of silver will be great. That’s win number one, obvious and straightforward.

“But if … this ETF never sees the light of day, that will be a big win as well for silver investors. Why? Because it will prove for all to see just how critical the supply/demand and inventory situation is in silver. If the government says no way to this ETF, it will be for one reason only – there is not enough real silver in the world to fund it.”

Either way, it’s a development worth watching. Graeme lists the Comex figures daily at the end of his column and always mentions when another allotment of silver moves to HSBC-Hong Kong. The growth of those figures could well be the ‘tracer’ of things to come.

Stay long precious metals.

Gold surpasses $500. an ounce after a long slumber and it is still one of the worlds greatest bargains. Every day it is becoming more evident that stocks, bonds, and property in America and most of the Anglo-Saxon world are propped up on borrowed money and borrowed time.

In the last half of 2005 alone, U.S. households spent well over $500 billion more than their after-tax earnings. How is this possible? By borrowing of course. About half of that money came from “equity extraction.” The present home owner generation is living off the perceived increase value of their houses. These poor householders are starting to get a clue. They thought they really could get rich by buying and selling each other’s houses at inflated prices and then borrowing against it. Well, putting on the dog and out doing the Jones’ was fun while it lasted. However, if you can still find a greater fool, now is the time to sell and find a nice inexpensive rental accommodation, or buy one of the rapidly growing heavily depreciated repos now on the market, and invest the rest in gold.

You need to protect yourself NOW from the biggest one year loss of wealth in the history of the world. Does this statement get your attention? Many western economies have participated in this gigantic fraud of escalating house evaluations as evidence of economic growth, relying on greed and bogus money supply to stoke the fires of the greater fool theory and thus give the illusion of prosperity. As a result house sticker prices kept going up and up in most cities, while in reality the true value has actually been going down. Skeptical huh. What is true value you say?

Remember, world economies have been off the gold standard now for over 35 years, ever since tricky Dick Nixon unpegged the US dollar from gold as a means of surreptitiously stimulating a sagging economy of the time. Adhering to the Gold Standard, the medium of exchange backed by gold, forced politicians and bankers to be accountable.

Money today is not based on anything tangible or of intrinsic value. It has only a perceived fungible value at whatever level skittish traders and speculators say it is. Politicians and central bankers since Nixon have been free to print fiat money (a piece of paper with numbers on it) at their whim without control or restraint to keep their game afoot. These currencies have since been played off each other as in a worldly game of monopoly. One clue of impending doom is the fact that every fool with greed in his heart can now trade currencies online.

As the unmasking of the great deception accelerates, countries with manageable debt and natural resources will see their currencies decline slower in relation to the US dollar, but all currencies will decline in relation to, you guessed it, Gold.

Like any expanding bubble, there comes a point where it can expand no more, and the subsequent resizing is shockingly fast. These is no new economic model in play that now guarantees perpetual prosperity or even status quo, despite what vested interests and their spin doctors would have you believe. When push comes to shove, paper and electronic blips won’t cut it. As the saying goes, BS walks, and the age old measure of real value called Gold, will be what talks.

If you played this oneupmanship real estate game with your friends and countrymen, your house is worth far less than you know. In fact, your house is losing value daily as you may now realize. When it becomes front page headlines, it will be too late. All the greater fools will have already been fooled with no one left to bail you out. Unfortunately, it will not be just the nouveau rich who will feel the pain. Their shortsighted greed, encouraged by unscrupulous appraisers lenders and politicos, will bring down the rest of the economy as well, precipitating the demise of many types of paper assets.

Americans in particular now owe far more money to far more people than can ever be paid back. They have bigger houses, newer cars, more electronic gadgets and a smug attitude to go with it. But they also have more bills to pay and no more money to pay them with. Much the same scenario as their government that purports to lead.

The U.S. government has borrowed more money from foreigners in the last eight years than all previous administrations since the time of George Washington. During the current US administration, the feds have borrowed more than $1.05 trillion from foreign governments and banks. This is more than all the rest of the nation’s administrations put together from 1776 to 2000. Oh, the costs of empire building and the waging of patriotic wars to free people so they can be more like us.

Consider the fact, that despite a flat or even negative earnings picture in overall stocks in recent years, bonuses paid to managers on Wall Street and high salaries throughout corporate America including G.M., are obscene. This is but more evidence that we have reached a late, degenerate stage of an imperial economy. The sun has not set yet, but its final glow is about to descend beyond the horizon.

The companies that make the most money these days are those that shuffle money – not those that make things people want to buy. And throughout the entire society, everyone participates in what has become an orgy of swindle and delusion. The practitioners of this prevarication call it salesmanship. At best it is entertainment. Not value or substance, but mindless triviality, delusion or false expectations. At worst, psychological manipulation to create frivolous desire, leaving the weak minded and undisciplined open to unbridled theft. Just add up how much interest you are paying on your car, your house, your credit cards and everything else you have been induced to believe is necessary for a successful life. The barbarians are at your door and benefiting mightily from your labors. The rich have indeed been getting richer while the consumer blindly signs on the dotted line.

The mantra of the private sector through its advertising is ‘get it while you can’ despite the fact that this attitude is crushing the hopes and aspirations of the next generation. Previous generations attempted to leave the world a better place then they found it for their offspring. Now, the young and the unborn are saddled with an insurmountable mountain of debt and who cares. I’ve got mine you say…but do you really, when the charade unravels? What are you going to do…who are you going to call? Be prepared for painful dislocation and introspection.

It will be the minority of savvy and erudite investors who pause to take notice that the emperor has no clothes. It will be the astute who shed themselves of the attractive burdens they have accumulated and put at least some of what is still marketable into gold. It will be the shrewd and brave who have the resources in the form of universally accepted coin, gold, to live reasonably well during the shakeout and to pick up the bargains for literally pennies on the dollar when the storm finally passes.

The fact is, most people no matter how well meaning or educated, fail to learn from the lessons of History. They go through life with blinders on content with petty self-interest. Nero fiddles while Rome burns. These are among the reasons why gold is going to go up more, no doubt, a whole lot more. Owning gold bullion or gold coins is decidedly a happy thought.

When you invest in mutual funds you are investing in not only funds but full time management of your funds by knowledgeable brokers. These managers you will take care of all of your investments from buying, selling and trading so all you have to do is sit back and watch your investment grow because the mutual fund mangers handle all of the work for you. Also, your mutual fund manager will make the best possible investments for you because the mutual fund companies are always working with analysts to get the most up to date information on companies and the investment world.

When you invest in mutual funds you will also be able to access your money quickly and easily if you need to. In most cases individuals make an investment for a long period of time, however sometimes emergencies develop where you need money quickly. In these instances you will be able to sell all or most of your shares for the market price and get the money immediately. That is good to know.

Also, when you invest in mutual funds your money will be invested in a wide variety of investments which would be nearly impossible for you to do on your own. The reason it is good to have your money invested in hundreds of different of investments is that the ups and downs of the market do not affect you as much and also your risk of loss decreases. So, investing in mutual funds is really a good option for people who want to make the most of their investment and the return on their money.

In addition to all of these benefits, when you use a mutual fund company to make your investments for you then you will also receive additional services. In general, these benefits include automatic reinvestment, transfer of funds electronically, and other services as well.

If you have investments that are not performing as you would like or are considering making some investments, then go ahead and look into investing in mutual funds. You will be amazed at the ease of investing in mutual funds and the potential growth you will see on your investments. However, make sure you use a credible mutual fund company to make your investments for you.

Know your forex trading market. Educate yourself about the currencies that you trade. The more you know about the country whose currency you’re trading in the forex market, the more accurately you’ll be able to predict which way the money will move.

Pick a forex trading system – and stick with it. Savvy forex traders will tell you that system is everything. Forex trading by system lets you automate your trades based on history, following the traditional peaks and valleys. Set up a system and live with it to make the most of your forex trading.

Practice makes perfect – but it’s not the real world. Practice forex trading accounts are great for learning how a particular trading account works – but they’re not the real world. Many experienced traders recommend starting off with a mini forex account to minimize your losses while you get acclimated.

Keep your eye on the margin. Margin trading is a great way to lose a lot of money quickly. Stay away from forex margin trading until you’re sure you know what you’re doing.

The only win that counts in forex trading is the bottom line. In forex trading, the bottom line is how much money you made at the end of the day. Don’t count won or lost trades – only dollars and cents.

Too many business owners, when asked about the value or ROI of their product or service, shrug their shoulders and say, “I can’t really put a value on it.” If you can’t put a value on it, think how hard it is for your prospects and customers! And if they can’t put a value on it, how likely is it for them to buy it?

We’re going to give you a simple way to identify all the value elements of your product or service and articulate it in such a way that your customers will absolutely know in quantifiable terms what your value is to them. They will see so much ROI they’ll be foolish not to want to buy from you.

The key idea here is that you communicate Return on Investment by looking at your value proposition through your customers’ eyes. In other words, why should they spend their scarce money with you, versus using the funds in some other way?

Your customers want to know how long it will take them to get back their investment or make a profit. Many will want to see a recurring return.

There’s an old marketing saying: “Make your product free”. People will pay more when they think that “it doesn’t cost them anything.” You do this by building so much intrinsic value into your offering that it far exceeds the cost to the customer; do this correctly and in their perception, it’s free.

Creating Value with Your Product or Service:

First, list all the ways that you create value for your customers.

Does your product or service…

–Help client’s increase their revenues? Does your product/service increase their sales? Create more leads? Increase their competitiveness in their market? Shorten the sales cycle? Get more repeat and referral business?

–Allow them to raise prices, or at least hold prices level? Does the value you create allow your customer to charge higher prices for their offering?

–Reduce expenses? Does it reduce initial or ongoing cost? Does it reduce overhead such as utilities and rent or carrying charges? Does it save money on materials, equipment, staff, and outside services? Does it provide a more economical installation or a longer life span? Does it reduce error rate?

–Allow them to replace some existing expense at a lower cost?

–Enable staff headcount reductions? Does it allow your customer to make headcount reductions in staff or support personnel?

–Avoid impending or predicable expenses? Does it help avoid expenses altogether?

–Increase their products’ and services’ perceived value. Does it increase the perceived value of your customer’s offering?

–Increase productivity? Does it increase your customer’s productivity or the productivity of his staff? Does it increase manufacturing production or throughput?

–Give them greater control? Does it offer some way for your customer to track results, lead generation, sales, profitability, productivity, or any other key success factor?

Next, review the list and for each of the ways you create value, figure what each is worth. This could be in terms of absolute amounts of money, some percentage of revenues, or some percentage of expense reduction.

Create proof for each of your value assertions. Proof can be in the form of worksheets, testimonials, case studies, success stories, printed statements, even survey results.

Add up each of the value elements to come up with a total value, combining earnings and savings into one number. Again, the total value can be an absolute money number, such as $645,000, or it can be a percentage of sales.

Lastly, calculate your return on investment by comparing the total value to the cost of your product. You may come up with either an ROI (return on investment) or a “payback period.” Either way, you’ve quantified your product’s value in concrete terms, justified your price, and made it far, far easier for your prospects to make a buying decision.

Success Story

One of our clients sells enterprise software in the $150,000 to $250,000 zone. After 9/11, their sales cycle began to get longer and longer and stretched out as much as eighteen months, with most prospective deals ending in “no decision.” Prospects knew they needed to replace their old software, but they simply couldn’t justify the expense in a no-growth economic climate.

To accelerate the sales process we implemented a return on investment analysis using the exact steps described above.

First we itemized each of the ways the software saved or earned the client money, including replacing old software with a high maintenance cost, reducing the cost of computer leases, reducing materials waste, decreasing the number of customer service staff required, shortening their salesman’s phone time, increasing the accuracy of sales quotes, thereby increasing the prospect’s sales AND increasing overall sales profitability.

By assigning a dollar value to each value element, and offering proof for each one, our client was able to demonstrate a payback period of around 9 months, and a significant positive return on investment thereafter.

The first two prospects who heard this value presentation said the same thing: “We’d be fools not to buy this,” resulting in the two shortest sales cycles, and coincidentally, the two largest individual sales in the company’s history.

All of these will come true by the time you reach your retirement age. It is a point in your life wherein work is no longer attractive yet income remains the top most necessity. If the day comes that you will no longer have to work, the biggest dilemma will be on what will happen next?

A retirement plan is a requirement if you are to take pleasure and benefit from the moment after you have decided to retire.

Most often than not, people are not concerned about retirement plans. They simply pass the time and believe that retirement will eventually take place, with or without retirement plan.

What they failed to realize is that creating a retirement plan is the next most important thing any working individual should work with. What lies ahead is never too clear for people who do not have solid retirement plans.

What Is Retirement Plan?

Retirement plans are, forms of agreement that cater to give people with a considerable amount of money by the time they have reached their retirement age. These amounts are enough to compensate their continuous struggle for existence even if they are no longer working or earning the kind of income they used to make before.

In most cases, retirement plans are established by government, employers, trade unions, or some financial institutions such as insurance companies.

In essence, there are only two major types of retirement plans — “defined contribution” and “defined benefit.” These plans are classified according to how the remunerations are resolved.

Defined contribution refers to retirement plans that will give disbursements based on the amount of contributions that the benefactor has paid.

On the other hand, defined benefit refers to a particular type of retirement plan wherein the disbursements are based on the flat rate as computed from the employee’s membership years and the amount of his income while employed.

Considering these facts, not all retirement plans are deemed equal. Hence, it is best to analyze your status and determine what type of retirement plan will work best for you. You need to consider some factors to help you with your decision.

1. Reflect on the advantages and benefits

Retirement plans were especially designed to give you the benefits that you need by the time you reach your retirement age.

However, not all benefits are the same. What may seem beneficial for the others may not necessarily work for you.

Therefore, consider the type of benefits that you need and consider them upon evaluating a particular retirement plan.

2. Know the law

Be sure that the retirement plan that you will take is inconformity with the present law on retirement. This will guarantee your safety in the future.

3. Read the fine print

Reading the fine print is important in analyzing the reliability of a particular retirement plan. Every benefit and rule should be explained in details through the catalog.

If you think that the conditions are too good to be true, then, they probably are. Hence, try to consider other choices.

Familiarize yourself with retirement plans before making a decision. This will help you create a dependable future ahead.

Further, few reports dared suggest that the price of gold could climb still higher. Gold stands a good chance of seeing higher prices before the inevitable price correction, which always follows such a strong move.

Most reports saw $500 gold as a novelty, not the ominous sign that something is drastically wrong with the state of financial affairs in the United States. The truth: gold is responding to profligate spending in both the government and the public sectors. Further, gold is rising because of the massive inflation by the Federal Reserve under Alan Greenspan. Let’s take a brief glance at only one reason for gold’s jump above $500: federal spending.

The federal government now has more than $8 trillion in official (on the books) debt. Only three years ago, gross public debt stood at $6 trillion. For those calculating, that is a one-third debt increase in only three years. The United States took 226 years to run up a debt of $6 trillion. In three years, an additional $2 trillion was tacked on.

According to The Privateer, present projected spending will push the official debt to $11 trillion before the end of Bush’s second term. If this becomes reality, in only eight years the official federal debt will have nearly doubled. Additionally, there are the “off-books” liabilities.

Unfunded U.S. government liabilities—Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, military pensions, federal workers’ pensions, and other promise such as picking up the tabs for bankrupt corporate pensions—will reach $50 trillion by the end of the year and climb to $70 trillion by the end of Bush’s second term.

The official debt is the accumulation of years of federal deficit spending. This fiscal year’s deficit (October 1, 2005 thru September 30, 2006) is projected to be $521 billion. Deficit spending looks to get worse.

Pulling statistics from the respected Congressional Budget Office’s January report on the federal budget and economy, Citizens for Tax Justice show annual deficits under Bush policies skyrocketing to $1.164 trillion by 2015. These projections are seven times the Bush administration’s numbers because the White House assumes, among other things, that current tax cuts “sunset,” that Iraq and Afghanistan expenditures will suddenly end, and that federal appropriations will “plummet” as a share of the economy.

The Congressional Budget Office forecasts that by 2013 “the government is likely to be spending more to pay interest on the debt than on all domestic appropriations put together.” Any wonder the price of gold topped $500?

It appears unlikely that the problem of deficit spending will be addressed any time soon in Washington. Sadly, our lawmakers do not yet even see it as a problem. While it is true that Democrats never miss an opportunity to carp about Bush’s refusal to “roll back” his tax break for “rich Americans,” the Democrats would be as quiet as church mice if the deficit spending were for welfare programs. Either way, the results would be the same: continued deficit spending.

The way gold topped $500 was a big deal because the price of gold is the thermometer for the health of a nation’s currency. A rising price for gold suggests a fever is building. However, the reporting suggests that few reporters understand the United States is infected with a deadly virus, not a common cold.

It is always safer to have a diversified portfolio, that is, to spread you money around in various types of schemes, so that the risks and returns get balanced out. The company you work for would have a 401(k) plan which is always a safe bet. In this scheme, they will deduct a part of your salary every month and give it to an independent financial source to manage the investment, so that you get a healthy return at the end of your tenure. For those of you with greater risk-taking ability, stock markets or mutual funds can be a good idea. In stock markets, you can buy shares of companies listed on the stock exchange. Usually, good companies offer dividends along with a fair return on your investment. Dividends are not mandatory, but a lot of companies like to distribute their profits among shareholders as dividends.

Some companies prefer to reinvest the profits into expansion projects instead of declaring dividends. These reinvestments in turn should lead to further profits. However, the stock markets are unpredictable and a lot of people who dabble in stocks with the purpose of making some quick bucks may end up with losses instead.

Mutual funds are relatively safer investments, though they are also subject to market risk. Mutual funds are investments made in the stock market by financial managers with a fund collected from actual investors. There can be sector-specific mutual funds for instance those that invest in Pharmaceutical or IT or infrastructure companies only. Whatever be the mode of your investment in the markets, it is vital that you track these on a regular basis. If the prices of your shares or mutual funds decline at a time when there is a slowdown in the economy as a whole, there is no need to panic and sell at a loss. The markets will quite likely bounce back to where they were or perhaps even better. However, if the markets are strong and yet, the value of your mutual funds is on a decline, it could mean it is not well invested and it would be advisable for you to sell and move your money into something that will generate better returns. A financial consultant can advise you about the market situation and what types of investments will suit your needs best.

However,I’m already on record as believing it’s a great way to acquire wallpaper one note at a time.

With that in mind, I’ve noticed that a recent statement from the USA government has announced that they’ve ‘hit the wall’ budgetarily in Iraq; they’ve given enough financial aid to rebuild Iraq. Apparently, they’ve concluded that almost $19 billion in handouts is quite sufficient, especially when half of it was engulfed by fighting the continued insurgency there and thus had no lasting effect as a basis for reconstruction. Instead, the Americans believe it’s time for other governments to belly up to the bar and make their own contributions to the cause.

That’s about as realistic as thinking that the new Iraqi Dinar will amount to anything of value in the near future.

Given that, should the USA ever leave Iraq, the country is as liable to devolve into a prolonged civil war as the former Yugoslavia was when an imposed authority — Tito’s Soviet-backed communist confederation — inevitably fell away. That would be a strong indication that the prospects of a stable currency in Iraq are slimmer than the profile of a starving amoeba.

The latest American report on their Iraqi ‘investment’ borders on the tragic. Details abound of unfinished schools and power plants, unrepaired roads and bridges, undermanned national miliatary forces and overpaid election costs. Again, a primary factor was the siphoning of funds to counter the insurgency.

Politics aside, does this sound like the foundations of a national economy that is going to improve anytime soon?

The sales point of most online Iraqi Dinar hawkers is that it only takes a minimal upgrade of their economy to profit from an increased exchange value for their currency. Fair enough, but who’s going to want to accept it in exchange? And when?

There are numerous other opportunities out there which have a much greater growth potential than new Iraqi Dinar, and given the comparative odds, I’d even suggest horse racing.

That brings to mind an old bromide comes about the man who strolls by a stable and sees a boy excitedly shoveling through a pile of manure. When he asks the boy why he’s doing it, the lad answers, “With all this evidence, there’s got to be a pony in here somewhere!”

Perhaps, but given the current status of Iraq’s economy and the dim prospects for its future, such an allegory may be making two different, but more salient points:

- Who would want a horse that made that much of a mess, and

- Someone else is going to have to clean it up.

The Americans have apparently come to the same conclusion, possibly even thinking that the oil business there is only a one-trick pony.

So, for anyone remotely thinking they can do better than the most financially dynamic government in the world and make money from anything representing the Iraqi economy — especially speculating on its currency — I can only make one recommendation:

Grab a shovel.

The forex was traditionally a playground for the monolithic international banks and substantial corporations. Times have changed, however, and it’s now possible for the small investor to enter the speculative waters of currency trading. Forex trading has become a bit of a craze of late, especially since it is something available to anyone who owns a computer. And anyone who is willing to put in some training time can profit from forex trading. The forex market finds traders from all around the globe monitoring currency fluctuations, not unlike the way a day trader may monitor a stock’s fluctuation on the Dow Jones.

The lion’s share of forex trades involve the major currencies: the Australian Dollar, British Pound, Canadian Dollar, Euro, Japanese Yen, Swiss Franc, and US Dollar. In forex trading, a trader will pair two types of currency. Currencies are bought and sold simultaneously, for example the US Dollar and the British Pound. As it requires more of one currency to purchase another, that currency loses value. Not unlike stock trading, forex traders try to accumulate currency when it weakens in hopes of selling it when it goes up in value. Forex trading is not unlike the buy low, sell high approach found in stock trading.

The way a trader on the forex market exchange goes about acquiring currency is by giving a bid/ask quote, saying he is willing to buy, for example 1.6 marks per dollar and sell them at 1.625 per dollar. One must be a market trader to have access to this process. So most people who are forex trading on line buy the currency through a bank, where they’ll pay a commission, then have to figure the commission paid to the bank into the calculation of their spread, or profit margin, when they sell it.

Forex trading is not an easy path to riches. And some people have lost considerable money in miscalculating the market. With its increased popularity, on some days the forex market exchange can see more than one trillion dollars exchanged. Packages for teaching a new forex trader how to invest in the market can range in price.

Last but not least, trading successfully is no easy task. It is a process and could take years to achieve the desired results. There are a few things though every trader should take in consideration that could accelerate the process: having a trading system, using money management, education, being aware of psychological issues, discipline to follow your trading system and your trading plan, and others.