Is there a best time to trade?

外汇市场每天 24 小时开放，但这并不意味着我们可以随时进行交易。 

首先，市场可以分为三个交易时段，主要是东京、纽约和伦敦。当我们提到某个特定的交易时段时，实际上指的是市场开盘时间。也就是银行营业的时间，因为我们只能在银行营业时间内进行交易。如果我们指的是伦敦交易时段，我们也包括欧洲，因为伦敦是欧洲的金融中心。当我们提到美国交易时段时，我们指的是纽约开盘时间。至于整个亚洲交易时段，我们通常指的是东京开盘时间。

为了在交易中获利，我们需要货币波动。我们依靠价格走势的变化来获利。如果我们买入欧洲美元，我们可能希望价格波动，最好是朝着特定的方向波动，这样我们就可以获利。要使价格波动，需要数百万美元的交易，并朝着特定方向进行布局。因此，我们需要数亿美元的交易资金，才能改变欧元的价格。这最有可能发生在银行和股票市场交易或开市的时候。同样，如果大多数在银行、对冲基金和经纪自营商公司工作的人都在睡觉，我们可能不会看到汇率出现太大波动。

是否存在最糟糕的交易时间？

与此相反，我们几乎可以立即看到人们早上开始工作时价格开始波动的时刻。 

例如，伦敦证券交易所早上八点开市，资金立即开始易手。但如果你观察伦敦时间凌晨四五点的市场，就会发现此时大多数金融界人士都还在睡觉。早上这个时候通常不会有太大波动。我们或许应该在伦敦时间早上七点再来观察。突然间，我们会看到价格走势发生显著变化。这也是因为欧洲的股市，例如法国和德国的股市，都已开市。大量资金正在交易。许多交易员正在执行交易决策，金融机构也都照常营业。所以，现在他们可以进行外汇交易，价格开始波动，这种情况会持续到大约11点左右的午餐时间，那时欧洲人通常会去吃午饭。那天早上，大部分计划好的交易都已经完成了，我们现在就等着美国人起床，好让他们去上班，做同样的事情。

对于货币交易者来说，外汇交易中最重要的指标之一就是时钟。如果我们需要在亚洲交易时段规划交易，那么最好等到亚洲市场开市，亚洲人起床上班后再进行。 

理解这一点至关重要，因为许多人仅仅将交易视为简单的数学公式，而不是理解人类行为。交易很大程度上就是理解人们。他们什么时候上班？什么时候吃午饭？什么时候是国定假日？

如果我们在伦敦交易时段进行交易，我们经常会看到趋势走势从伦敦时间早上7点或8点开始，然后在上午11点到11点30分左右突然开始减弱。这意味着许多交易者已经达到了他们的目标。是时候在美国人醒来之前平仓了，或许，他们可能会决定将市场引向不同的方向。 

对某些人来说，这似乎很难理解。如果我们仔细观察图表，并绘制伦敦交易时段的时间线，就会发现一个反复出现的模式。伦敦交易时段在伦敦时间下午 1:30 左右趋于平静，此时纽约已经醒来，开始工作。交易正在进行，同时，纽约证券交易所开市前发布的大量经济数据也随之发布。显然，这些数据与美国以及美元相关，这对市场以及作为货币中最大的货币的美元产生了巨大的影响。因此，所有这些因素意味着，我们可以预测市场参与者和交易量何时会增加，这往往会导致汇率波动，而我们希望抓住这些波动。这就是我们的工作。

作为货币交易员，我们如何衡量货币的特定波动？ 

实际上，它每天都在变化。作为流动性最强的交易货币对，欧洲美元在东京交易时段的波动幅度超过 70 点，在纽约交易时段的波动幅度超过 90 点，在伦敦交易时段的平均波动幅度则远超 100 点。 

因此，如果我们想通过交易欧洲美元获利，最好在东京、伦敦或纽约这三个交易时段之一进行交易。我们应该避免在这些时段之外进行交易。例如，美国人下班回家后、亚洲人醒来之前。这段时间市场会非常平静。同样，在亚洲人下班后、伦敦交易时段开始之前也是如此。在这些非交易时段，市场也会非常平静，我们可能不想进行交易。

Asian currencies tend to do better during Tokyo compared to American currency. It’s not recommended to trade the Dollar/CAD during the Tokyo open. It makes more sense to trade dollar/cad in during the New York session. So, thinking of how and why a move happens will help us decide which pair to trade and which session to trade it in.

Now, of course, the trading it’s not all done in Tokyo. Hong Kong, Singapore, Sydney, they all contribute hugely to the Asia session. So, don’t just focus on when a bank in Tokyo is going to open. In the three sessions highlighted, we see Asia is slightly lighter compared to London and New York. So, when we trade Asia, we trade it slightly differently to when we trade London. Also, we need to consider that London and New York, they actually overlap each other time-wise. Just bear in mind that largely the market is made up of people who simply just wake up in the morning and go to work, bank or the hedge fund, or wherever they may be, and once these people finish work and go home. They’re trading stops. So, the timing of the day makes a huge difference when we are analysing the markets.

Similarly, if we want to place a trade during the New York lunchtime, we may want to consider that London Traders are now finishing work and the banks are closing and liquidity is about to start drying up. In fact, the trend could start to reverse because London Traders may start taking their profits and the process of taking profits means they may trade in the opposite direction of where we initially traded. For example, the Eurodollar has been going up all New York morning. It’s not uncommon to then see it fall because the Europeans are now selling to take their profits on that Eurodollar position.

Quite often, Friday is the day that many Traders want to just take their profits for the weekend. It would also be good to remember, not hold anything overnight positions, and risk them over the weekend.

So, what are the best days to trade Forex? If we look at the average pip range for each of the major pairs for each day of the week, we have often found that Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday are the busiest days of the week. This is where we see the highest movements in price action. Come Friday, Europe is winding down for the weekend. Asia has already gone home for the weekend and there isn’t any new money coming into the market. Without new money coming into the market, it will be hard to see how a trend will continue further in that direction although Forex is traded 24 hours a day. There are certain days of the week, certain times of the day that certain currency pairs offer more favourable trading than other currency pairs. It will be good to remember this. So, although these opportunities are open to us, it will be good for us to try to use a little bit of common sense to know when to trade but also when not to trade.

So, the best days to trade are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. It will be good to avoid trading during holidays, Thanksgiving, and even in the week during Christmas because it is not very liquid during these times of the year to be trading. 

The market can behave unpredictably. So, for example, if we are approaching the week of Thanksgiving, good to bear in mind that a lot of people are going to be gearing up for that holiday and good for us to get into a sort of unwinding position and not really look to take on any new trades.