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Trader`s Glossary

Trader`s Glossary

A

Abnormal Market Conditions

a rapid or thin market.

Account history

a register of completed transactions, balance operations and cancelled orders in the customer’s account.

Admiral Markets

a dealer in contracts for differences on spot foreign currencies, stocks and futures.

Admiral Markets website

www.admiralmarkets.com

Asian Session

between the hours of: 23:00 to 08:00 (Tokyo).

Ask

the price a seller or market-maker is willing to accept for a traded instrument; also known as the offer price; a price for establishing an open Buy position.

AUS 200

another name for the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX 200); 200 stands for top 200 (by market capitalisation) companies listed on the ASX.

Aussie

Aussie or Ozzie are nicknames for the AUD/USD currency pair.

Available Margin

also called free margin; a rest of funds in the customer’s account with the deduction of margin, floating profit/loss and rollovers summary.

B

Balance

a summarised financial result of all funds deposited in, and withdrawn from the customer's account, and of all closed positions in that account.

Base Currency

the first currency in a currency pair (e.g. if EUR/USD rate is 1.3283 then one EUR is worth 1.3283 USD).

Base Rate

the given central bank country lending rate, which is used by banks to calculate the interest rate given to borrowers.

Basis Point

a unit that describes the minimum change in the price of a product.

Bear

slang for a trader who expect prices to decline; trader who is holding a short position.

Bearish / Bear market

slang for a downtrend market (price is declining).

Bid

the price at which a seller or a market maker is willing to buy a traded instrument; a price for establishing an open Sell position.

BOC

Bank Of Canada (Canada’s central bank).

BOE

Bank Of England (UK’s central bank).

BOJ

Bank Of Japan (Japan’s central bank).

Bull

slang for a trader who expect prices to rise; trader who is holding a long position.

Bull / Bullish Market

slang for an uptrend market (price is rising).

Bundesbank

Germany’s central bank; also referred to as BUBA.

Buy Limit

a pending order for establishing an open Buy position in the customer's account. In the event that the price on the specified instrument falls to the specified level; it can be only executed at the Ask price, and then placed below the current Ask price of the specified instrument.

Buy Position

an open position that represents expectation that the market price will increase (e.g. buying the base currency against the quote currency, or buying a contract for difference on an underlying security rate).

Buy Stop

a pending order for establishing an open Buy position in the customer’s account, in the event the price on the specified instrument rises to the specified level; can be only executed at the Ask price and placed above the current Ask price of the specified instrument.

C

Cable

slang for the GBP/USD currency pair.

CAC40

short name for the French Stock Exchange; 40 stands for top 40 companies (by market capital).

Candlestick Chart

one of the ways to view or present a chart. The Candlestick Chart indicates the opening and closing price in a chosen date range; if the close price is higher than the open price, then that area of the candlestick is not shaded, and vice versa if the open price is higher than the close price.

CBs

short for central banks.

Central Bank

usually a government organisation that manages a country’s monetary policy.

CFD (Contract for Difference)

an object of a electronic transaction based on the price fluctuation of an underlying asset (e.g. stock or futures contract).

Chart

a diagrammatic representation of historical quotes in the form of lines, bars or candlesticks.

Client Log-file

a text file located in the folder 'MetaTrader4/Logs' that is used for recording all requests from the client terminal; it is created in the form of separate daily files.

Client Terminal

the MetaTrader 4 (hereafter called MT4) program designed for customer trading, exercising supervision over customer accounts, obtaining real-time and historical quotes, news and other market information that Admiral Markets may have made available to our customers. Also commonly used for technical analysis, automated trading by expert advisors, and for customer feedback via the internal mail system.

Close

a request or instruction for closing a specified position at the current market price.

Close By

a request or instruction for closing two locked positions on the same instrument.

Commission

an amount of service payments charged to the customer’s account.

Contract

a standard unit on the Forex market (e.g. 1 lot).

Contract Details

parameters of an instrument specified by Admiral Markets for customer trading and published on the Admiral Markets website.

Counterparty

one of the participants in a financial transaction.

Currency Pair

traded instrument based on the change of the value of one currency against another currency.

Customer

a physical or juridical person; a signatory of the Customer Agreement with Admiral Markets.

Customer Account (Account)

our customer’s personal system register of transactions, orders and balance operations.

D

Data Feed

a stream of quotes in Admiral Markets' MT4 trading platform.

Dealer

an Admiral Market's employee responsible for accepting customer requests, executing customer orders and carrying out the liquidation of customer open positions in the event of a Stop Out.

Deficit

negative balance for a trade or payment (i.e. not enough money).

Demo Account

practice account.

Depo

money deposited on an account.

Dispute, Complaint, Claim

an event that occurs when our customers believe that Admiral Markets' actions or inactions are erroneous or contradictory to what is found in the Terms or/and the Admiral Markets Customer Agreement, and vice versa.

Dividend Adjustment

an adjustment that is applied when a share passes its ex-dividend date (including the ex-date of any special dividend) in the underlying stock market.

DJIA or Dow

short for the Dow Jones Industrial Average or US30.

Dove

refers to easier monetary policy or lower interest rates; opposite to hawkish.

Downtrend

declining price action, which can be described as lower-lows and lower-highs.

E

ECB

European Central Bank.

ECN

Electronic Communication Network, which eliminates the third party in executing an order.

Equity

a net worth of funds in the customer’s account.

EST/EDT

New York City time zone (United States Eastern Standard Time/Eastern Daylight Time).

ESTX50

short for the Euronext 50 index.

European Session

between the hours of: 07:00 to 16:00 (London).

Exchange Execution

order execution mode where a transaction order is passed to an external gateway connected to an exchange or another liquidity provider.

Exotic pair

a less traded currency pair.

Expert Advisor

a program written in MQL4 (MetaQuotes Language 4) and executed by the Client Terminal for the purpose of automated trading in the customer’s account.

Expiry

an instruction for cancellation of a pending order at a specified time and date.

Explicit Error

an event where the position opening or closing price significantly differs from the market price being actual at the moment of execution; an event where the execution of the customer’s order or request is inconsistent with the order or request by general meaning.

F

FED

The Federal Reserve Bank (USA central bank).

Fill

means the order has been successfully executed.

Fill or Kill

order type where if the order cannot be filled, then it will be cancelled (killed).

Floating Profit/Loss

a difference value between the customer account’s equity and balance.

FOMC

The Federal Open Market Committee is the policy-setting committee of the FED.

Foreign Exchange

''Forex (FX) is the global market for buying one currency and selling another.''

FRA40

other name of CAC 40.

FTSE 100

short name for UK 100 index.

G

a group of seven nations including USA, Japan, Germany, UK, France, Italy and Canada.

G7 + Russia.

Gap

significant difference between the two consecutive quotes; may be shown on charts as a blank field between bars or candles when the time period between the two quotes covers the bars or candlestick’s close time.

GDP

Gross Domestic Product is the total value of a country's output, income, or expenditure produced within its physical borders.

H

Hawkish

refers to easier monetary policy or higher interest rates: opposite to dove.

Hedge

combination of positions or a position that reduces the risk of your primary position

Hedged margin

Admiral Markets' margin requirements for maintaining locked positions.

HK40 / HKHI

short name for Hong Kong Seng Index.

I

Initial Margin (Margin)

Admiral Markets’ requirement for security collateral to open a position.

Instant Execution

a request execution type that means all quotes shown in the Client Terminal can be accepted by Admiral Markets for customer trading, with no preliminary requests for quotes.

INX

symbol for S&P 500 index.

J

JPN225

short name for the NIKKEI index.

K

Kiwi

slang for the NZD/USD currency pair.

L

Leverage

transaction size/margin ratio (e.g. 1:100 leverage means the customer needs to have 1% of the transaction size in his/her account as security collateral or margin).

LIBOR

The London Inter-Bank Offered Rate, which banks use as a base for international lending.

Locked Position

consists of equal long and short positions on the same instrument; locked positions require 50% of summarized margin for both positions.

Login

customer account’s unique identification number.

London Session

between the hours of: 08:00 to 17:00 (London).

Long Position

when the pair’s base currency is bought, the position is deemed long.

Loonie

slang for Canadian dollar, which is also known as Funds.

Lot

a transaction size unit in MT4, where: 1 lot is equal to a contract on 100000 base currency units for currency pairs; 1 lot is equal to one unit of an underlying security for stock CFDs.

Lot Size

an amount of base currency units or underlying asset units that is specified by Admiral Markets' contract as a transaction size per 1 standard lot.

M

Margin

a summarized value of the customer’s account funds that is reserved as security collateral for maintaining that customer’s open position; in accordance with Admiral Markets’ margin requirements.

Margin Level

an equity/margin percentage ratio.

Margin Trading

a customer trading service utilising the leveraged technique, which allows the customer to make transactions exceeding his/her account deposit.

Market Execution

order execution mode where a transaction is processed at the best price available on a trade server.

Market Opening

the time when instruments become available for customer trading after weekends, holidays, regular closing intervals or server downtimes.

Market Order

an electronic instruction for opening a position in the customer’s account, at the current market price.

Modify

a request for modification of a pending order level; a request for placement, cancellation or modification, or Stop Loss & Take Profit levels on an open position or pending order.

MT4 Admiral Markets

a software platform designed for online trading, which is the technology base for Admiral Markets' customer trading services; consisting of MT4 Client Terminal (customer terminal), MT4 Server, MT4 Data Center, MT4 Multiterminal, MT4 Mobile and MT4 Smartphone.

Multiple Close By

a request or instruction to close all locked positions in a customer's account

N

New York Session

between the hours of: 08:00am to 05:00pm (New York time)

Normal Market Conditions

the opposite of a rapid market; where there are no market data errors.

O

Open Position

a contract for buying or selling an instrument within the customer’s account; the first part of a complete transaction and an obligation to make an equal counter transaction afterwards; also treated as the customer’s obligation to satisfy Admiral Markets’ margin requirements and to maintain, without notice or demand from Admiral Markets, a sufficient account balance at all times that continuously meets Admiral Markets’ margin requirements and the equity/margin minimum ratio specified by Admiral Markets (e.g. a minimum ratio of 30%).

Order

an electronic instruction for opening or closing a position in the customer’s account on a specified instrument, in the event its price reaches the specified level.

Order Level

a price specified by the customer in the order placement request as an instruction for opening a position in his/her account, at this price and under conditions determined by the order type.

Over The Counter (OTC)

describes any transaction that is not conducted via an exchange.

P

Pending Order

an electronic instruction for opening a position in the customer’s account, in the event the price of a specified instrument reaches a specified level; the customer is enabled to use pending orders that include Buy Limit, Sell Limit, Buy Stop and Sell Stop.

Platform Time Zone

the time which the Admiral Markets server is synchronized with; a time zone which is used for recording any events into the server log-file; Admiral Markets MT4 is currently synchronized with GMT+2 or GMT+3 during Daylight Savings.

Point

a minimum price change (e.g. 0.0001 for EUR/USD); also called a Pip.

Price

a two-way quote consisting of Bid and Ask prices; a position’s opening or closing price; an order level.

Price Gap

an event where the current Bid price is above the previous Ask price and vice versa.

Q

Quote

an electronic message about the current price displayed in the Client Terminal, which consists of demand price (Bid) and supply price (Ask).

Quotes Base

Admiral Markets' server archive file, which contains historical quotes.

Quoting

providing the customer with quotes that Admiral Markets may accept for buying or selling instruments in his/her account.

R

Rapid Market

market conditions characterized by significant price changes in short periods of time that frequently cause wide gaps between consecutive quote values; commonly occurs immediately before and/or after important events (e.g. key economic reports on any G7 countries, press conferences by G7 financial ministers or central banks’ chairmen, central bank’ decisions on interest rates, market interventions, political or natural force majeure such as war or terrorism).

Rate

the base currency value in the quoted currency for a currency pair; the underlying asset value for a CFD.

Request

an electronic instruction for opening or closing a position, placement, cancellation or modification of an order that is given by the customer via the Client Terminal; a query for a two-way quote.

S

Sell Limit

a pending order for establishing an open Sell position in the customer’s account, in the event the price on the specified instrument rises to the specified level; can only be executed at Bid price and placed above the current Bid price of the specified instrument.

Sell Position

an open position, which represents expectation that the market price will decline (e.g. selling the base currency against the quote currency or selling a contract for difference on an underlying security rate).

Sell Stop

a pending order for establishing an open Sell position in the customer’s account, in the event the price on the specified instrument falls to the specified level; can only be executed at Bid price and placed below the current Bid price of the specified instrument.

Server

the MT4 server that transmits requests from the Client Terminal to dealers, sends (i.e. news, quotes, execution confirmations) to the Client Terminal and records all messages related to the customer trading process; it maintains mutual liabilities between Admiral Markets and our customer, which are formalised in the Admiral Markets Customer Agreement, contract details and margin requirements.

Server Log-file

a text file generated by the MT4 server that is used for recording all events related to customer trading and platform performance, including all dialogues between client terminals and dealers.

Session Gap

a price gap between the first quote of the current market session and the last quote of the previous market session.

Slippage

a parameter of Expert Advisor that sets-up the maximum difference between the requested price and the dealer’s price, that is acceptable to Expert Advisor for opening a position in the customer’s account; a difference between the order’s price and its actual price execution.

Spike or Data Error

an incorrect quote generated by the server because of a data feed error; commonly looks like a significant price gap returning close to the previous level on the next price update, with no signs of rapid market around; Admiral Markets has the discretion, but not the obligation, to remove such errors from its quotes database.

Split Close

a partial position closing (e.g. closing 0.5 lots of 2 lots).

Spread

the difference between Bid and Ask price, which is evaluated in points.

Stop Loss

an order for closing a specified open position at a specified level, in the event the price moves in an unfavourable direction; can only be executed at Bid price and placed below the current Bid price with reference to Buy positions; can be only executed at Ask price and placed above the current Ask price with reference to Sell positions.

Stop Out

a compulsory closing of the customer’s open positions by Admiral Markets, in the event the customer’s account does not satisfy Admiral Markets’ margin requirements.

STP

Straight Through Processing, i.e. passing all transactions electronically to the execution venue without human intervention

SWAP

an amount of overnight adjustments paid or charged to the customer’s account at 23.59 in the platform’s time zone, in accordance with values specified in Admiral Markets contract details; it is a daily settlement for margin trading services.

Swissy

slang for the Swiss Franc.

Symbol

an object of an electronic transaction (e.g. currency pair, stock CFD, futures CFD); an instrument within MT4.

T

Take Profit

an order for closing a specified open position at a specified level, in the event the price moves in a favourable direction; can be only executed at Bid price and placed above the current Bid price with reference to Buy positions; can be only executed at Ask price and placed below the current Ask price with reference to Sell positions.

Thin Market

periods of low trading activity and amounts of quotes per time, as compared to normal market conditions (e.g. periods between 21.00 and 00.00 GMT and before Christmas holidays).

Ticket

a unique identification number of a position, order or balance operation in the customer's account.

Trailing Stop

a built-in option of the Client Terminal that automatically adjusts a Stop Loss order level by a specified amount of points, if the favourable price motion exceeds this amount; it only works with the Client Terminal connected to the server.

Transaction

an operation consisting of two equal counter trades in a specified instrument.

Transaction Size

lot size multiplied by the amount of lots.

U

U-Shaped Recovery

a chart shape showing a gradual price rise back to its previous peak, after gradual decline.

UK OIL

short name for Brent Crude Oil.

UK100

short name for the FTSE 100 index.

Uptick

a new price quote, at a price higher than the previous quote.

US OIL

short name for WTI Crude Oil.

US30

short name for the Dow Jones index.

V

V-Shaped Recovery

a chart shape showing recovery that involves a sharp rise to a previous peak, after a sharp decline.

Value date

the future date on which counterparts to a financial transaction agree to determine the value of a product’s price; for a spot foreign exchange trade this date is normally two business days after a transaction is agreed.

Volatility

measure for fluctuation of price of a financial instrument over time; delegate to an active market that represents trading opportunities.

W

W-Shaped Recovery

a chart shape showing a change of sharp decline, rise, decline and ending with another sharp rise; the middle part of the shape can be lower than two price peaks on each side.

Whipsaw

slang for a very high volatility market where price is moving similar to a ‘whipsaw’ at work; the price movement is followed by a sharp and quick reversal movement.

Working order

Stop or Limit orders that have been placed but not filled yet.

X

XAG/USD

symbol for the Silver Index.

XAU/USD

symbol for the Gold Index.

Y

Year Over Year (YOY)

any measurable event that recurs annually; a popular way to compare the performance of investments.

Yield

the percentage based income return on an investment.