There is a strong link between forex trading and the interest rates. The foreign exchange is governed by many factors, but the currency’s interest rate is the major variable that prevails above all of them.
To put it briefly, money tends to follow the currencies with the highest and real interest rate. The nominal interest rate minus the inflation is the real interest rate.
Foreign exchange traders must monitor the interest rate of every country’s central bank and more essentially, when it is estimated to change, to predict movements in currencies.
When traders speak about interest rates, they usually are implying the interest rates of the central bank. Interest rates are extremely important to FX traders because when the anticipated rate of interest rates change, the currency normally follows through it. The central bank consists of some monetary policy tools which it can utilize to impact the interest rate, like the discount rate and the open market operations, which are the most common.
Central banks are tasked to deal with inflation and further stability for the exchange rate of their country. They make this happen by exchanging interest rates and supervising the money supply of the nation.
The Interest Rates and Economic Cycle
Economies are either contracting or expanding. When the economies are contracting or there is recession, everyone is worse off, and when the economies are expanding, everyone’s better off.
The central bank intends to maintain inflation in check while letting the economy to boost at a reasonable pace.
How Interest Rates Affect Currencies
Interest rates influence the forex markets through expectation changes of interest rates which lead to alteration in currency demand.
Forex Interest Rate Differentials
Interest rate differentials are just the differences in the interest rates between two nations. If a trader supposes the US to suddenly spike interest rates, he expects the US dollar to appreciate.
To boost the trader’s success opportunities, he can buy the USD against a currency with small interest rates since the two currencies departing in the track of their own interest rates.
Interest rates and differentials have a huge impact on the currency pair’s appreciation and depreciation.
Differentials are generally used in carry trades. In carry trade, money is loaned from the country with low rate and capitalized in the country with higher interest rate. However, there are risks involved with carry trade like the currency invested in devaluing relative to the currency utilized for trade funding.
Trading Strategies in Forex Interest Rates
Foreign exchange traders can choose to trade the product of the news release of interest rate, selling or buying the currency the instant of release of news.
Sophisticated forex traders may try to predict changes in the tones of central banks which can change market expectations. Traders do this by observing key economic factors like inflation, and exchange before the speeches of central bankers.
Another way is to wait for a currency pair’s pullback after the interest rate product. The central bank suddenly increased rates, the currency must appreciate. A trader can wait for the currency to devalue before performing a buy position- expecting that the currency will keep on increasing in value.
