"Forex" stands for Foreign Exchange, and refers to the buying or selling of one currency for another. It's the most heavily traded market in the world because people, businesses, and countries all participate in it. When you go on a trip and convert your US dollars for euros, you're participating in the global foreign exchange market. How much demand there is for a currency will either push it up or down in value relative to other currencies.
With this in mind, here's some things you need to know about the currency market, so you can take the next step and start forex trading.
In the Forex market, currencies always trade in pairs. When you exchange US dollars for euros, there are two currencies involved. For every foreign exchange transaction, you must exchange one currencyfor another. This is why the forex market uses currency pairs, so you can see the cost of one currency relative to another. The EUR/USD price, for example, lets you know how many US dollars (USD) it takes to buy one euro (EUR).
The Forex market uses symbols for currencies. The euro is symbolized by EUR, the US dollar is the USD. Other currency symbols are: Australian dollar=AUD, British pound=GBP, Swiss franc=CHF, Canadian dollar=CAD, New Zealand dollar=NZD and Japanese yen=JPY.
Each forex pair, EUR/USD, AUD/USD, USD/JPY for example, will have a market price associated with it. The price refers to how much of the second currency it takes to buy one unit of the first currency. If the price of the EUR/USD is 1.3635 it costs 1.3635 US dollars to buy one euro.
If you want to find out how many euros it costs to buy one U.S. dollar we need to flip the pair to USD/EUR. To find out this rate, divide 1 by 1.3635 (or whatever the current rate is). The result is 0.7334. It costs 0.7334 euros to buy one USD based on the current price. The price of the currency pair constantly fluctuates, as transactions occur around the globe, 24-hours a day during the week.
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