Entering a Trade
To enter a trade, you need to place an order. An order is an instruction given to the broker through the trading platform to buy or sell a particular cryptocurrency.
All cryptocurrency pairs available for trading are listed in the Market Watch window. For example, a trader can buy or sell BTC/USD by placing a new order. Similarly, a trader can buy or sell any other cryptocurrency pair, such as ETH/USD, LTC/USD, or XRP/USD by placing a new order.
When your order is filled, it will show in the Positions tab.
Once in your trade, your position will generate profit or loss. When you decide to close the position, the floating profit or loss becomes realized and your balance changes by your realized profit or loss.
Order Types
You can enter a market by placing either a market order or a pending order.
Market Order
You have to place a market order if you want to open a new position at a market price, which is the best price currently available on the market.
To send a market order, you need to:
- Step 1: Choose the cryptocurrency you want to trade
- Step 2: Ensure that the Order Type is set to Market
- Step 3: Specify the Size you want to trade
- Step 4: Press the BUY or SELL button.
Pending Order
You have to place a Pending order if you want to open a new position at a specified price in the future, which can be either below or above the current market price.
The following four types of pending orders are available:
- Buy Limit – an instruction to buy at a particular price less than the current market price.
- Buy Stop – an instruction to buy at a particular price greater than the current market price.
- Sell Limit – an instruction to sell at a particular price greater than the current market price.
- Sell Stop – an instruction to sell at a particular price lower than the current market price.
Note that in all types of orders – both Market, Limit, and Stop orders – a particular cryptocurrency is bought at the Ask price (the higher one in the quote) and sold at the Bid price (the lower one in the quote).
To send a pending order, a trader needs to:
- Step 1: Choose the cryptocurrency you want to trade
- Step 2: Ensure that the Order Type is set to Limit or Stop
- Step 3: Specify the Size you want to trade
- Step 4: Specify the Order Price, at which you want to buy or sell the cryptocurrency
- Step 5: Press the BUY or SELL button.
When placing a new order, please, remember that:
- Order Type and Size (in lots) must always be specified
- Order Price is applicable to Limit and Stop orders only. It is not applicable to Market Orders, which are automatically executed at best bid/ask prices, currently available on the market.
- Stop Loss and Take Profit prices are always optional. These values can be set, modified, and deleted at any time.
Monitoring P&L
Once you entered a trade, you should be able to track the state of your trading account.
Your account information is located on the upper left-hand side of the trading platform:
The account summary window shows you the following:
- How much capital you own at each point in time: Balance
- How much profit or loss is generated by your open positions: Floating P&L;
- How much equity is reserved by the broker to maintain your open positions: Margin
- How much is available for opening new positions: Free margin
Sending a Market Order: Trade Example
Assume, you decide to buy 5 lots of Bitcoin (BTC/USD) at a market price.
The following picture demonstrates how you should fill a New Order Tab to place a Buy Market Order:
Once you click BUY and the order is executed (almost instantaneously), you will see a new market position opened in the Positions Tab.
Note that in the Positions Tab the value in column Profit or Loss is floating and equal to the amount of profit, generated by a particular market position. In the example, presented above, the result is positive and is equal to 0.00372 BTC (rounded to five digits).
Sending a Pending Order: Trade Example
Buy Limit – a trade instruction to buy at a price less than the current market price. The current market price is higher than the price specified in the order.
For example, if the market price for BTC/USD is $4,000 and a trader anticipates that the price will decline first to $3,500 and then will begin increasing, he should place a Buy Limit order at $3,500.
Buy Stop – a trade instruction to buy at a price equal to or greater than that specified in the order. The current market price is lower than the price specified in the order.
For example, if the market price for BTC/USD is $4,000 and a trader anticipates that, upon reaching a $4,500, which is above the current market price, the price will continue to grow even further, he should place a Buy Stop order at $4,500.
Sell Limit – a trade instruction to sell at a price equal to or greater than that specified in the order. The current market price is lower than the price specified in the order.
For example, if the market price for BTC/USD is $4,000 and a trader anticipates that a price will increase first to $4,500 and then will begin to decline, he should place a Sell Limit order at $4,500.
Sell Stop – an instruction order to sell at a price equal to or less than that specified in the order. The current market price is higher than the price in the order.
For example, if the market price for BTC/USD is $4,000 and a trader anticipates that, upon falling to $3,500, which is below the current market price, the price will continue to fall even further, he should place a Sell Stop order at $3,500.
