To help you in that journey of financial discovery here are four things you need to know before you start trading types of trading theres more than one way to invest your money and before you part with any of your hard earned cash you need to think about the type of investment that you would be confident in the making. Just before the open of the ftse and other european markets traders should look to study the support and resistance levels and the possible reactions to the previous nights trading in the us as well as moves that have occurred in the far eastern markets many traders look to trade european markets in the first two hours when there is high liquidity otherwise traders usually focus between 12pm 5pm gmt when both the uk and us markets are open. When you trade with cfds or spread bets you can speculate on both rising and falling markets if you think the price will rise you would open a position to buy and if you think the price will decline you open a position to sell your trading decision should be based on your analysis of the market and your trading strategy you can trade on a variety of platforms including pc android apple ipad and more you can also utilise our powerful charts to spot trades and stay ahead . The length of time a trader has a position open for can range from seconds to years this timeframe is entirely up to them and relates to their objectives account size risk profile and time they can commit to trading trading requires a more hands on approach than investing and regular assessment of market conditions is essential when traders have open positions. Paper trading also known as demo account trading allows traders new to the forex market and cfds the ability to trade for free on a practice account before trading for real by building up skills and acquiring trading confidence paper trading plays an invaluable role in a traders education