When it comes to investment, hedging is not a strange word. Though many of you have already heard of the name hedging, not many of you may be able to explain what hedging is. Without the ability to explain the term, I guess you have not yet participated in the hedging world, which actually can be useful to protect yourself. Let us now understand it.

Why there are so many people and well established enterprises use hedging? You need opportunities from investments. But no free lunch, there are risks linked to such investments. To reduce the risks on such investments, many of them choose hedging as one of the methods. There are many different types of hedging products available to cover different types of investments. You can find foreign currency ones, interest rate ones, future ones, options ones and stock price ones.

You have to remember the golden rule that hedging is not a way to help you earn more money. It is a tool to help you reduce the risk. By that, you will invest in two different products that are negatively correlated. The risk is reduced by the offset between the gain and the loss from each of the investment. Or, when investment A is in a gain position, investment is on the contrary a loss position. The gain offsets the loss.

When the risk is higher, the earning or opportunity is likely to be higher, too. But, by hedging, the risk is reduced, therefore, the highest possible earning is also reduced. That means, when you are gaining on investment A, the gain is reduced by the loss in investment B. On the other hand, if you are making loss on investment A, the loss is reduced by gain in investment B.

Let me give you an example on interest rate swap. If you have a loan from the bank of $100,000 and the bank is charging you a floating interest rate (or market rate). You biggest concern must the increase in interest rate (“interest rate risk”), which than you have to pay more interest. To reduce the interest rate risk, you can enter into an interest rate swap with the bank.

When it comes to such hedging instrument, you have a choice to decide if you want to fully hedge or partly hedge. You can enter into a $30,000 hedge or a full hedge of $60,000. Why you want to do so? It is because there is tradeoff between you risks and opportunities. For simple explanation, I assume you have entered into a $60,000 hedge that you receive interest income.

When the market rate goes up, you have to pay more for the loan, but on the other hand, you receive more from the interest rate swap. On the other hand, if the interest rate goes down, you pay less, but you receive less as your interest income. To note that, hedging may not help you eliminate the risk but only reduce, therefore, you cannot expect that the interest pay out should be exactly the same as interest income.

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Foreign currency trading is a very common investment. It is so common that I actually saw many elderly trade forex, even though they do not have a lot of forex knowledge. But in order to do a real investment instead of a bet, you need to equip yourself with the basic information and knowledge of foreign currencies.

In fact, currency fluctuation can be affected by a number of factors. In the broadest sense, a country’s economic situation and its macroeconomics decisions have the greatest effect on its currency fluctuation. That is why you find the analysts are really familiar with such economical statistics, news and information. Common indices that you should be aware of include Gross National Product 9GNP), interest rates and consumer price index, etc. With the grasp of such information can help you make wise decisions in the forex trading market.

One way to study currency trend is to look at the foreign income and foreign expenses incurred on foreign economic activities. Normally, the demand of a foreign currency is indicated by the greater amount of foreign expenses (than the foreign income). As the currency fluctuates based on the demand and supply of currencies, the foreign currency in this case is likely to appreciation in response to the increased demand.

Other than the foreign income and expense, you can also look at the national income. National income means the people’s income in the nation. The fact is that, when people are earning more, they are likely to spend more. When they spend more, the demand of local currency increases. Like what we have talked above, the demand of the local currency drives the appreciation of it.

Even though you see that people’s income is increasing, it does not necessarily mean that the local currency must appreciate. You have to understand the real factor that drives the increase in people’s income. For example, if the increase in income is driven by a series of government policies or demand, you may not see the appreciation of local currency. Why? Usually the government demand is so big that additional foreign imports are required. In this case, the demand on foreign imports or foreign currencies induces appreciations of foreign currencies.

Inflation rate is another fundamental factor that affects currency fluctuation. If a nation has over issued its currency which exceeds the demand in product purchasing, there will be inflation. Inflation decreases the purchasing power of the people and therefore leads to currency depreciation. In general sense, the local currency depreciates means the foreign currencies appreciate.

The main factors affecting currency fluctuation are basically covered here. There are still many other factors causing currency appreciation and depreciation. You should get yourself more well prepared before invest in forex!

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