Trading is buying and selling financial instruments to profit from changes in their price. A trader does not need to own a company, a barrel of oil or a stack of euros for the long term. They need a reason to expect a price to move, a plan for what to do if it does not, and the discipline to follow that plan.

Two directions, one idea

You can profit from a price going up or going down.

• Buying (going long). You buy at one price and sell later at a higher one. If you buy EUR/USD at 1.0850 and sell at 1.0900, you made 50 pips.
• Selling (going short). You sell first and buy back later at a lower price. If you sell gold at 2,650 and buy it back at 2,630, you made $20 per ounce.

Being able to sell first surprises many beginners. With contracts for difference (CFDs), which this platform simulates, you never take delivery of the underlying asset. You simply hold a position whose result depends on the difference between your opening and closing price.

What a trade is made of

Every trade has the same anatomy:

The last two are not optional extras. A trade without a stop loss is a trade without a plan for being wrong, and every trader is wrong often.

Trading versus gambling

A gambler and a trader can place the same trade. What separates them is everything around it:

• The trader has an edge: a repeatable reason why, over many trades, gains outweigh losses.
• The trader sizes positions so that no single loss matters much.
• The trader measures results and changes what does not work.

A coin toss that pays 2:1 on heads is a good bet even though you will lose half the time. Trading works the same way. You will not win every trade; you aim for a process that wins over a hundred of them.

Why trade a simulated account?

Learning with real money is expensive. A simulated account gives you live market prices, real trading conditions and real consequences for breaking the rules, without risking your savings. Pass the evaluation and you trade a funded account where you keep most of the profit you make.