Place your first trade from the desk

The trading desk (Desk) is FxMind's full-screen chart and order screen. Every order you send goes to your broker through the account you linked, so you trade the same account as always, with your rules watching. FxMind never opens a trade for you: you place each order yourself.

What you need first

• A plan with order entry. That is Pro or above. The 14-day trial counts. On Free and Trader the desk shows charts, but the ticket cannot send an order.
• A guarded link. The account has to be linked with the master password (the trading password), not the investor password. The investor password is read-only by design: it can see the account and never place a trade.
• A platform that takes orders from FxMind. If yours does not yet, the ticket says so instead of sending.

Your account is linked read-only today? Open Accounts, pick the account and press Upgrade to guarded. FxMind asks for the master password and shows you what it may and may not do before you agree. Steps for finding the password are in Link an account. Want to try the ticket first? The demo account takes small orders.

Opening the desk

1. 1In the menu press Trading desk (on a phone, Desk). Or open an account on Accounts and press Open trade desk: that opens the desk on that account instead of the one it had last.
2. 2Look at the account name at the top left. With more than one account, press it and choose Switch account.

The desk fills the screen. Exit desk in the top bar, or the Esc key, takes you back to the app.

Picking what to trade

1. 1Press Ctrl K (⌘K on a Mac). A box named Chart a pair opens. Or click a row in the watchlist on the left.
2. 2Type a symbol, for example EURUSD (the euro against the US dollar).
3. 3Choose one from the list. It opens on the chart.

The list holds what your account can actually trade: your broker's own instruments, with their own names, and nothing your broker has disabled or limited to closing positions.

The order ticket

The ticket is the Ticket tab in the panel on the right. On a phone it is the Trade tab, or Place an order from the chart.

1. 1Press Buy if you think the price will rise, or Sell if you think it will fall.
2. 2Pick the Order type.
3. 3Set the Size.
4. 4Under Stop and target, set your Stop loss. Add a Take profit if you want one.
5. 5Read the line that says what you risk, for example: You risk $50, 0.5% of your balance, if the stop is hit.
6. 6Read the rules check under the ticket (next section).
7. 7Press the button at the bottom. It names the order, for example Buy 0.10 EURUSD.

Market

Sends now, at the best price your broker has

Limit

Waits for a price better than the one on screen

Stop

Waits for the price to run past a level, then sends at market

Stop-limit

When the stop price trades, a limit order is placed at the limit price

Size: Lots

You set the size. One lot of a currency pair is 100,000 units of the first currency, so 0.10 lots is a tenth of that. Your broker sets the smallest step, often 0.01

Size: Risk % or Risk money

FxMind works out the size from the part of your balance you are ready to lose at the stop. It needs a stop loss to do that

Stop loss

The price where the trade closes against you, so the loss stops there. Set it before you send, not after

Take profit

The price where the trade closes in your favour. Optional

Pip

The usual smallest step of a price: 0.0001 on most pairs, 0.01 on yen pairs. You can set the stop and target by Price, Pips or Money

Spread

The gap between the price you buy at and the price you sell at. You pay it the moment you open a trade

RR

Compares the target to the stop. 1 : 2 means the target is twice as far from your entry as the stop

Under More options you find Good till (how long a waiting order stays at your broker), the slippage you accept (how far from the price on screen a market order may fill) and Send it later instead. The money line is the number worth reading: lots are an abstraction, and cash is not.

What FxMind checks before it sends

1. 1Your rules. If the order would break one, you are told which and why, and sending is off while that rule applies. If it only comes close, you get a warning to read and tick, I read the warnings and want to send this order, then send.
2. 2The account and the market. The account must be connected, the numbers on screen must not be behind your broker, and the market must be open. On a closed market the ticket says so: open More options and use Send it later instead.
3. 3The size. Against your broker's smallest, largest and step sizes, so a rejected order is caught here rather than at the broker.

Closing it

• Open trades tab, in the panel under the chart: close the whole trade, or choose Close part of it.
• On the chart: drag the stop line or the target line to move it. The desk asks you to confirm, for example Move the stop to 1.0850?
• Emergency close in the top bar: it cancels every waiting order and closes every trade on the account you are looking at, biggest loss first. You see the list first and hold the button to confirm. It only closes and cancels. It never opens a trade.

Whatever you close appears in your journal by itself, with its entry, exit, fees and result. Nothing to write down.

Faster orders, when you are ready

One-click trading sends a market order the moment you press Buy or Sell on the chart, at your default size, with no second question. It is off until you turn it on in Desk settings (the gear in the top bar) and read the one-screen explanation. Your rules are still checked before every order.