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Most of us traders know that picking a reliable, competent broker is an extremely important task that determines the future course of our trading career. It is not excessive to suggest that failure in this step alone ensures that we have no chance of succeeding in our trading career, regardless of how great our analytical skills and talents in money management may be. As such, here are a few suggestions for creating a systematic approach towards the broker selection process.

Have you ever traded stocks before? And if you did, did you ever feel frustration over your failure to master the market due to its great complexity, the vast number of stocks that you need to study, and the great difficulty in making sense of market movements in the absence of some fundamental background knowledge? If you did feel all that, then you will be delighted to experience the great opportunities provided by forex trading.

On Thursday evening the dollar almost reached its two-week highest. The euro gained more versus the Japanese yen, due to high European corporate earnings in April, which became reason for hopes that the economic downturn in the world might be slowing down.

On one hand, the market was slow and slightly moving due to holidays in many countries, such as the Japanese Golden Week holiday in Asia and May Day holiday in many countries in Europe, and on the other hand, end of the month caused some rapid moves in the exchange rates.

Both the dollar and the yen were seriously falling during Thursday trades, as more investors are turning to riskier assets, hoping that the worst recession in the global economy might be ending.

The main reason for investors to change their trading direction was the information from the US Federal Reserve, which showed factors, indicating improvement in the American economic outlook.

As the risk aversion stopped for a while, the euro and the dollar are gaining back their positions against the yen. The traders still have some concerns regarding the decision of the American banks, which will seriously impact the global economy.

The Euro/USD pair seems to be holding off their highs. Orders are placed at the level of USD1.3220. Offers for pound of sterling keep to the same as previously level at USD1.4730.

On Tuesday Euro was falling against the dollar, due to the improvement of the American information and comments made by Lorenzo Bini Smaghi, a member of the Executive Board of the Central bank of Europe.

Lorenzo Smaghi suggested that quantitative easing by the Central Bank has not yet been approved. Therefore, market traders found it more interesting to play riskier assets, and the European currency reached its highs during the session, going up to 1.3167 against the USD dollar, 1.3167against the yen and 0.8995 against the pound of sterling.

On Wednesday the dollar fell against the euro, due to the market waiting for the policy statement of the Federal Reserve. The economic growth report that was revealed today, showed the GDP growth much worse than it was expected, which pushed the American currency lower.

The decrease in the American economy turned out to be much worse than expected, hitting the level of 6.1% in the first quarter of 2009, compare to the forecasted 4.9%. Few of the many reasons for this situation are significant declines in country’s exports and nearly absence of business inventories.

As a result of Tuesday trading day in Asia, the yen hit its highs during many past weeks against both the dollar and the euro. The dollar fell due to concerns regarding the banking sector in America, because American authorities are making the Citigroup Bank and Bank of America to raise more capital.

As the dollar was losing its positions, more traders turned to purchasing the Yean, which is a safe-heaven currency, as well as it should be protected from the spreading of swine flu around the world.

No matter if you are an experienced player at the foreign exchange market, or if you are new to it and want to try your luck and analytical mind in currency trading, having the strategy in place is a very important issue.

A good strategy is not a guarantee for constant profits on the Forex market, and use of robots or any other software will also not assure that you are always profitable. But it is anyway necessary to have a strategy, and it should be a strategy, which is easy and understandable to you and convenient to use.

The death cases of the swine flu in Mexico and fears that it would spread around the world raised the risk aversions and increased the levels of the dollar and the yen for the European traders on Monday.

Another reason, which also caused the decrease in the euro levels, was the report about huge debt of toxic assets in German banking system. The stress tests of the American banks are also still uncertain, causing some confusion in the market rates.

Improved sentiment of business in Germany gave hope to traders, which caused rising of the Euro against the dollar on Friday. This is the fourth straight session of growth of the Euro versus the Dollar.

On the other hand, dollar was not in demand, as there are many risks aligned with it, such as the possible bankruptcy of the American car-maker Chrysler.

After the day of sell-of, the Euro has been gradually stabilizing against the American Dollar. Other world currencies showed even better tendencies, especially the British Pound and Australian dollar. Both of the mentioned currencies reached their high vs. American dollar, after falling on Monday. The yen was the most changeable currency this week, first rising, and then falling against both the euro and the dollar.

Brazil's central bank sold about $1.02 billion in an auction of currency swap contracts on Wednesday, rolling over securities that mature next month.

The bank sold 20,640 of 44,800 contracts on offer in the auction, extending the maturity of securities due on Jan. 2.

Brazil's currency, the real BRBY, was trading 0.7 percent stronger at 2.355 per dollar shortly after the auction.

New housing starts and permits plunged to record lows in November, as long-standing problems in the housing market continued to weigh on the U.S. economy, a Commerce Department report showed on Tuesday.

Housing starts fell 18.9 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 625,000 units from 771,000 units in October. That was much less than the 740,000 starts Wall Street analysts expected for November.

The price of wholesale gold slipped lower early in London on Tuesday, recording the best Gold Fix in two months at $833.50 an ounce but trading 1% below Monday's top in the spot market.

Tokyo stocks ended the day 1% down, while London shares held flat. The US Dollar regained one of yesterday's four-cent losses vs. the Euro.

The Gold Price in Euros held near €608 an ounce.

"We finally saw Gold break out to the upside Monday," says a note from the precious metals team at Mitsui in London. "Stops at $829 were triggered leading to a $10 spike – this level is now acting as the support.