Trading in the FX market reached an all-time high of $5.3 trillion per day in April 2013, a 35% increase relative to 2010. Non-dealer financial institutions, including smaller banks, institutional investors and hedge funds, have grown into the largest and most active counterparty segment. The...

This special feature looks at trading activity in the foreign exchange market between the Triennial Surveys conducted in 2010 and 2013 and in the months following. We estimate that the $5.3 trillion per day reported for April 2013 was a peak, with activity falling subsequently by $300 billion to...

This special feature looks at trading activity in the foreign exchange (FX) market. By using information from surveys conducted by FX committees around the world as well as settlement data from CLS Bank, I analyse how global FX market activity was affected by the recent financial crisis. I show...

This article provides an overview of the foreign exchange components of the Triennial Central Bank Survey. It highlights key dimensions of this dataset and methodological issues that are important to interpret it correctly. It also compares the methodology of the Triennial Survey to that of more...

Daily average foreign exchange market turnover reached $4 trillion in April 2010, 20% higher than in 2007. Growth owed largely to the increased trading activity of "other financial institutions", which contributed 85% of the higher turnover. Within this customer category, the growth is driven by...

Foreign exchange turnover evolves in a predictable fashion with increasing income. As income per capita rises, currency trading cuts loose from underlying current account transactions. In parallel, an increasing share of trading in the currency takes place outside the home country. At given...

n-deliverable forwards (NDFs) allow investors and borrowers to take positions in currencies that are subject to official controls. Turnover in NDFs has risen in recent years as non-residents use them to hedge increasing investment in local currency bonds. Pricing in deliverable forward and NDF...

This article presents an overview of widely practised short-term multicurrency investment strategies such as carry trade, momentum and term spread strategies. We provide evidence on their downside risk properties and illustrate their performance over historical episodes of financial market...

ECU-denominated international bonds owed much of their limited success in the 1980s and 1990s to restrictions on the internationalisation of the Deutsche mark and to speculative investment, rather than simply to the benefits of diversification. Basket bond issuance may come at the cost of a less...

The most recent BIS triennial survey shows that turnover in foreign exchange markets increased by more than 70% over the three years to April 2007. Two specific findings stand out. First, the growth in transactions between banks and other financial institutions was particularly strong,...