Trading Sessions

Stock exchanges and the indices built on them still keep fixed trading hours, a direct hangover from the physical floor era covered in History of Trading, even though almost everything is electronic now. Forex trades close to 24 hours a day instead, because currencies don’t belong to any single exchange, but the open and close of the major regional sessions still matter enormously for how price behaves. Why the open is different Price closes one session, then opens the next well away from that level, a gap, before continuing. ...

Forex and index trading is usually split into three broad regional sessions, Asian, London, and New York, and each one has its own personality in terms of volume, volatility, and which instruments tend to be most active. Asian, London, and New York sessions (UTC). The boxed section is the London/New York overlap, the highest-volume window of the day. ...