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Compare markets

Put up to four markets on the same ruler. The shapes do most of the explaining.

Market 1 Market 2 Market 3 Market 4

Foreign exchange 50 Demanding The deepest market on earth, made hazardous for individuals almost entirely by the leverage it is sold with.
Contracts for difference 63 Extreme Easy to open, expensive to hold, leveraged by design — the shape behind the 65–80% of retail accounts that lose money.

	Foreign exchange	Contracts for difference
Exit difficulty	1	2
Volatility	3	5
Leverage	5	5
Carry cost	4	5
Fraud risk	4	4
Protection gap	3	3
Barrier to entry	1	1
Expertise needed	3	3
Difficulty	50 Demanding	63 Extreme
In a sentence	The largest market on earth by turnover, running continuously from Sunday evening to Friday night, and overwhelmingly used for plumbing rather than speculation.	A bilateral bet on a price move with your broker, leveraged, financed daily, and losing money for the substantial majority of the people who use it.
Unit	A standard lot of 100,000 units of the base currency	One contract per unit of the underlying
Smallest realistic trade	A micro lot of 1,000 units, or any amount at a bureau	Fractional positions on most platforms
Settlement	T+2 for spot, same day for many electronic platforms	Cash difference on closing; no ownership at any point

The fingerprint measures how demanding a market is to take part in. It is not a rating or a recommendation.