How to Use the FX Terminal

Terminal Layout

The terminal uses a three-column layout at full width — a left sidebar, a wide main content area, and a right panel. By default it loads in split layout mode: the main area is divided into a left column (chart, FX table, heatmap) and a right column (risk, rates, COT, sessions, news). Understanding the structure helps you navigate quickly:

Split Layout

The main content area is split into two scrollable columns by default — the chart, FX table, and heatmap on the left; cross-asset, risk, rates, COT, sessions, news, and signals on the right. This is the recommended view on desktop as it keeps the chart visible while scrolling through data panels on the right. The split ratio is adjustable: drag the vertical divider bar between the two columns left or right to resize. Your preferred split width is saved automatically.

To toggle split mode on or off, click the split icon button ⊟ in the top-right corner of the Price Chart panel header — next to the panel subtitle. When split layout is active, the button is highlighted in blue. Clicking it again collapses back to a single full-width scroll. Split layout is disabled automatically on mobile viewports.

On mobile, the layout collapses into a single scrollable column regardless of the split setting. The sidebar and right panel fold into the main flow.

The sticky topbar navigation links jump you directly to major sections: FX Pairs, Macro, Rates, Cross-Asset, Risk, Positioning, and Calendar.

Topbar & Quote Bar

Session indicator

The top-right of the topbar shows the current active trading session (Sydney, Tokyo, London, New York, or an overlap) based on your browser's local time converted to UTC. A blinking green dot indicates the clock is live.

Quote bar

The horizontal strip below the topbar shows live prices for EUR/USD, USD/JPY, GBP/USD, AUD/USD, USD/CAD, USD/CHF, NZD/USD, EUR/GBP, GOLD FUT, WTI FUT, BTC/USD, US 10Y Yield, and DXY. Prices are sourced from yfinance (~5 min delay during market hours). Frankfurter/ECB rates serve as a silent fallback only when yfinance data is unavailable.

Click any pair in the quote bar to jump to the Price Chart with that symbol pre-selected.

News ticker

The scrolling headline strip below the quote bar shows the most recent FX-relevant headlines from RSS feeds (FXStreet, ForexLive, Reuters FX, ECB, BoE, BoJ, RBA, RBNZ, BoC, SNB, Federal Reserve, Investing.com, ForexCrunch, MarketPulse, DailyForex, ActionForex, BabyPips, FX Empire and others), updated every hour by the engine. The terminal re-checks for new data every 10 minutes. Headlines are color-tagged by currency when a specific pair is mentioned.

AI Narrative & Regime

Immediately below the quote bar in the main panel, the Narrative bar provides a 2–3 sentence summary of current market conditions, synthesized by the AI engine from rate differentials, cross-asset flows, COT positioning, and upcoming macro events.

Next to the narrative text, the Regime label provides a one-word characterization of the overall market environment:

Price Chart

A native LightweightCharts price chart — the primary chart for all symbols with OHLC data (all G8 FX majors and crosses, Gold FUT, WTI FUT, DXY, BTC/USD, and others). 22 instruments are accessible via the tab row above the chart. For symbols without OHLC data, the chart falls back to an embedded TradingView widget.

The LW chart loads in candlestick mode with a 3-month default range. The toolbar above the chart gives you full control: chart type (Candle / Bar / Line / Area), range (3M / 6M / 1Y / 3Y / ALL), overlay toggles (WM — symbol watermark; PC — previous close line; VOL — volume histogram; CB — central bank meeting markers), logarithmic scale, and a multi-MA selector (periods: 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 200 — up to three simultaneous MAs). The OHLC header updates on hover showing O/H/L/C values and the daily change.

FX Pairs Table

Below the price chart, the FX Pairs — Majors table shows a snapshot of all major pairs with the following columns:

• Pair Currency pair identifier (e.g., EUR/USD)
• Bid / Ask Current bid and ask prices sourced from yfinance (~5 min delay)
• Spread Estimated current spread in pips, color-coded (green <1.5 pip, orange 1.5–3, red >3)
• 1D Percentage change vs. yesterday's closing price
• 1W Percentage change vs. last week's close
• HV 30d 30-day historical (realized) volatility — annualized standard deviation of daily log returns, computed from yfinance data. Not implied volatility.
• Sess H Intraday session high price.
• Sess L Intraday session low price.

Currency Strength Heatmap

A ranked row of 8 cells — one per G8 currency (USD, EUR, GBP, JPY, AUD, CAD, CHF, NZD) — sorted from strongest to weakest. Each cell shows the currency's average percentage change computed across all 28 G8 pairs (the industry standard), giving each currency exactly 7 observations and a true basket-weighted strength score.

Strength is computed using the industry-standard 28-pair method: all combinations of the 8 G8 currencies (8×7÷2 = 28 pairs). Each currency appears in exactly 7 pairs, so every score carries equal statistical weight — no currency is over- or under-represented. When intraday data is available (yfinance RT cache, ~5 min delay), each currency's score is the average of its signed % contribution across the 7 pairs it appears in. For example, JPY's score averages its move in USD/JPY, EUR/JPY, GBP/JPY, AUD/JPY, NZD/JPY, CAD/JPY and CHF/JPY — giving a true basket reading rather than a single-pair proxy. ECB daily rates serve as a silent fallback only when RT data is unavailable. Cells are color-coded by intensity: dark green (strong), light green (mild), flat (near zero), light red (mild weakness), dark red (weak).

Currency Detail Modal

Clicking any cell in the heatmap opens a full-screen detail modal for that currency. The modal organizes data into four tabs:

Pair Breakdown — shows the 7 direct pairs for the selected currency with close price, previous close, percentage change, day % and 1W %, and a proportional impact bar. A composite ranking row shows the full 8-currency strength order with animated horizontal bars. The metrics strip above the table shows six tiles: Composite (intraday), 1W Strength, Rank, Pairs won, Strongest vs, and Weakest vs.

Session — shows the selected currency's strength contribution weighted by trading session volume (New York 38%, London 35%, Tokyo 18%, Sydney 9%). The active session is highlighted in blue. Below the session bars, an AI Session Context block provides per-session notes for the currency: a concise recap of the catalyst that drove price action in each session (CLOSED), current session dynamics (ACTIVE), and the upcoming scheduled event to watch (UPCOMING). Session context notes are generated 12× daily alongside the main narrative and are grounded in actual economic calendar events. All displayed times are converted to your local timezone.

Correlations — shows an 8×8 strength differential matrix with a Composite column: each cell is the composite % difference between the row currency and the column currency, with color intensity proportional to the divergence. Below the matrix, a Strength Drivers block lists the top 3 pairs by absolute contribution, each with an AI-generated one-line note (max 85 characters) explaining the structural driver — CB stance differential, COT positioning extreme, or carry differential. Attribution footer: AI Analytics · ~5min delay. Clicking any row in the Key Correlations panel (right panel) opens a dedicated correlation modal with a 252-day history sparkline showing real calendar dates, z-score, and a regime signal.

CSI — Currency Strength Index: a multi-series LightweightCharts chart showing the cumulative log-return of all 8 G8 currencies over selectable periods (1M / 3M / 6M / 1Y / All). Computed from the full OHLC dataset across all 28 pairs — the same data as the heatmap. The focal currency's line is highlighted; all series start at 0% at the beginning of the selected period. A crosshair tooltip shows all 8 values simultaneously ordered strongest to weakest. A legend table below shows cumulative return, min, max, and range for each currency over the period.

Left Sidebar

FX Liquidity

A canvas-drawn chart showing estimated FX market liquidity across the 24-hour trading day. The curve peaks at London–New York overlap (~13:00–17:00 UTC), which historically accounts for the highest volume and tightest spreads. A vertical orange line marks the current UTC time — everything to its left is scaled to today's actual volatility; everything to its right is a historical projection. A small source label below the legend shows the active data source (yfinance · H-L range proxy · 30d avg when live data is available, Historical avg · fixed reference as fallback). See the dedicated FX Liquidity & Sessions guide for a full explanation.

Crosses

Live prices and daily percentage changes for 21 cross pairs, ordered by standard ISO currency hierarchy. EUR group: EUR/GBP, EUR/JPY, EUR/CHF, EUR/CAD, EUR/AUD, EUR/NZD. GBP group: GBP/JPY, GBP/CHF, GBP/CAD, GBP/AUD, GBP/NZD. AUD group: AUD/JPY, AUD/NZD, AUD/CHF, AUD/CAD. NZD group: NZD/JPY, NZD/CAD, NZD/CHF. CAD group: CAD/JPY, CAD/CHF. CHF group: CHF/JPY. Click any cross to open it in the price chart and expand its inline detail strip — the same data card available in the FX Pairs table (Price · Volatility · COT Positioning · Retail Sentiment). Click the same row again to collapse it. Cross pairs often reveal currency-specific stories that major pairs obscure.

Carry Trade — Top Pairs

A ranked list of the top carry trade pair candidates across all 28 G8 combinations, sorted by the carry-to-vol ratio — the industry-standard metric for vol-adjusted carry: rate differential divided by realised 30-day historical volatility (HV30). This reflects how much yield per unit of realised volatility risk each pair offers, not just the raw rate differential. When HV30 data is unavailable, the panel falls back to gross rate differential ranking and the subtitle updates accordingly.

Each row shows the gross rate differential between the two legs (e.g. +4.00% = long-leg rate minus short-leg rate), giving an instant read on the raw carry available. Clicking any row opens the pair in the price chart. Hovering shows the full breakdown: long rate / short rate / gross diff / HV30 / carry-to-vol.

Color coding: green = carry-to-vol > 0.30 (strong), neutral = 0.12–0.30, dim = < 0.12 (weak). The spread column shows the gross rate differential (long-leg rate minus short-leg rate) — the raw carry available before adjusting for volatility.

Upcoming Events

A Myfxbook economic calendar widget embedded at the bottom of the left sidebar, showing the next scheduled high-impact macro events (FOMC, ECB, NFP, CPI, etc.) with their expected release times. Use this to anticipate volatility windows before they arrive.

Pair Detail

When you click any pair in the FX Pairs table or any cross in the sidebar, an inline detail strip expands directly below the selected row. It updates instantly on every click with no page reload — click the same row again to collapse it. Data is organized into four labeled sections — Price · Volatility · COT Positioning · Retail Sentiment — matching the grouping convention of institutional FX terminals:

Fields are grouped into four sections:

• Price block Live price, daily % change, session H/L, spread and ADR in pips.
• Price section 1W Chg · Carry differential · ADR · Base currency policy rate.
• Volatility HV 30d · ATM IV · IV−HV · 25d Risk Reversal · Bid-Ask Spread. ATM IV color: green ≤7% (cheap), red >12% (expensive). 25d RR from Saxo Bank (1M tenor, indicative mid) — positive = calls bid over puts (upside skew on base currency); negative = puts bid (downside protection dominant).
• COT Positioning LF Net · LF WoW Δ · AM Net · Net % OI · LF Open Interest — all from CFTC Disaggregated TFF report. For USD majors, one currency block (base vs USD). For cross pairs (EUR/GBP, GBP/JPY, etc.), two independent blocks are shown — one per component currency — each labeled by currency code. The summary line at the bottom shows LF/AM alignment: LF Short · AM Long · diverging.
• Retail Sentiment Long/short ratio from Myfxbook community — retail traders only. Contrarian indicator: extreme retail long bias typically precedes institutional short positioning.
• Carry Numerator currency rate minus denominator currency rate. Positive = holding long earns the differential. For USD/JPY: Fed Funds − BoJ rate. For EUR/USD the carry is currently negative (ECB rate below Fed rate, so holding long EUR/USD costs the differential).

Right Panel

Central Bank Rates

Current policy rates for all eight G8 central banks (Fed, ECB, BoE, BoJ, RBA, BoC, SNB, RBNZ), updated daily from official CB sources. The trend column shows the direction of the most recent rate cycle: ↑ Hiking, ↓ Cutting, or — Hold. The trend resets to neutral (—) after approximately 90 days without a policy move — regardless of the prior cycle direction.

Key Correlations

Rolling Pearson correlations between 12 FX-relevant pairs and reference assets, computed from yfinance data. Three lookback windows are available — 30d, 60d, and 90d — selectable via the buttons in the panel header (60d is the default). The table includes a vs norm column showing how far the current 30d correlation deviates from its 252-day historical baseline, expressed as a z-score. The baseline is the mean of all rolling 30-day Pearson windows over the past 252 trading days — keeping the norm horizon consistent with the current correlation regardless of which display window (30d/60d/90d) is selected. Pairs deviating more than 1.5σ from their historical norm are flagged as stretched; above 2.5σ as a break — a broken correlation is often as informative as the correlation itself. Clicking any row opens a detail modal with a 252-day sparkline on real calendar dates, z-score, 30d/60d/90d snapshots, and a regime signal indicator.

Two pairs monitor macro regime specifically: DXY vs SPX (normally negative — a positive reading signals USD funding stress) and Gold vs DXY (normally negative — a positive reading signals the safe-haven model is broken or inflation is driving both).

CB Rate Expectations

Forward-looking rate expectations for all eight G8 central banks at their next scheduled meeting, sourced from OIS (Overnight Index Swap) and futures market pricing — not analyst forecasts, not editorial opinion. This panel is distinct from the CB Rates table above it: the CB Rates table shows what the rate is today; this panel shows what the market expects the rate to become at the next meeting. FX reacts to expectations, not to the current rate — which is why this signal matters at the margin.

Each Bias field is computed from the overnight rate market specific to that currency:

Classification: if the OIS/overnight rate is more than 10bp below the current policy rate → ↓ Cut; more than 10bp above → ↑ Hike; within ±10bp → → Hold. The label is prefixed with ~ when the OIS source is unavailable and the terminal falls back to estimating from historical rate trajectory. Where market-implied probabilities are available (USD via CME FedWatch, AUD via ASX, NZD via RBNZ), a small chip appears next to the Bias showing the probability of the expected move: 42%↓ for cut bias or 100%↑ for hike bias. Cut chips are color-coded red (≥60%), neutral (40–59%), or muted (<40%); hike chips follow the same thresholds in green.

Positioning Bias CBOE/CME Vol · COT · 25d RR

A directional bias table for major pairs, synthesised from three complementary sources. The ATM IV column shows annualised implied volatility sourced primarily from the CBOE/CME FX Volatility Indexes (^EUVIX for EUR/USD, ^BPVIX for GBP/USD, ^JYVIX for USD/JPY, ^AUDVIX for AUD/USD) — the same variance-swap replication methodology used by the VIX, published jointly by CBOE and CME, and the underlying benchmark for Bloomberg BVOL FX. These are clean index values, not derived from bid/ask option chains, and carry a ~15-minute delay. For USD/CHF and USD/CAD (no dedicated CBOE/CME index), the cascade falls back to CME FX futures options (6S, 6C) and then CBOE ETF options as a last resort. NZD/USD is derived from ^AUDVIX × 1.08 (long-run NZD/AUD realised vol ratio) and labeled as estimated. The COT bias column shows the net position of Leveraged Funds (hedge funds, CTAs) from the CFTC Disaggregated TFF report — Options+Futures Combined — as a directional proxy on a ±1.5 scale. The 25d RR chip in the Direction cell shows the 25-delta Risk Reversal from Saxo Bank's public options page (1M tenor, indicative mid-market): positive means calls are bid over puts — the market is skewed for upside on the base currency; negative means puts are bid — downside protection is dominant. When all three signals align, the read is most reliable. Divergence — e.g. IV elevated, COT flat, RR neutral — signals uncertainty or a positioning squeeze risk.

News Feed

FX-relevant headlines from FXStreet, ForexLive, Reuters FX, ECB, BoE, BoJ, RBA, RBNZ, BoC, SNB, Federal Reserve, Investing.com, ForexCrunch, MarketPulse, DailyForex, ActionForex, BabyPips, FX Empire and others, filtered and sorted by estimated market impact. Each item shows the timestamp, headline, currency tag for the pairs most likely affected, and the source. The engine updates the feed every hour; the terminal re-checks for new data every 10 minutes.

The Economic Map to the right of the news feed is a TradingView world economics widget showing GDP, inflation, and other macro metrics by country in an interactive geographic view.

Alerts & Market Signals

The final section of the main panel shows AI-generated market signals, updated 12× daily alongside the narrative (00:00, 02:00, 04:00, 06:30, 08:30, 10:30, 12:30, 14:30, 16:00, 18:00, 20:00, 22:00 UTC). Each signal includes:

• Priority dot — a colored indicator: red = critical, amber = warning, blue = informational
• Timestamp — time of the last update cycle, converted to your local timezone
• Title — a short label identifying the pair or theme
• Text — the rationale: cross-referencing logic across rate differentials, COT positioning, and price action
• Evidence chips — click any signal row to expand the data points that triggered it (e.g. "VIX: 24.1", "EUR/USD: 1.1505")

Signal Notifications

A bell icon button in the panel header lets you opt into browser notifications for new AI signals. When enabled, the button turns blue and the browser will notify you each time the signal set updates with new content — one notification per update cycle, summarising the count by priority. The preference is saved in your browser's local storage. To disable, click the bell again. If your browser has blocked notifications for this site, the button shows a red "blocked" state — re-enable notifications in your browser's site settings to use this feature.

Price & Advanced Alerts

Configurable alerts are available via the alerts button in the status bar at the bottom of the screen. An alert type selector lets you choose from six categories:

All alerts check every 5 minutes, fire a browser notification on trigger, and persist across sessions in local storage. Click the alert row in the popover to delete it. If your browser has blocked notifications, the alerts button shows a red state — re-enable from your browser's site settings.