AUDUSD Trading Guide

Australian data lands during the Sydney session, US data during New York, so it has two separate active windows.

HomePairsAUD/USD

AUD/USD at a glance

Contract size and pip size are market conventions and are the same figures the calculators on this site use.

SymbolAUDUSD
Base currencyAUD — Australian dollar
Quote currencyUSD — US dollar
Pip size0.0001
Standard lot100,000 units
Pip value, 1.00 lot$10.00
Pip value, 0.10 lot$1.00
Pip value, 0.01 lot$0.10
Quoted to5 decimal places
Active sessionsSydney, Tokyo, New York

Pip values are shown for an account held in US dollars. On an account in another currency the amount is converted at the rate of the day, which the pip value calculator does for you.

When AUD/USD is in session

Sydney07:00 – 16:00 Sydney time
Tokyo09:00 – 18:00 Tokyo time
New York08:00 – 17:00 New York time

These are the business hours of the financial centres where Sydney and New York trade. Session times shift through the year with daylight saving. The live session clock shows what is open right now in your own time zone.

What moves it

Releases and decisions that concern the Australian dollar or the US dollar:

  • RBA rate decision
  • Australian employment change
  • Chinese trade data
  • Non-Farm Payrolls
  • CPI inflation
  • FOMC rate decision
  • retail sales

Rate decisions come from the Reserve Bank of Australia and the Federal Reserve. Dates and times for all of these are on the economic calendar, which is updated from the published schedule.

Costs on AUD/USD

Spread, commission and swap are set by your broker, not by the market, and they differ by account type and by the hour. No single figure would be true for most readers, so none is given here.

The broker directory lists what each firm advertises, attributed and dated, and the spread cost calculator turns whatever your broker charges into money for a given position size.

AUD/USD questions

What is one pip worth on AUD/USD?

One pip on a standard lot of AUD/USD is $10.00, because a pip is 0.0001 and a standard lot is 100,000 units. A mini lot is $1.00 and a micro lot is $0.10. Those figures hold when the account is in US dollars; in any other currency the amount is converted at the rate of the day.

How big is one lot of AUD/USD?

A standard lot is 100,000 units, a mini lot is 10,000 and a micro lot is 1,000. This is the standard contract, and it is the same at every broker.

Why is AUD/USD quoted to 5 decimal places?

Most brokers show a fifth decimal, and that last digit is a point or pipette, one tenth of a pip. A pip is the fourth decimal, 0.0001.

When does AUD/USD actually move?

Sydney and Tokyo and New York are the sessions where the currencies in this pair have their home markets open: 07:00 – 16:00 Sydney time, 09:00 – 18:00 Tokyo time, 08:00 – 17:00 New York time. That is a statement about which centres are trading, not a promise about volatility on any particular day. The live session clock shows which one is open right now.

What spread should I expect on AUD/USD?

That depends entirely on your broker, your account type and the time of day, so no honest single number exists. The broker directory here lists what each firm advertises, taken from its own site and dated, and the spread cost calculator turns a spread into money for a given position size.

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