Introduction #
Spot trading offers a simple way to invest and trade. With crypto investing, your first experience will likely be a spot transaction in the spot market, for example buying ArdCoin at the market price and holding.
Spot markets exist across different asset classes, including cryptocurrencies, shares, commodities, forex, and bonds. You’re probably more familiar with spot markets and spot trading than you think. Some of the most popular markets, like the UBX or MSE (Mongolia Stock Exchange), are spot markets.
What’s a Spot Market? #
A spot market is a financial market open to the public where assets trade immediately. A buyer purchases an asset with fiat or another medium of exchange from a seller. Delivery of the asset is often immediate, but this depends on what’s being traded.
Spot markets are also known as cash markets because traders make payments upfront. Spot markets come in different forms, and third parties, known as exchanges, typically facilitate trading. You can also trade directly with others in over-the-counter (OTC) trades.
What’s Spot Trading? #
Spot traders try to make profits in the market by purchasing assets and hoping they’ll rise in value. They can sell their assets later on the spot market for a profit when the price increases.
The current market price of an asset is known as the spot price. Using a market order on an exchange, you can purchase or sell your holdings immediately at the best available spot price. However, there’s no guarantee that the market price won’t change while your order executes. There also might not be enough volume to satisfy your order at the price you wanted. For example, if your order is for 10 ArdCoin at the spot price, but only 3 are on offer, you will have to fill the rest of your order with ArdCoin at a different price.
Spot prices update in real-time and change as orders match. Over-the-counter spot trading works differently. You can secure a fixed amount and price directly from another party without an order book.
Depending on the asset, delivery is immediate or typically within T+2 days. T+2 is the trade date plus two business days. Traditionally, shares and equities required the transfer of physical certificates. The foreign exchange market also previously transferred currencies via physical cash, wire, or deposit. Now with digitized systems, delivery takes place almost immediately. Crypto markets, however, operate 24/7 allowing for usually instant trades. Peer-to-Peer trading or futures can however take longer for delivery.
How to Do the Spot Trading? #
A spot trade is a simple transaction between a buyer and a seller to trade at the current market rate, known as the spot price. The trade takes place immediately when the order is fulfilled.
Users can prepare spot trades in advance to trigger when a specific spot price is reached, known as a limit order. You can make spot trades on idax through our trading page interface
Making a spot trade on the idax exchange #
1. Visit the idax website and click Login at the top right corner.
2. Click on any cryptocurrency on the home page to go directly to the corresponding spot trading page. You can find a larger selection by clicking View more markets at the bottom of the list.
3. Let’s look at buying some ARDX. At the top of the idax home page, click on the [Trade] option.
- Go to the buying section to buy ARDX and fill in the price and the amount for your order. Click on [Buy ARDX] to complete the transaction.
- The default order type is a limit order. If traders want to place an order as soon as possible, they may switch to [Market] Order. By choosing a market order, users can trade instantly at the current market price.
- If the market price of ARDX/MNT is at 20, but you want to buy at a specific price, for example, 10, you can place an [Limit] order. When the market price reaches your set price, your placed order will be executed.
- The percentages shown below the ARDX [Amount] field refer to the percentage amount of your held MNT you wish to trade for ARDX. Pull the slider across to change the desired amount.
How to Resolve Order Issues #
Occasionally you may encounter problems with your orders when trading on idax. We can divide these into two categories:
1. Your trade order is not executing
- Check the selected order’s price in the open orders section. Verify whether or not it has matched a counterparty’s order (bid/ask) with this price level and volume.
- If you would like to expedite your order, consider canceling it from the open orders section and submitting a new order at a more competitive price. For a quick settlement, you may also consider using a market order.
2. Your order has a more technical issue:
Issues like the inability to cancel your orders or coins not being credited to your account require further support. Please contact our Customer Support team and provide screenshots that’ll document:
- The order’s details
- Any error code or exception message