ADVFN
ADVFN has a broad range of features that would be very useful to any Forex trader or person dabbling in the stock market. The site operates a membership system, although this is totally free and it gets you live Forex trading prices as well.
The main page has a wealth of information on stock markets, exchange rates, shareholding information, stock exchange information and much more besides. This is certainly one busy home page that isn’t afraid to start revealing lots of info the minute you arrive!
Take me to the site! How do I get there?
That’s very easy – the site is available to view here. From the home page you will see all the links to the other site areas, as well as being able to check the site map.
What does the site offer?
There is such a lot going on here that the best way to find out what they do on the whole is to take a look at the site map. You will need to log in to use and view most of the features on the site, but as mentioned before you can get a free membership so you won’t be spending any money at all.
There is also a very useful series of features for anybody new to the whole foreign exchange market arena. Among the best of the lot are the links which exist as small pictures near the bottom of the website. For example you can read about Robbie Burns, the ‘Naked Trader’, in his regular column. Features like this really enhance the overall look and feel of the site.
The site also aggregates a large volume of Forex related news, so you can easily tell what is going on, and why certain movements are taking place. As you can probably tell, it can be a bit overwhelming to begin with, but as soon as you get your free membership and you start finding your way around you’ll soon get the hang of it.
What is their currency converter like?
You’ll see here that the currency converter is underneath the facility to get live spot prices as well. So be sure you are using the right one when you do your calculations.
Firstly you select the currency you want to convert from. There are dozens to choose from here, and it is quite a comprehensive list. There are no metals or anything else untoward that you sometimes see – it’s purely currencies. Older and extinct currencies like the French franc are also included, strangely enough.
So you put the amount you are going to convert into the box, excluding any symbols such as the $ dollar symbol for instance. Then you select the currency you are converting from by going into the first drop down box. The one you are converting to is selected from the second box.
All you have to do then is click on the ‘OK’ button and the results are displayed underneath for your perusal. The country flags will appear next to each currency, along with the exchange rates back and forth, and the three letter currency codes in brackets next to the currency name.
You’ll see also that the spot prices for those two currencies will be at the bottom of the page in chart form. One is shown on a historical basis over the last few months, and the other is shown across the most recent hours that they have the data for.
You’ll also see that currency conversions for one, two, five, ten and twenty units of whatever currency you have looked up are converted into the second currency. This means you can tell at a glance how far small amounts of the cash would go. This is a neat additional feature that isn’t seen very often, so it does give this website a leg up over its competition in this sense!
Supposing I need some help and advice – can they help me with that?
This site can be a little confusing when you first arrive, so you’ll want to know where the help is if you need it.
At the bottom of the page in very small type you will spot a link that invites you to ‘contact us’. There are phone numbers and email addresses for both UK and US based customers, so you should quickly be able to find what you need here. The full postal address of the company behind the ADVFN site is also listed, just in case you should need it.
You will no doubt have noticed that on the left hand side of this page there is a list of processes you can go through if you wish. It turns out that this contact page is part of a more comprehensive help section, and you can click back to this by looking for the link at the top, where it says ‘help, how to, contact us’.
This reveals a lot more to delve into should you need to!
In conclusion
This site is very big and bold and is obviously designed to appeal to those foreign exchange traders who have at least a little experience in the market. If you don’t have any knowledge at all of it then you will probably struggle to make sense of any of the charts or data given.
However they are extremely helpful and point out as much as they can to make it more straightforward. As such the site is well thought out and can offer you a wealth of help and advice. If you have an interest in Forex then you might find plenty to delight you here.
Rating (out of five stars)
We’re giving this site four out of five stars. It’s not aimed at beginners but the currency converter is certainly very useful and gives away a lot more information than some others do.
For that reason alone it deserves a high number of stars in our ratings system – and that’s what we’ve given it.
- 4 Stars
Link: advfn.com Currency Converter