Automated Trading

Instead of people making decisions about what financial products to buy, hold or sell – with automated trading the decisions and the actions are made by computer algo software.

Where have you heard about automated trading?

Automated trading is a service promoted by various companies so you may have seen it advertised. Online providers often focus on automated spread-betting, and forex trading.

What you need to know about automated trading...

It's very, very fast – more than a million trades per second. It's sometimes called algorithmic trading, because of the complicated maths used to set the rules for buying or selling. Even if you use automated trading you still have to decide your own strategy. Some providers will offer you set strategies to choose from. Automated trading has been blamed for large, short-term falls in the stock market. This is because patterns of selling can grow very quickly.