Exness Trading Costs — per lot, per trade, per month — South Africa

The unit price: one lot, one round trip

Everything in this table shares one denominator: one standard lot, opened and closed. Break-even restates the same figure in price movement instead of money, and cost against the daily range restates it again as a proportion — three columns, one quantity, which is why they may be read across a row and never across a page.

For scale: the EUR/USD spread of 0.8 pips is about 1.7% of its average daily range — the market typically moves 60× the cost of entering it in a single day.

One quantity written two ways

The column headed margin inside the spread is that same spread restated as a difference against an independent reference over matched hours, and a negative figure means the measured spread was the tighter of the two. Matched hours and a common price basis are what make the two sides one quantity; without them there would be two numbers and no comparison.

Both feeds compared over identical UTC hours, normalized to absolute price — pip definitions differ between feeds. Indicative; refreshed on a schedule.

The same trade counted over nights

Overnight swap is added on top of the spread — always on the side shown, at the measured rate per night (five nights include one triple-swap day; energies have no triple day and charge once per night). Full per-night rates for every instrument are on the swap rates page; swap-free account options are covered on the Islamic account page.

Three numbers, one event

The figures in the table above are unit prices: what one standard lot costs to open and to close. That is the form in which instruments can be set against one another, because the size is held still. It is also the form that answers almost nobody's actual question, since almost nobody trades exactly one lot.

Multiply by the size actually traded and a unit price becomes the cost of a trade. Multiply again by how often that trade is repeated and it becomes the cost of a month. Each step is arithmetic, and each step also adds something that was never measured: the size is a decision, the count is a forecast. The further down the chain a number sits, the more of it is assumption.

When two figures cannot be compared

A cost figure carries four things besides its value: the denominator it is divided by, the scope it covers, the instrument it belongs to and the units it is written in. Change any one of them and the comparison is void however close the numbers look. A per-lot figure set beside a per-trade figure is the commonest of these, and it always makes the smaller trade look cheap.

Scope is the quiet one. A figure covering only the opening of a position is half of a figure covering opening and closing, and both are perfectly legitimate on their own. Units are quieter still: the same cost written in price movement and in money is two numbers with no fixed relation between them, because the conversion depends on the instrument and on the size.

Which number answers which question

Is this instrument expensive is a question about a unit price, and it is answered per lot or as a share of what the instrument typically moves. Asking it of a monthly figure returns nothing useful, because a monthly figure mostly measures how much somebody trades.

What will this trade cost is a question about a single event and is answered per trade. What does my activity cost is a question about a period and is answered per month — with the count stated alongside it, because a monthly number without its count cannot be checked or reproduced by anyone, including the person who wrote it down.

Checking whether two cost figures are comparable

1. Name the denominator of each: per lot, per trade, per month, or per side.
2. Name the scope of each: one side of the trade, or opening and closing together.
3. Name the units of each: price movement, or money.
4. Name the instrument and the account terms standing behind each figure.
5. If all four match, compare them. If any one differs, convert first or do not compare at all.

A number quoted without its denominator is not a cost yet; it is a digit.

Three denominators for one cost

Two figures may be set side by side only when the denominator, the scope, the instrument and the units all match.

Related Exness pages