Trading knowledge libraryOpen and Closed Trades ExplainedMarket Basics
Market Basics
Open and Closed Trades Explained
An open trade has a profit that changes every tick and is not yet yours; a closed trade has one final number on your balance. This paper shows you the same real trade on the two tabs of your platform, what its open row read at three moments of the day, how balance and equity differ because of the two states, and where each is written on the statement.
Every trade is in one of two states. While it is open it sits in the Trade tab and its profit is recalculated with every tick of the price: that number is floating, which means it is not yours yet and can be a different number a second from now. When the trade is closed it leaves the Trade tab and appears in the History tab with one number that will never change: that number is realised, and it has been added to, or taken from, your balance. The real trade of 3 September 2026 — one lot bought at 1.15881 — was the first kind all day and the second kind from the moment it closed at 1.16259.
A state, not a result
Here is the open row at three moments of that day. At 03:00 the price had dipped to 1.15834 and the row read a loss of $47 — a pip is the fourth decimal place, $10 at one lot, and the trade was 4.7 pips below its buying price. At 19:00 the price had reached 1.16411 and the row read a profit of $530. Neither number was ever yours. Had the trade been closed at 03:00, $47 would have left the balance; at 19:00, $530 would have joined it. It was closed at the day's end at 1.16259, and $378 was written into the History tab. The floating number is a state; the carved one is the result.
