basic question about the value of pairs traded

[wonkabar]

I am new to this and have a basic question. Say I have an account denominated in usd and I want to trade $10k per pair. Do I need to convert the non usd pairs into usd or does it happen automatically? Say for example I am trading eur/gbp. Would I say I am buying $10k or would I have to convert it into the euro equiv to that?

A similar question would be how do people position size across pairs with different pip values? If I am still trading $10k per trade should I actually be trading more in pairs like usd/chf which have a lower value than in pairs like eur/gbp which are worth more?

any help or advice on how exactly people look at this would be appreciated. thanks

[KingCreole]

When you open an account with your choice of broker that is automaticially preset. With MG Financial you have a choice. 1% or 250 to 1 margin. Example: 1% of Euro=$1296.9 or use the fixed margin and use less capital the same trade Euro= $250.00. It all pays the same . 1 pip equals $10.00. You can guess my choice. Then there is Oanda. Another choice is to use a set amount of your account. Lets say a 10K account and you only want to risk 2%. Then you enter the % of risk in the trading platform and and the rest is automatted. Some people trade with 2 accounts. One for position trading and one for scalping. I hope this helps. Best regards. cnwc2004@yahoo.com.

[joebarry]

Margin Requirement
The table below shows an example of the margin required for each contract size in the major currency pairs based on spot rates of 1.2100 for EUR/USD and 1.7220 for GBP/USD. Margin required is subject to change in market rate. In a live account, the margin required for each non-dollar based currency pair will be converted to U.S. Dollars, in real-time, at the prevailing market price for that pair.

Required margin for selected currency pair:
1,000
units/lot
5,000
units/lot
10,000
units/lot
50,000
units/lot
100,000
units/lot

EUR/USD
$12.10
$60.50
$121
$605
$1,210

USD/JPY
$10
$50
$100
$500
$1,000

GBP/USD
$17.22
$86.10
$172.20
$861
$1,772

USD/CHF
$10
$50
$100
$500
$1,000