How to Trade Gold in 5-Steps in 2025

Why Gold CFDs?

Gold CFDs let you speculate on changes in the price of bullion without holding physical metal. You can both buy (go long) and sell (go short), apply leverage, and open positions as small as 1 troy ounce. That flexibility explains why gold is one of the most heavily traded CFD markets after Forex.

Step-by-step guide to trading gold

1. Open a trading account

First, open and fund an account with FPMarkets.com, or create a demo account to follow this tutorial step-by-step. FP Markets is TrustedBroker's best gold CFD broker in 2025 for reasons we'll touch on later.

2. Add XAUUSD to your trading platform

FP Markets supports a wide range of trading platforms, including MT4/5, cTrader and even TradingView. For simplicity, this tutorial uses MetaTrader 5's web trading platform with no download required. However, you could trade through a mobile app, or desktop if you prefer.

Here's how to add XAUUSD, the price of gold in US dollars, to MT5:

1. Enter 'XAUUSD' in the field labelled 'Search symbol'.
2. Click the '+' symbol to add it to your list of favourites
3. Right-click on 'XAUUSD.r' and 'Specifications' to view contract specs (as illustrated below).

3. Size your position

First, decide how much money you are willing to risk on this trade. Let's assume you don't want to lose more than US$ 100.

Next, determine where you'll close the trade should the price of gold move against you. Let's assume you'll set your stop-loss US$ 50 below the spot price of gold. In practice, you'll need to use technical analysis to infer levels of support.

Finally, calculate your preferred position size, in lots, by dividing the dollar amount you are willing to risk, by the value of your stop for a standard contract. In this example, this amounts to 0.02 lots, calculated as $100 / ($50 per oz x 100 oz per lot).

4. Check your margin

The initial margin is the amount of equity, or capital, you'll need to commit to a given trade.

Calculating the required margin is simple once you know your preferred lot size:

At a minimum, you'll need to set aside US$ 67.13 of capital to open this position. However, most traders ensure their free margin is at least 2–3× that amount to avoid margin calls from ordinary price swings.

Note: if you have too little free margin in your account, you'll need to reduce the trade size, or deposit more funds.

5. Execute the trade

You're now ready to place your trade. In MetaTrader, click the 'New Order' button.

1. Enter your chosen 0.02 lot size in the 'Volume' field.
2. Set the stop-loss $50 below the spot price.
3. Optionally: set a take-profit level.

Then click the 'Buy by Market' button to submit and execute your market order. Congratulations, you've placed your first gold trade!

Best gold CFD broker in 2025

If you're unsure which broker to trade through, take a look at what FPMarkets.com has to offer. FP Markets is TrustedBrokers' 'Best gold CFD broker in 2025' for the third year in a row for the following reasons:

• Gold CFDs: FP Markets offers the widest selection of gold CFDs, spanning the price of gold in US dollars, euros, british pounds, aussie dollars, singaporean dollars and even chinese yuan.
• Flexible Leverage: Trade gold with flexible leverage up 100 times your initial margin, or chose little to no leverage if you prefer. FP Markets supports all trading styles and Expert Advisors.
• Trading Platforms: FP Markets supports supports MetaTrader 4, 5, cTrader as well as TradingView. Trade directly from the charts across all platforms.
• Local Funding: Open a trading account in one of 13 local currencies - including GBP, EUR, USD, CAD and AUD - to avoid FX fees on deposits and withdrawals.
• Excellence in Customer Service: FP Markets have over 8,000 5-star reviews on TrustPilot, and a string of awards commending its customer service, available 24/7.

Conclusion

Trading gold CFDs is straightforward once you understand the contract size (100 oz per lot), and your broker's margin requirement (1% in the case of FP Markets). Start by trading small amounts with low leverage until you're comfortable with this asset class. Open a trading account on FPMarkets.com to get started.

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