“Quote” is a word of polysemantic nature, i.e. it has numerous meanings. The word originally was used as a notion of repeating someone’s saying or speech. Later on it was used in other fields, one of them is – concerning forex exchange trading. In context of foreign exchange trade it means price, rate, interest rate – depending on the meaning of a phrase or a text. Usually the word quote is used when it goes about the rates that are changing very quickly, with enormous decrease or dramatic increase. Sometimes quote means bid or ask in certain deal or business offer. Sometimes it is used to denote the fact price of the deal that has already taken place.
It is evident that the field of use of the notion is very vast and the word’s exact meaning depends on the context. Even when analyzed in one field, the foreign exchange market, the word can have various meanings.
The most common meanings of the word are: quotes or rates of stock options, obligations, currencies.
Stock options quote means the market price of an option set by an exchange for a certain period. The largest companies with the highest business performance are mostly quoted on the stock exchange.
Currency quotes – the price of a currency on the currency market, or a rate set for a period of time. In this period a trader manages financial transactions according to set bid and ask rates. Usually market players would be informed of forex rates or currency rates twice a day: in the beginning and in the end. The minimal and the maximal rates are taken into account.
Currency rate set for one day for off-exchange operations is official currency rate.
Firm quote is quote of specific kinds of stocks, that is carried out off-exchange by the most influential market players.
Commodity quotation is price for exchange goods that are registered and published in exchange bulletins (wholessale). In a similar way stocks and currencies rates are published in the bulletins.
Ratio of two currencies that is calculated corresponding to a third currency is called cross-rate.
To summarize, if it goes about 4x currency trading, quote is a tool for price definition in a limited period of time.
