Major pairs
Family I · Instruments
Not to be confused with forex pairs, major currency pairs, major forex pairs.
Major pairs are the currency pairs that account for the largest share of daily turnover in the global foreign exchange market. They almost always include the US dollar on one side and a currency from a major developed economy on the other. Because of their high liquidity and tight spreads, they are the pairs most closely followed by market participants.
Composition and turnover
The set of major pairs is not fixed by any central authority, but market convention generally recognises seven pairs: EUR/USD, USD/JPY, GBP/USD, USD/CHF, USD/CAD, AUD/USD, and NZD/USD. Some sources also include USD/CNY or treat the Scandinavian crosses as majors, so the exact list varies by broker and data provider.
Turnover in these pairs is concentrated: the forex pairs that include the US dollar consistently rank at the top of surveys published by the Bank for International Settlements, though the precise percentages shift with each triennial survey.
Worked example
The example uses illustrative spreads. Actual spreads vary by broker, account type, and market conditions, and are typically wider outside the main trading session.
Liquidity and trading hours
Major pairs trade continuously from the Sydney open on Monday to the New York close on Friday. Liquidity peaks when the London and New York sessions overlap, and it thins during holidays or in the final hours of the New York session. Because of this depth, major pairs usually show narrower bid-ask spreads and less slippage than exotic pairs, although conditions can deteriorate sharply around scheduled economic releases.
Often confused with
- forex pairs
- Forex pairs is the broad category of all traded currency pairings, including majors, minors, and exotics, whereas major pairs is a specific subset; the visible sign is that a list of forex pairs will contain entries such as USD/TRY or EUR/PLN alongside EUR/USD.
- major currency pairs
- Major currency pairs is a near-synonym that emphasises the currencies involved rather than the pairs themselves, and some data providers use it to include crosses between major currencies that contain no US dollar, such as EUR/GBP; the visible sign is the presence of a non-USD cross in the list.
- major forex pairs
- Major forex pairs is the same concept with the asset class made explicit, and it is used mainly to distinguish these pairs from major pairs in other markets such as equities or commodities; the visible sign is the word forex in the label itself.