How to use the swap calculator
The page has two tools. Swap cost works from the rates your broker publishes and gives the exact amount for a trade. Carry trade works from interest rates and shows what a rate differential is worth over time.
Swap cost
- Choose the pair, your account currency and the direction. The swap you pay or receive differs for long and short positions.
- Enter the swap rates from your platform’s contract specification, and say whether they are in points (tenths of a pip, the MetaTrader default) or in pips. Negative means you pay.
- Enter the position size and the number of nights, counting weekend nights too.
- Choose the day you open and the day your broker charges the triple swap: Wednesday for most currency pairs, sometimes Friday for metals or CFDs.
- Enter a conversion price if asked, so pips can be turned into your account currency.
Carry trade
- Choose the pair and direction and enter the full position value, not the margin.
- Enter the interest rate of each currency. The defaults are illustrative only; use current central bank rates or your broker’s financing rates.
- Enter the broker markup, the yearly spread the broker keeps, and your leverage and holding period.
How the swap is calculated
Total swap = Swap per night × Swap-days chargedA swap rate in points is divided by 10 to get pips. Each weeknight's rollover counts as one swap-day, the triple-swap night counts as three, and Saturday and Sunday count as zero. The pip value is converted into your account currency as in the pip value calculator.
For the carry trade:
Carry = Position value × Net rate × Days ÷ 365
Return on margin = Carry ÷ (Position value ÷ Leverage)
Break-even move = Carry ÷ Position value × Price ÷ Pip sizeThe sign is + for a long position (you hold the base currency) and − for a short. The break-even move is how far the price can go against you before the exchange-rate loss equals the carry earned.
A worked example
Swap cost. You hold 1 lot of EUR/USD long for 7 nights, opening on Monday. The long swap is -7.2 points, which is -0.72 pips or -$7.20 a night. The Wednesday rollover counts three times and the weekend nights not at all, so you are charged 7 swap-days: a total of -$50.40. The short side would have earned $14.70 over the same week.
Carry trade. A AUD/JPY long worth $100,000, with rates of 3.6% on the Australian dollar and 0.5% on the yen, has a 3.10% differential. After a 1% markup the net rate is +2.10%, worth $2,100.00 a year or $517.81 over 90 days. On $5,000.00 of margin at 1:20 that is +42.00% a year, and an adverse move of 50.5 pips would erase the 90-day carry.
The triple-swap day
Holding through one Wednesday night costs three nights of swap: in the example, -$21.60 for a single rollover. Holding through Friday night and the weekend costs only one, because the weekend was paid in advance. A full week always comes to seven swap-days, whatever day you open; a 30-night hold in the example costs -$216.00.
The triple day matters most for short trades. A position opened on Wednesday afternoon and closed on Thursday morning pays three days of swap for a few hours in the market, while the same trade one day later pays one.
Why your swap is not the interest rate differential
If swaps were pure interest, one side of every pair would earn exactly what the other side pays. In practice brokers subtract a markup from both sides. With the example rates:
| Position | Net rate | Carry over 90 days |
|---|---|---|
| Long AUD/JPY, no markup | +3.10% | $764.38 |
| Long AUD/JPY, 1% markup | +2.10% | $517.81 |
| Short AUD/JPY, 1% markup | -4.10% | -$1,010.96 |
The markup reduces what the long side earns and adds to what the short side pays. When the two currencies have similar rates, the markup can make both swaps negative. Broker markups vary widely and some accounts, such as swap-free accounts, replace swaps with a fixed fee.
Carry, leverage and risk
Leverage multiplies the carry return on margin, but it multiplies the exchange-rate risk in exactly the same proportion. At 1:5 the same trade earns +10.50% a year on margin instead of +42.00% at 1:20, while the break-even move in pips stays at 50.5 pips: leverage changes how much you can lose, not how far the price can move before the carry is gone.
Over a full year the cushion grows to 204.8 pips, still only about 2% of the price. Currencies routinely move more than that in a few weeks, which is why a carry trade is a bet on the exchange rate as much as on the interest rates.
What this calculator does not include
- Changing rates. Brokers update swap rates often, and central banks change policy rates. The result assumes today’s figures hold for the whole period.
- Bank holidays. Brokers sometimes charge extra rollover days around holidays in either currency’s country.
- Conversion rate changes. For pairs that need a conversion price, the swap in your currency moves with that rate.
- Exchange-rate moves. The carry tool shows the break-even move but not the profit or loss from the price; use the forex profit calculator for that.