Spot date

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In Finance the Spot Date is the normal settlement day for a transaction done today. This kind of transaction is referred to as a Spot Transaction or simply Spot.

The Spot Date may be different for different types of financial transacions. In the foreign exchange market spot is normally two banking days forward for the currency pair traded.

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A transactions which has settlement after the spot date is called a Forward or a Forward contract.

Other Settlement dates are also possible. Standard Settlement Dates are calculated from the Spot Date. For example a 1 month FX Forward settles one month after the spot date. I.e. if today is Monday February 1st, the spot date is February 3rd and the 1 month date is a month later or March 3rd (assumed that neither of these dates are bank holidays).

For a trade with two dates such as an FX Swap (see Forex swap), which runs from one date to another date, the first date is the Spot Date if nothing else is specifically agreed. I.e. a 1 month swap is from the Spot Date to a date one month after Spot.

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