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The New York open explained: 3 openings, one morning

People say "the New York open" like it is one moment. It's really 3, spread over 90 minutes. Learn what happens at each one, and the morning stops feeling like a blur.

Beginner guide · 7-minute read · Updated 2026-10-21

3 openings, not 1

People say "the New York open" and mean different things. A forex trader means 8 am. A stock trader means 9:30. Both are right.

Here's the morning in order, in Eastern Time:

Our market hours tool shows the open sessions in your own time zone.

8:00 am: New York forex starts

Around 8 am ET, New York banks and funds join London. This starts the busiest stretch of the forex day.

More traders means more orders. On the big pairs, the Spread is often at its tightest here. Moves often pick up too.

This window, about 8 am to noon ET, has its own page: trading the London–New York overlap.

8:30 am: the news minute

Many big US reports come out at 8:30 am ET. The ones that move markets most:

• CPI (inflation) — monthly, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. See CPI report explained.
• The jobs report — usually the first Friday of the month. See nonfarm payrolls explained.
• Weekly jobless claims — most Thursdays.
• Retail sales, PPI and GDP — on their own schedules.

On a big-news morning, price can jump in seconds. Spreads can widen. A stop can fill at a worse price than you set. That's called Slippage.

9:30 am: the stock market bell

At 9:30 am ET, the regular session opens on the NYSE and Nasdaq. This is the open stock traders mean.

What often happens:

• Prices open away from yesterday's close. News overnight can open a stock higher or lower. That jump is a Gap.
• The first minutes are fast. Lots of orders hit at once. Spreads on smaller stocks can be wide.
• Index futures react too. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures trade nearly all day, but they often get busier at 9:30.

The first hour has its own page, with a full plan: the US stock market open.

10:00 am: the second wave

Some reports come out at 10 am ET instead. Examples include ISM surveys and consumer sentiment. They're usually smaller movers than CPI or jobs, but not always.

Check the calendar for both times, not just 8:30.

Around 11 am: the London fix

At 4 pm London time, about 11 am ET for most of the year, a widely used set of benchmark currency rates is set. It's often called "the London fix."

Big firms that need to buy or sell currency at that rate place orders around it. So forex can see a burst of activity near 11 am ET, then calm down as London leaves.

You don't need to trade the fix. Just know it's there, so a sudden move at 11 am doesn't surprise you.

A simple New York morning plan

Here's one way to plan it. It's an example of a process, not a promise of results.

1. Before 8 am: check the calendar. Write down any release times. Cross out the minutes around them.
2. Check the bigger chart. On the 1-hour or 4-hour, is price making higher highs and higher lows, or lower ones? Plan to trade with that.
3. Mark the key levels. The overnight high and low, and the last places price turned around.
4. Wait for a candle body to close past a level. Wicks poking through don't count.
5. Stop from the chart, size from the stop. Risk about 1%. Use the position size calculator.
6. Stop after 2 losses. That's your day. See daily loss limit.

A math example: risk 1 unit, target 2. Win 2 trades out of 5 and you're up 1 unit before costs. A math example, not a promise. A morning can go the other way too.

Common mistakes

• Calling everything "the open." Know which one you're trading: 8, 8:30 or 9:30.
• Trading the news minute by accident. A trade opened at 8:25 is a news trade, whether you meant it or not.
• Chasing the 9:30 spike. The first candle can reverse. Wait for a body close.
• Forgetting daylight saving. For a few weeks in spring and fall, London's times shift against New York's.

Try it today

1. Open this week's calendar and list every 8:30 and 10:00 release.
2. Open a 5-minute chart of EUR/USD or the S&P 500 on TradingView's bar replay.
3. Replay a past news morning. Watch 8:00, 8:30 and 9:30 one at a time.
4. Write down what each one looked like. Do this for 5 mornings.

Questions