The forex market closes on Friday evening and reopens on Sunday, and it does not always reopen at the same price. A weekend holding rule limits or forbids carrying positions across that gap, and often across major news too. Break it and, depending on the firm, your trades are closed for you or the account is failed outright.
What it is
A restriction on open positions during closed or high-risk periods. It usually takes one of three forms:
- Weekend holds — no positions open when the market closes on Friday, around 22:00 GMT, through to the Sunday reopen.
- News holds — no positions open across high-impact releases such as non-farm payrolls, CPI or central bank decisions, or no opening and closing within a few minutes either side.
- Forced Friday close — a hard cutoff, say flat by Friday 20:45 server time, after which the firm closes anything still running.
Not every firm bans weekend holds. Some allow them, some sell it as a paid add-on, some restrict it to swing-account products. The rule is firm-specific, so read yours rather than assuming.
Why it exists — gap risk
Over a weekend, elections, geopolitics and policy surprises land while you cannot trade. Price can reopen far from where Friday closed. A stop-loss cannot fill inside a gap — it fills at the next available price, which may sit well past the level you set. The firm cannot manage exposure it has no chance to close, so it removes the exposure entirely. News restrictions solve the same problem compressed into a few seconds around a release.
A stop-loss does not protect you across a gap. It fills at the first price on the other side, which on a bad weekend can be nowhere near the level you chose.
A worked example
A swing trader on a £50,000 account holds a one-lot EUR/USD long into the weekend. Friday closes at 1.0900. Over the weekend a political shock hits Europe and Sunday opens at 1.0810 — a 90-pip gap down. At roughly £8 a pip that is about £720 gone before the trader can touch anything, and the stop sitting at 1.0850 never had a chance to fill there.
If the firm also bans weekend holds, it is worse than a bad trade. The trader has taken the full gap loss and breached a rule in the same move, so the account fails on top of the drawdown.
What to check
- The exact Friday cutoff, in server time, not your local clock.
- Whether the ban covers all instruments or only certain ones.
- Whether news restrictions apply to opening, closing, or holding through the release.
- Whether a swing add-on exists if your strategy needs to hold.
The Karnek note
Karnek shows what you are holding and when you opened it, live from the terminal, so an open position running towards a Friday cutoff is visible before it becomes a breach. It is read-only and can never close a trade for you or place one — it reports, you decide.
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Written and reviewed by the Karnek Research team. Last updated August 2026.
Educational content only - not financial advice. Past performance does not predict future results. Trading carries significant risk.