To help display how leverage is calculated, let's look at two traders, Trader A and Trader B. Trader A: ($1,000/5:1) If Trader A has an account leverage of 5:1 and they wish to use $1,000 on one trade as margin, they will have exposure of $5,000 in base currency ($1,000). 5 x $1000 = $5,000 (trade value). Trader B: ($1,000/30:1) If Trader B has an account leverage of 30:1 and they wish to use $1,000 on one trade as margin, they will have exposure of $30,000 in base currency ($1,000). 30 x $1000 = $30,000 (trade value). Comparison Trader B could open a position with the same value as Trader A using only a fraction of the $1,000 in their trading account. As the margin requirement of Trader B is only 3.33% (30:1), they would be able to open a position with a value of $10,000 with just $333. $10,000 x 0.033 = $333