Hedge funds as speculators

About 70% to 90% of the foreign exchange transactions are speculative. In other words,
the person or institution that bought or sold the currency has no plan to actually take
delivery of the currency in the end; rather, they were solely speculating on the movement
of that particular currency. Hedge funds have gained a reputation for aggressive currency
speculation since 1996. They control billions of dollars of equity and may borrow billions
more, and thus may overwhelm intervention by central banks to support almost any currency,
if the economic fundamentals are in the hedge funds' favor.