HighFX was a forex broker that was established by a team of successful traders and is operated within the United Kingdom. Their vision is to make a difference for their traders by creating a unique relationship and to provide information and strategies to help them succeed. With a high-quality customer support team behind them, HighFX is confident that they can achieve this. That is what the website says, we will be looking into the services on offer to see if this is achieved.
Account Types
5 different accounts are available from HighFx, these are the Standard, Gold, Platinum, Diamond and Islamic accounts. We will take a little look at each as they each have their own requirements and conditions.
Standard Account: This entry-level account comes with spreads starting from 1 pip, it also has a leverage range between 1:5 – 1:400. Hedging is allowed and swaps are present on the account. There is a deposit bonus of 15% and it has access to fast and safe withdrawals. You can get support from a personal investment expert and access to forex analysis. This account comes with 24/5 support and also has access to forex training and the WebTrader and mobile applications.
Gold Account: The Gold account reduces the spreads slightly as they now start at 0.8 pips, the account has the same leverage range of 1:5 – 1:400 and hedging is allowed. Swap charges are present and there is an investment bonus of 20% available. The account offers high lot refunds along with fast and safe withdrawals and access to a VIP investment expert. The account received WhatsApp signal and analysis support as well as live trading sessions, dealing room access, 24/5 customer support and access to the EbTrade rand mobile trading platforms.
Platinum Account: The Platinum account reduces the spreads further as they now drop down to a starting level of 0.5 pips. Leverage remains the same between 1:5 and 1:400 and hedging and swaps are both allowed and present. There is a bonus of 30% available and the account offers high lot refunds as well as fast and safe withdrawals. You are able to contact the VIP investment expert, the account also receives WhatsApp signals and analysis support as well as live trading sessions, dealing room access, 24/5 customer support and access to the WebTrade rand mobile trading platforms.
Diamond Account: The Diamond account is the top tier account on offer from HighFx and so the spreads are further reduced down to 0.1 pips. Leverage remains the same between 1:5 and 1:400 and hedging and swaps are both allowed and present. There is a bonus of 30% available and the account offers high lot refunds as well as fast and safe withdrawals. You are able to contact the VIP investment expert, the account also receives WhatsApp signals and analysis support as well as live trading sessions, dealing room access, 24/5 customer support and access to the WebTrade rand mobile trading platforms.
Islamic Account: The Islamic account seems to be similar to the Standard account except for the fact that it has no swap charges. It has a spread starting from 1 pip and leverage between 1:5 and 1:400. Hedging is allowed and there is a bonus of 15% available. Withdrawals remain fast and secure and there is access to a personal investment expert, along with access to forex analysis and 24/5 customer support. The account can use both the WebTrader and the mobile platforms to trade.
Platforms
HighFx use their own platforms to offer their trading, each with their own features, let’s see what they are.
WebTrader: Features of the WebTrader include trading through your browser easily, enables creating a favorites list, so traders can easily access their preferred assets. Easily trading option for your preferred investing assets. Live Stream Technology, a unique live feed that gives instant information and insights about market events and mass trading behaviors. This option also allows traders to get real-time notifications about important financial events or news directly on the platform. Cashback Bonus Program, a Bonus program that enables customers to earn for every position they open. Traders can easily see how much they can earn on the related assets box. The Web Trader platform enables access over all browsers without downloading. Trading Central signal and analysis access and 7 language options.
Mobile Application: The Mobile Forex Application includes all the features of the desktop platforms but with an intuitive interface so you can trade in the quickest possible and most comfortable manner. The main advantage of mobile, in general, is that it is made as simple as possible in order to accommodate our fast-paced lives. Efficiency is a must and most people want to utilize their spare time in the best possible way. By trading with your mobile device, you will be able to actively participate in the world of Forex trading, no matter where you are – on holiday, on a business trip, waiting in a long queue or just during your lunch break.
Leverage
Leverage for all accounts can be between 1:5 and 1:400, this can be selected when opening up an account, should you wish to change it on an already opened account then we would suggest getting in contact with the customer support team with this request.
Trade Sizes
Trading sizes start as low as 0.01 lots and go up in increments of 0,01 lots so the next trade would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots. We could not locate information regarding the maximum trade size, however, we would not recommend trading more than 50 lots as it can become harder for the markets and liquidity providers to execute trades quickly and without commission the bigger they are.
Trading Costs
The majority of the accounts use a spread based system so there is no added commission. It is not clear if this is for all accounts as there is no mention of any commissions on the accounts comparison page or within the terms of service. So we can not comment on any potential commissions.
Swap charges are present on all account types apart from the Islamic account, there are charges for holding trades overnight and can be either negative or positive. These can often be viewed from within the trading platform you are using. There is also a dormancy fee of 10% of the account balance for not trading for an extended period of time.
Assets
HighFx has broken down their assets into a number of different categories but there isn’t a full breakdown of all the tradable instruments, just a few examples. Currencies are the first and there are major pairs and minor pairs available, some of the examples given are EUR/USD, USD/JPY, AUD/USD and NZD/USD.
Next up is commodities, where there are the usual metals of Gold and Silver, and then other commodities also such as Crude Oil and Natural Gas. Indices are also present with the usual suspects including Dow Jones, S&P 500, Dax 30 and Nasdaq. Plenty of stock on offer from the likes of Apple, Google, Boeing and Amazon available to trade. There are EFTs and finally, there are Cryptocurrencies which is great to see, the likes of Bitcoin, Ethereum, DASH, EOS, Ehtereum Classic, and Iota are all available to trade.
Spreads
The spreads that you receive depends on a number of aspects, first up is the account type that you are using, If we look at EUR/USD the Standard account has spread of 1.5 pips, Gold 1.1 pips, Platinum 0.9 pips, Diamond 0.8 pips, and Islamic 2 pips. The spreads re variable which means they move with the markets when the markets are being volatile than the spreads often widen and become bigger.
It should also be noted that different instrument shave different spreads, so on the Standard account EUR/USD may have a spread of 1.5 pips, other instruments like USD/CAD has a spread starting at 5.5 pips and commodities such as Bitcoin has a spread of 20,000.
Minimum Deposit
The minimum deposit required from HighFx is 200 USD, EUR or GBP, this is the same for the initial deposit as well as any further top-up deposits you may make.
Deposit Methods & Costs
Just two methods available to deposit with which are Credit / Debit card, both Visa or MasterCard and Bank Wire Transfers. Using Bank Wire Transfer should mean your funds arrive in your account within 1 – 2 business days. While HighFx does not add any fees of their own, they do state that it is the customer’s responsibility to cover any expenses that may be incurred, so be sure to check with your bank to see if they add any fees of their own.
Withdrawal Methods & Costs
The same methods are available to withdraw as they were to deposit, withdrawals must be made to the same account that deposited. The first withdrawal of the month is free, any subsequent withdrawals are subject to a 30 USD, EUR or GBP charge. The minimum withdrawal amount is 100 USD, EUR or GBP.
Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time
Withdrawals are processed by HighFx within 36 hours of the request being made. It will then take 2 – 5 business days for the withdrawals to become available in your bank account due to the banks’ own processing times.
Bonuses & Promotions
There are a few different bonuses however the information surrounding them is not completely clear, but this is what we have got.
Reward Points: Get rewarded for your trading, by simply trading on your live account, you can accumulate HighFx points proportional to the volume of your closed trade. These points can be easily converted into funds and credited directly to your trading account. The more you trade, the more HighFx points you get.
Deposit Bonus: There is a deposit bonus available from each account which ranges from 15% up to 30%, the conditions of this bonus are unknown as the terms of service simply state that they can not be withdrawn until they have been converted into real funds, but there is no mention of how to do that.
Competiton: There is a trading competition each month where you can win up to $25,000. You simply need to trade the most volume, those who trade the most win.
Educational & Trading Tools
There is an economic calendar available to show you any upcoming news events and which currency they are on, however it is very basic and far better ones can be found elsewhere. There is a technical analysis section of the site, but no actual analysis, just information on what technical analysis is. The Academy is disappointing, it is just a single page outlining some basic information about forex trading. Finally, you are able to request a live trading session with a professional trader, we do not know how worthwhile this is though as we did not do it ourselves.
Customer Service
The customer service team is accessible via email or phone. There are email addresses for General Topics, Customer Services, and Affiliates. There are then phone numbers in a number of different countries including the United Kingdom, Canada, France, South Africa, Australia, Turkey, Malaysia, Singapore, and Nigeria. You can also get in touch on social media like Facebook and Twitter.
Demo Account
There is no mention of demo accounts on the website, however near the top of the Terms and Conditions there is a very strange sentence, it states: “I confirm that I got an opportunity to trade on a demo platform and/or read a tutorial” However the demo accounts do not seem to be available so we are a little confused by this statement.
Countries Accepted
Which countries are accepted is not clearly indicated on the website so if you are interested in getting an account we would suggest getting in contact with the customer service team to see if you are eligible for an account or not.
Conclusion
The trading conditions being offered by HighFx seem reasonable, spreads are not incredibly high and there is no mention of commissions, however, the lack of information on commissions can be a little concerning. There needs to be a better breakdown of tradable assets as potential clients will use this to ensure that there are enough and the right assets for them to trade. The main downside to HighFx is the withdrawal fees, the first in each month may be free but people often withdraw multiple times a month and any additional withdrawals will cost you 30 base currency which is quite high.
