Tag: Forex

WinFinance is a foreign exchange broker based in the Marshall Islands, the company was founded in 2013 and aims to provide an unequaled value to their clients. They claim to offer an outstanding customer support team, a host of tradable assets, advanced trading platforms, tight spreads, and an experienced team. We will be looking into the services on offer to see how they stand up next to the competition.

Account Types

There are four different accounts available to use from WinFinance, we have outlined some of their main features below.

Standard Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $250, it allows you to trade forex and uses a desktop and mobile platform. It gives part access to video tutorials and has access to a support team 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It can trade base currencies and typical spreads range from EUR/USD 2.4 pips, AUD/USD 3.3 pips, and USD/JPY 2.8 pips. The account has a fixed spread, access to an account manager and can be leveraged up to 1:200.

Classic Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $2,500, it allows you to trade forex and uses a desktop and mobile platform. It gives part access to video tutorials and has access to a support team 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It can trade base currencies, Gold, Silver and Oil and typical spreads range from EUR/USD 2.4 pips, AUD/USD 2.0 pips, and USD/JPY 1.4 pips. The account has a choice of fixed or floating spread, access to an account manager and can be leveraged up to 1:200.

Premium Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $20,000, it allows you to trade forex and uses a desktop and mobile platform. It gives full access to video tutorials and has access to a support team 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It can trade all currencies, indices, and shares and typical spreads range from EUR/USD 0.6 pips, AUD/USD 1.3 pips, and USD/JPY 0.6 pips. The account has a choice of fixed or floating spread, access to an account manager and can be leveraged up to 1:200.

Gold Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $50,000, it allows you to trade forex and uses a desktop and mobile platform. It gives full access to video tutorials and has access to a support team 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It can trade all instruments and typical spreads range from EUR/USD 0.6 pips, AUD/USD 1.3 pips, and USD/JPY 0.6 pips. The account has a choice of fixed or floating spread which is adjustable, access to premium customer support and has adjustable leverage.

Platforms

Just the one platform available to use is xStation, xStation was designed for advanced currency traders who prefer more control, flexibility, customizations, and speed than traditional retail trading software packages. It provides true one-click trading on Level 2 market depth/order book views, built-in trading calculator, in-platform economic calendar, customizable layouts saved in the cloud, and a direct connection to the WinFinance liquidity infrastructure. It was designed from the ground up as an ECN/STP platform. It is usable as a desktop download, mobile application and as a web trade.

Leverage

The Standard, Classic and Premium accounts all have a maximum leverage of 1:200, the Gold account doesn’t have a set limit, it instead can be selected when creating an account. All accounts can have their leverage (up to the maximum) selected when opening up an account and can have it changed by sending a request to the customer service team.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots on all accounts, they then also go up in increments of 0.01 lots so the next trade size would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots. Unfortunately, we do not know what the maximum trade size is or how many trades/orders you can have open at any one time.

Trading Costs

There doesn’t appear to be any added commission on any of the accounts as they all use a spread based system that we will look at later in this review. There are however spread fees, these are interest charges that take effect when holding trades overnight, they can be both positive or negative and can be viewed from within the trading platform you are using.

Assets

Unfortunately, there isn’t a full breakdown or any sort of product specification so we cannot see exactly which assets or instruments are available to trade, this is disappointing as many potential clients will look to see if their preferred assets are available, the last thing they want is to sign up and find that they cannot trade it.

Spreads

The spreads are based around the account that you use. The Standard account has spread starting at EUR/USD 2.4 pips, AUD/USD 3.3 pips, and USD/JPY 2.8 pips. These spreads are fixed which means they will never change, no matter what is happening in the markets or how volatile they are.

The Classic account has spreads ranging from EUR/USD 2.4 pips, AUD/USD 2.0 pips, and USD/JPY 1.4 pips. These spreads can be either fixed or variable, variable spreads mean they move with the markets, the more volatility there is the higher they will be, the starting figure for variable spreads is often lower than fixed spreads.

The Premium and Gold accounts also have a choice of fixed or variable spreads and start at around EUR/USD 0.6 pips, AUD/USD 1.3 pips, and USD/JPY 0.6 pips.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum amount required to open up an account with WinFinance is $250, this allows you to use the Standard account, if you want a higher tier account you will need to deposit at least $2,500. We do not know if this amount reduces once an account has already been opened.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Sadly there isn’t any information on the site regarding deposit methods or anything to do with them except for three little images of Visa, MasterCard, and Maestro, so we will be confident to say that they will be available, but we cannot say about any other methods. We also cannot comment on whether there are any added fees for depositing by WinFinance.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

As we do not know how you can deposit we also do not know how you can withdraw, the same three images are available but that is it. Just like with the deposits we do not know if there are any added fees when withdrawing.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Unfortunately, we also do not have any information on this topic, we would hope that any withdrawal requests would be fully processed between 1 to 7 working days after the request is made depending on what methods are available to withdraw with.

Bonuses & Promotions

We had a good look around the site and could not see any indications of an active promotion or bonus so we do not believe there are any. This does not mean that there won’t be any in the future, if you are interested in bonuses we would suggest contacting the customer service team to see if there are any coming up that you could take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

There doesn’t appear to be any educational material or tools on the site which is a shame as a lot of modern brokers are now trying to help their clients improve, so it would be good to see WinFinance add something to help their clients.

Customer Service

The customer service page states that the team is available from Sunday to Friday 10 am – 8 pm GMT, however, the account page states that there is 24/7 support available, so they contradict each other.

You can use the online submission form to send in your query and then you should get a reply via email. There is also a postal address available along with two emails and two phone numbers.

Address: Trust Company Complex, Majuro, MH 96960, Marshall Islands
Support Email: [email protected]
Marketing Email: [email protected]
Great Britain Phone: +442036082593
Italy Phone: +97316195023

Demo Account

There isn’t any information surrounding demo accounts on the site, however, we do not have a full account so we cannot see if there are any available in there if there aren’t then it is a shame as demo accounts allow clients to test out the trading conditions and new strategies without risking any real capital.

Countries Accepted

This information is not present on the site so we would suggest contacting the customer service team to find out if you are eligible for an account or not.

Conclusion

The four different accounts offer some variety especially when it comes to the choice of fixed or variable spreads. Sadly, that is about where all the positives end, there is no information about what assets and instruments are available to trade or how you can deposit and withdraw your funds., This information is vital if a company is going to be holding onto your money, you need to know how you can move it about and also if it will cost you to do so, without this information being available is it hard for us to recommend them as a broker to use, and would instead suggest looking somewhere that is being a little bit more transparent.

Vinson Financials is a foreign exchange broker founded in 2004 and situated in Hong Kong however, they also have offices in the UK and Cyprus. They do not give a huge amount of information about themselves away, however, their objectives and goals are to operate responsibly, executing with excellence and capture new opportunities for growth. They are always looking to improve and so throughout this review, we will be looking into what is on offer to see if they live up to the expectations.

Account Types

There are two main account categories with Vinson Financials, within each category are two different account types, we will briefly overview the 4 total accounts.

Classic Accounts

Pearl Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $200, it can be leveraged up to 1:500 and has forex and metals available to trade. The account can use both MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 as its trading platforms and has spread starting from a fixed 2 pips. Swap fees are present and expert advisors are not allowed. Trading sizes start at 0.1 lots and go up to 20 lots maximum. Support is available 24/5 and the margin level is set at 30% with the stop out level at 5%.

VIP Account: The minimum deposit raises up to $5,000 for this account type, it can be leveraged up to 1:500 and has forex and metals available to trade. The account can use both MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 as its trading platforms and has spread starting from a fixed 1 pip. Swap fees are present and expert advisors are not allowed. Trading sizes start at 0.1 lots and go up to 30 lots maximum. Support is available 24/5 and the margin level is set at 30% with the stop out level at 5%.

Advance Accounts

Diamond Account: This account type has a minimum deposit requirement of $200, it can be leveraged up to 1:200 and uses market execution. It has forex, metals, and indices available to trade and can be used with both MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5. It has a floating spread starting at 1.6 pips and trading starts at 0.1 lots and goes up to a maximum of 50 lots. Support is available 24/5 and both expert advisors and trading signals are allowed, the account also has a margin level set at 30% and stop out level set at 5 %.

VIP Account: The minimum deposit for this VIP account raises up to $5,000 as a minimum, it can be leveraged up to 1:200 and uses market execution. It has forex, metals, and indices available to trade and can be used with both MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5. It has a floating spread starting at 1 pip and trading starts at 0.1 lots and goes up to a maximum of 50 lots. Support is available 24/5 and both expert advisors and trading signals are allowed, the account also has a margin level set at 30% and stop out level set at 5 %.

Platforms

There are two trading platforms available to use, both from MetaQuotes, so let’s look at what they are and what features they offer.

MT4: The MetaTrader 4 trading platform is a fully-equipped trading system that enables you to trade various financial instruments, including forex, CFDs, metals, and futures. The MetaTrader 4 trading platform offers you many advantages such as placing different order types, the ability to analyze the market with more than 50 built-in indicators, trade on a variety of mobile devices, use Expert Advisors (EAs) for automated trading, develop your own EAs, custom indicators and scripts and, it uses 128-bit encryption ensuring the security of trade transactions. The platform is accessible via a desktop download, web trader and application for your mobile devices.

MT5: The MetaTrader 5 platform offers a complete selection of trading functions, including many impressive analytical features. Moreover, the platform contains a full spectrum of trading tools to ensure flexible and full-fledged trading activities. Useful tools, such as alerts on trade positions, automated trading programs, technical analysis, fundamental analysis, and trading signals, are available directly on the platform. Some other features it has included trading with a variety of order types, the ability to analyze the market with 30+ built-in technical indicators, open up to 100 charts simultaneously, use Expert Advisors for automated trading, create your own technical indicators and the use of 128-bit encryption ensuring the security of trade transactions. The platform is accessible via a desktop download, web trader and application for your mobile devices.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available depends on the account you are using. If you are using a Classic account then your maximum leverage will be 1500, if you are using one of the Advance accounts then you will have a maximum leverage of 1:200. The leverage can be selected when opening up the account and once it is open, you can contact the customer service team should you wish to change it.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes for all accounts start at 0.1 lots, however, the maximum trade size for each one is different and is 20 lots for the Classic Pearl, 30 lots for the Classic VIP, 50 lots for the Advanced Diamond and, 100 lots for the Advanced VIP.

We would recommend not trading over 50 lots in a single trade due to it being harder to execute quickly, and we are not sure about the maximum number of open trades allowed at any one time.

Trading Costs

The accounts do not have any added commissions, instead, they all use a spread based system that we will look at later in this review. The accounts do have swap charges, these are interest fees charged for holding trades overnight and can be both positive or negative, they can be viewed within the trading platform you are using.

Assets

The assets have been broken down into a number of categories which we will now outline for you.

Forex: EURUSD, GBPUSD, USDJPY, USDCHF, USDCAD, AUDUSD, NZDUSD, EURJPY, GBPJPY, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURCAD, EURAUD, EURNZD, GBPCHF, GBPNZD, GBPCAD, GBPAUD, CHEFJPY, CADCHF, CADJPY, AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, NZDCAD, NZDCHF, NZDJPY.

Metals: Gold and Silver.

Indices: Dow Jones, S&P 500, Nasdaq, DAX, FTSE, Nikkei, France 40, Swiss 30, Euro 50, Hong Kong 40, Spain 35, Italian 40.

Futures: Brent Crude Oil, Natural Gas, Light Sweet Crude Oil, Corn, Soybeans, Wheat, Coffee, Copper.

Spreads

The spreads on offer vary quite a lot, they are using two different types of spreads fixed and variable. Variable (or floating) spreads mean that they move with the market when there is added volatility the spreads often widen and are seen larger. Fixed spreads are the opposite, they do not change no matter what is happening in the markets, they always remain the same.

Here are the outlines of the starting spreads.

• Classic Pearl: Fixed from 2 pips
• Classic VIP: Fixed from 1 pip
• Advanced Diamond: Variable from 1.6 pips
• Advanced VIP: Variable from 1 pip

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit required to open up an account is $200, this will get you either the Classic Pearl or Advanced Diamond accounts, if you want a VIP account you will need to deposit at least $5,000.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are only three ways to find your account, you can use Bank Wire Transfer, Credit / Debit Card (Visa and MasterCard) and Skrill. Looking through the FAQ on the site, they state that there are no added fees, however when depositing using Bank Wire Transfer you should check with your bank to see if there are any added fees.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

You must return funds to the account used to deposit, however, once the withdrawal equals the deposit, it seems like you can only use Bank Wire Transfer as a withdrawal method. Just like with deposits, there are no added fees but be sure to check with your bank to see if there are any transfer fees added by them.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Vinson Financials will aim to process withdrawals within 2 business days, however, on occasion, they could take longer. The amount of time in total that it takes depends on the method used and could take between 1 to 5 working days to fully process.

Bonuses & Promotions

It does not seem like there are any bonuses or promotions active at the time of writing this review if you are interested in bonuses you could always contact the customer service team to see if there are any upcoming promotions you can take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few different aspects to the tools and educational side of the site, in relation to tools there is an economic calendar which details upcoming news events along with the markets they may affect, there is also a currency converter for working out the exchange of currencies. Finally, for tools, there are live charts of various pairs and assets to view on the site.

There are a few different sections centered around learning, the first are guides to different aspects such as forex trading, metals trading, CFD trading, commodities, futures, oil trading, and Expert Advisors. There is then a section for articles however this has not been updated since 2018 so it isn’t the most relevant, there is then market news, but this again is slightly out of date as the latest article is from November 2019. There is technical analysis, but again the last update was in 2018, finally, there are webinars that again have not been updated since November 2019.

Customer Service

If you are required to get in contact with the Vinson Financial support team you can do so 24 hours a day 5 days a week, they are closed only over the weekends and on bank holidays. You can get in contact using the online submission form to fill in your query or you can also use the online chat feature. If those don’t suit you then you can email them directly or use a phone number and finally, the postal address.

There are a few different offices, but we will detail the Cyprus office.

Address: 6 Voreiou Ipeirou Street, Limassol 3022, Cyprus
Email: (+357) 25 02 88 61–63
Phone: [email protected]

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available, the demo account allows you to test using the MetaTrader 4 platform, you can select between the classic or advanced accounts and choose leverage between 1:1 and 1:500. The account comes with a balance of $100,000, there is no expiration o the account so they will remain open indefinitely.

Demo accounts are a great way for new clients to test the servers and trading conditions while also allowing existing traders a way to test new strategies without risking any of their own capital.

Countries Accepted

Vinson Financials do not specify who can and who cannot use their service, so if you are not sure, get in contact with the customer service team to check prior to signing up.

Conclusion

The trading conditions offered by Vinson Financials can be seen as competitive, they are very slightly on the high side but still in line with what you would expect. There are no added commissions and so the spreads are expected to be high, starting at 1 pip for the VIP account is more than acceptable. There are quite a few assets to trade which is good to see, additions of crypto would help them out a lot. The main downside is the deposit and withdrawal methods, they are very limited. While there are no fees, if you use a different transfer method normally, you may be forced into using one you don’t normally use. Plenty of ways to contact the customer service team which is great and they are available 24/5. Not too many negatives from Vinson Financials from what is on the site, but whether they are right for you, is your decision.

Traderia is a foreign exchange broker that doesn’t give a lot of information about themselves away. It is always a concern when they don’t list things like locations, addresses or other important information. What they do say is that they are a team of hardworking professionals that are focused on your success. We will be using this review to look at the services on offer to try and find out a little more information about them and so you can decide if they are the right broker for you.

Account Types

There are four different accounts available each coming with different features, the account page doesn’t specify trading conditions so we will outline those in each section of this review. Let’s get a brief overview of what the accounts offer.

Classic Account: This account has a minimum deposit requirement of $1,000. It comes with daily briefing & research as well as desktop & mobile trader and video tutorials.

Gold Account: This account has a minimum deposit of $10,000. It comes with daily briefing & research, desktop & mobile trading platforms, video tutorials, competitive spreads, and webinars & seminars.

Platinum Account: The minimum deposit amount for this account is $25,000. The account comes with daily briefing & research, desktop & mobile trading platforms, video tutorials, competitive spreads, webinars & seminars, a general account manager and, SM news & signals.

VIP Account: This is the top-level account and requires a minimum deposit of $100,000. The account comes with daily briefing & research, desktop & mobile trading platforms, video tutorials, competitive spreads, webinars & seminars, a general account manager, SM news & signals, premium daily analysis and premium customer care.

Platforms

The only platform available to use with Traderia is MetaTrader 4, the good news is that it is an extremely popular and versatile platform. It is accessible anywhere as it can be used as a desktop download, mobile application or as a web trader. You can execute trades manually or with preloaded indicators and automated robot trading strategies (or Expert Advisors). Alternatively, MT4’s highly customizable, advanced software allows you to create your own trading strategies using its unique MQL4 programming language. Take advantage of MT4’s one-click functionality to make sure your trades are executed fast, every time.

Leverage

Unfortunately, it was not clear to us what the maximum trade size was, leverage is normally selectable when opening up an account but we did not see the option so it must be further in the account creation process, so, unfortunately, we are not able to comment on the maximum leverage.

Trade Sizes

The minimum trade size available is 0.01 lots which is known as a micro lot, the trade sizes then go up in increments of 0.01 lots. There is a maximum trade size of 1,000 lots which is far too high and you shouldn’t really trade any more than 50 lots in a single trade. It is not known what the maximum trade size is.

The different instruments also have different trade size boundaries, we have outlined them below.

• Forex: Min 0.01 lots / Max 1,000 lots
• Indices: Min 1 lot / Max 1,000 lots
• Commodities: Min 1 lot / Max unknown

Trading Costs

It seems like all accounts use a spread based system (that we will look at lateR) rather than having any commission, so we do not think there is any added to the accounts at Traderia.

Swap fees are present, these are fees that are charged for holding trades overnight and can be both positive or negative. They can be viewed on the website or within the MetaTrader trading platform.

Assets

The assets have been broken down into various categories, we will outline the different instruments within them below.

Forex: USDJPY, GBPUSD, EURUSD, EURJPY, AUDUSD, EURCHF, AUDJPY, USDCAD, NZDUSD, USDCHF, EURGBP, AUDAD, CADCHF, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, NZDCHF, NZDCAD, USDHKD, AUDCHF, NZDJPY, USDSGD, CHFJPY, CADJPY, EURCAD, EURAUD, AUDNZD, EURTRY, GBPAUD, GBPNZD, USDCNH, USDDKK, GBPCAD, USDTRY, EURDKK, EURNZD, EURNOK, EURHUF, EURPLN, EURSEK, USDCZK, USDHUF, USDILS, USDMXN, USDNOK, USDPLN, USDRON, USDZAR, USDRUB, EURRUB, USDSEK.

Commodities: WTI Crude Oil, Brent Crude Oil, Natural Gas, Gold, Silver, Aluminum, Copper, Cotton, Feeder Cattle, Heating Oil, Live Cattle, Lead, Nickel, Palladium, Platinum, RBOB Gasoline, Rough Rice, SoyBean, Tin, Zinc.

Indices: UK 100, Aussie 200, Nikkei 225, German DAX, IBEX 35, IBEX 50, CAC 40, Hang Seng, Nasdaq, S&P 500, Dow Jones.

Spreads

Looking at the product specifications it doesn’t make it entirely clear what the spreads are for each account. When looking at USDJPY as an example, it states that the Classic account has spread of 30 (which normally means 3.0 pips), the Gold account has spread of 0.9 pips while the VIP account says 3, which we are not sure if it means 3 pips or 0.3 pips, using the different styles for each account is confusing. The spreads are variable which means they move with the markets and when there is added volatility they will often be seen higher.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit depends on the funding account used but the bare minimum is 250 USD, EUR or GBP. It seems that this amount remains even after an account has been opened rather than reducing for top-up payments.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are just a few ways that you can deposit into Traderia and they are Credit/Debit Card, Bank Wire Transfer, and Skrill. We have outlined the minimum deposits of each below.

• Credit / Debit Card – $250 / €250 / £250
• Skrill – $250 / €250 / £250
• Bank Wire Transfer – $500 / €1000 / £1000

There is a daily and monthly deposit limit which is 10,000 and 40,000 respectively. There is no mention of any fees, but be sure to check with your bank or card issuer to see if they add any fees of their own.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The same methods are available to withdraw which are Credit/Debit Card, Bank Wire Transfer, and Skrill. When withdrawing with a Credit/Debit card, you are only able to withdraw the same amount that you deposited, any extras must be withdrawn using one of the other available methods.

Platinum and VIP accounts have free withdrawals, however, the other accounts will have the following fees added to their withdrawals.

• Credit Card: 3.5%
• Debit Card: 3.5%
• Wire Transfers: $30, €25, £20

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Traderia simply states that they will process withdrawals as quickly as possible, they don’t actually give a timescale, we would hope that all withdrawal requests would be fully processed between 1 to 5 business days from the request being made.

Bonuses & Promotions

It does not seem like there are any active promotions or bonuses at the time of writing this review, that doesn’t mean that there won’t be any in the future so be sure to check regularly. You could also contact the customer service team to see if there are any upcoming bonuses or promotions that you could take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

The academy section of the site has a few different aspects to it. The first is an economic calendar that details various news events that are coming up as well as indicating the potential effect they could have on the markets. There is also a calculator available to help work out margins, some real-time charts which simply show what the charts currently look like. There is also a glossary of forex related terms which is helpful if you come across something you do not know the meaning of. Finally, there is an ebook available, it is quite basic and just goes over the real basics, good if just starting out but if you have traded before then you probably know everything it has inside.

Customer Service

The contact us page consists of a single submission form, you can fill it in and then get a reply via email. Luckily at the bottom of the screen, there is an additional phone number and email address should you prefer to use those methods of contact.

Phone: +44 2038 078 269
Email: [email protected]

The customer support team is available 24 hours a day 5 days a week and is closed over the weekend and on bank holidays, just like the markets are.

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available and you can have as many of them as you want, demo accounts are great as they allow you to test out new strategies without risking any real capital. The account lasts forever and so they can be used indefinitely. The trading conditions of the accounts are not noted but we suspect them to be similar to those of the live accounts.

Countries Accepted

Information about eligible countries is not on the site, so in order to find out if you are able to get an account or not, you will need to contact the customer service team to check.

Conclusion

Traderia seems to get a little confused as to who they are, there are mentions of multiple different brokers when referring to themselves, so either they are a shell of another company or they were copy and pasting information from other sites and simply forgot to change the name. In terms of the trading conditions it wasn’t easy to find some of it, leverage is not stated and the spreads are a little confusing due to different formats being used. There are enough assets available to keep you busy and when it comes to deposits and withdrawals, the methods are slightly limited and for withdrawing there is a fee if you do not have one of the higher-tier accounts. The fact that some information seems to be copied from other sites means we would probably avoid using them, as not a lot of care has gone into the site.

Twin Option is an online foreign exchange, binary options, CFD and cryptocurrency broker, fully regulated and governed by the European MiFID regulations. The vision of the company is to give everyone access to the trading world by improving their understanding and offering a lucrative trading experience. Some of their main goals are to grow their community, offer a secure trading environment and to ensure that their clients are well looked after by their customer service team.

Twin Option offers both trading and binary options, for the purpose of this review, we will only be looking at the trading port of the broker and not the binary options side of the broker.

Account Types

The FAQ on the site states that there are multiple different accounts on an account type page, however, we could not find that page. We did sign up and could locate a number of different accounts however they doid does not have many differences, especially in terms of trading conditions which seem to be the same for all, we have outlined a few of the major differences.

Standard Account: This is the account that you automatically receive when signing up, it does not come with any extra features and has a withdrawal time of 4 to 6 working days.

Bronze Account: This account requires you to deposit at least $1,000. It does not come with any special features apart from a slightly reduced withdrawal time of 3 to 4 days.

Silver Account: This account increases the minimum deposit up to $5,000, it comes with the addition of technical reports, an account manager, trading signals, investment strategies, and the withdrawals are performed between 2 to 3 days from the request being made.

Gold Account: This account requires a deposit of at least $10,000, it comes with all the same features as the Silver account except there are more in-depth investment strategies available and the withdrawal times are further reduced down to 1 to 2 days.

Platinum Account: You need to deposit at least $20,000 to use this account type, all features remain the same with the addition of a personal account manager and further detailed investment strategies. The withdrawal timeline is once again reduced down to 12-24 hours.

Diamond Account: This is the top tier account and so requires a minimum deposit of $50,000, it comes with a dedicated account manager, access to technical reports, an economic calendar, trading signals, the most detailed investment strategies. The withdrawal timeline for this account is 1 to 2 working hours.

Platforms

Twin Option uses its own trading platform, we have to open up an account to view it properly, it uses a layout similar to binary options (this is not a surprise as they also provide binary options trading). The platform only has three different time frames which are 1 minute, 5 minutes and 15 minutes. It also does not seem to have much analysis capability as we did not find any indicators available to use. It is a very simple platform and not something that you can use to analyze, only to place your trades.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available is 1:1000, you get a choice of 1:100, 1:200, 1:500 or 1:1000 for each trade that you make. This is a slightly different way of working as it is based on each individual trade and not account type.

Trade Sizes

There are a limited number of trade sizes that you are able to use, they are all in lots and are as follows: 0.01, 0.05, 0.10, 0.15, 0.20, 0.25, 0.50, 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0. You are not able to place trades at any other interval. We do not know how many trades you can have open at any one time.

Trading Costs

We could not locate any information surrounding any additional fees or charges when trading so it does not appear that there are any and the accounts all use the fixed spreads as their payment structure. We also do not know if there are any swap charges present when trading as there is no relevant information about them.

Assets

We are only looking at the assets that are available for trading on the forex side, there isn’t a huge selection of them but we have outlined them below.

Forex: EURUSD, USDCHF, GBPUSD, USDJPY, AUDJPY, AUDUSD, EURAUD, EURCAD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, GBPAUD, GBPJPY, USDCAD, AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDNZD, EURNZD, GBPCAD, GBPCHF, GBPNOK, GBPNZD, NZDJPY, NZDUSD, USDMXN, USDNOK, USDSEK.

Metals: Gold, Silver, Palladium, and Platinum are available to trade.

Spreads

Looking through the platform it looks like the spreads for all currencies are set at 1 pip, the FAQ on the sites states that the spreads are fixed so this means that they will not change and the FAQ also said that they will remain fixed even during news events.

Minimum Deposit

There is not a minimum amount required to open up an account as you automatically get access to the lowest tier account, the overall minimum deposit requirement is $10 which is the lowest that the payment methods available allow.

Deposit Methods & Costs

The following methods are available to withdraw with: Credit/Debit Card, Skrill, Neteller, Crypto, Perfect Money, Payeer, WebMoney and AirTM. Unfortunately, we do not know if there are any fees charged by Twin Option so we are not able to suggest what they may be.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

A slightly different selection of methods is available to withdraw with, they are Skrill, Neteller, Crypto, Perfect Money, Payeer, WebMoney, AitTM, and Bank Wire Transfer. The FAQ on the site indicates that there may be some fees charged, but they do not indicate what they might be. The minimum withdrawal amount allowed is $5.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

The amount of time it takes for Twin Option to process your withdrawal request will depend on the account you are using, we have listed the expected times below:

• Standard: 4 to 6 working days
• Bronze: 3 to 4 working days
• Silver: 2 to 3 working days
• Gold: 1 to 2 working days
• Platinum: 12 to 24 working hours
• Diamond: 1 to 2 working hours

It will then take some additional time for your own processor or bank to process the incoming transaction, how long it will take will depend on the method used.

Bonuses & Promotions

Apart from the usual affiliate scheme, there did not appear to be any promotions or bonuses taking place. You could always check with the customer service team if bonuses are something that you are interested in.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few little tools available, or at least information about them, we say information as we don’t actually see the tools, just information about what is available. The first is an economic calendar, this can be used to look into the future at what sort of news events will be coming up; it will also give you an idea of what sort of impact those news events could have on the markets. There is a currency conversion tool which will do what it says on the box, it will help you work out the exchange rates between different currencies. The pip calculator tools allow you to work out a pip price while the broker spread comparison tool simply compares different spreads between brokers.

Customer Service

The customer service team is available 24 hours a day, they do not state if they are open on the weekends though. You can use the online submission form to send your query, they have also provided us with a postal address or a direct email address to use.

Address: Twinoption Ltd, 21 Old Gloucester Street, London WC1N
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available and allow you to use fake or pretend money to trade with, the demo account will closely mimic the trading conditions offered on a real account and are a good way to test out the markets. We do not know what the specific trading conditions of the demo accounts from Twin Option are, but they should be similar to any information provided throughout this review.

Countries Accepted

Twin Option has not provided this information, so we would suggest getting in touch to find out your eligibility prior to signing up.

Conclusion

The accounts on offer give you a different selection of tools and analysis, but the trading conditions do not seem to change between them. The leverage available can be set per trade which is a different feature to most brokers, there is also a limited set of trading sizes with 5 lots as the maximum which could be a little restricting. Spreads are fixed at 1 pip which is relatively low and if there are in fact no added commissions could make trading with Twin Option quite cheap. Plenty of methods available to withdraw and deposit with, but their fees are unknown, they are present for the withdrawals but it does not state how much they are. There is also a slight lack of tradable assets. While the platform offered by Twin Option is interesting, if you are looking for a more traditional trading experience you may need to look elsewhere.

The website that Volume Groups Forex uses is basically a template, there are sections that they have not yet rewritten, instructions telling them what to write, that doesn’t build a lot of confidence in the service that is going to be offered. Due to this, they haven’t posted much information about themselves, so we will be going in blind with this review, we will outline our different findings within each section of the review so we can see what services are on offer and so you can decide if they are the right broker for you. The following is an extract from their site and the only real information about themselves:

“Volume Groups FX is a leading online FX and CFD brokerage firm offering trading facilities to worldwide investors and traders in forex, indices, commodities, and futures. We are proud to offer a trading solution to both retail and institutional clients across a wide range of risk and experience levels and our client base currently spans more than 20 different countries.”

Account Types

There isn’t any account information or comparison page, from briefly looking through the site it seems that there may only be the one account on offer, as we go through each section of the review, we will outline any potential differences, otherwise, all information provided is relevant to the one account that is available.

Platforms

Volumes Forex Group offers just MetaTrader 5 as its trading platform. It offers instant execution and request execution, complete technical analysis package: wide range of inbuilt indicators and charting tools, the ability to create various custom indicators, different time periods (from minutes to months), inbuilt program language MetaQuotes Language it’s a multilingual platform interface (English, German, French, Russian, Arabic, Spanish, Farsi, Japanese, Chinese Simplified, Polish, Turkish, Korean, Indonesian, Bulgarian, etc.), a history database management and import/export facility, inbuilt help guides for MetaTrader and MetaQuotes Language, and the ability to manage your account in different base currencies. It can also be used in a number of ways such as a desktop download, mobile application, and web trader, so you can access your trades and account wherever you are.

Leverage

The average on offer ranges from 1:1 all the way up to 1:500, this is a good level to have and seems to be what a lot of brokers are now aiming for, it can offer a good level of risk and reward. Leverage can be selected when first opening up an account, we are not sure if it can be changed once an account has been opened.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots and go up in increments of 0.01 lots. We do not know what the maximum trade size is or how many trades you can have open at any one time.

Trading Costs

We do not know if there are any added commission on the trading account as there is no mention of it anywhere, there are also no mentions of swap charges, looking a the Arabic version of the site the only account available is an Islamic account, however, we do not know what sort of account the English version uses, we would expect the same but cannot say for sure.

Assets

There is no product specification or breakdown of assets, so the only information that we know if that there are both Forex and CFDs available to trade, it is a shame that we do not know which ones though as many potential clients will look for their preferred assets prior to signing up and may go elsewhere as hey cannot see what they can trade.

Spreads

Spreads are another aspect of the broker that we do not know, the information provided simply states that they are competitive and low. It also mentions that they are fixed, this means that they will not move or change, no matter how much volatility there is in the markets, they will always remain the same.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum amount required for the initial deposit is $500, once this first deposit has been made, and further deposits will no longer have a limit and can be of any amount desired.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are two mentioned methods, the first being Bank Wire Transfer and the second being Credit/Debit Card. Volume Groups FX does not charge any additional fees or commissions when depositing, however, you should check with your own bank or card issuer to see if they will add any transfer fees of their own.

Strangely, in the notes there is a mention that PayPal charges approximately 1.9% EUR 0.35/USD 0.20 per transaction, however, they are not listed as a deposit method, so we are unsure if they can actually be used or not.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The two methods mentioned on the site are Bank Wire Transfer and PayPal, so it does, in fact, seem like PayPal is available. Volume Groups FX Does not charge any fees or commission for withdrawing funds. However, please note that PayPal and the banks that they deal with usually charge fees/commission for their services.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Funds withdrawn to a PayPal account will show up in your account within 24 hours of receiving your Withdrawal Form. And the funds withdrawn to a bank account will reach your bank account in 2 to 4 working days from the request being made.

Bonuses & Promotions

There does not seem to be any active promotions or bonuses happening at the time of writing this review, if you would like to see if there are any coming up then you could always contact the customer service team to find out.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are three very basic blog posts that equate to the educational side of the site. The first is a page giving tips on how to trade better, the second is more forex trading tips and the third is a very short overview of trading Gold and Silver.

Customer Service

The customer service department can be contacted by using the online submission form, fill it in with your query and you should then get a reply via email. They have also provided a London and Istanbul based telephone number and an email address.

London Phone: 0044 2076600966
Istanbul Phone: 00905533000084
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

A demo account is available, there isn’t any additional information provided about them so we would expect the trading conditions to mimic the information that we have put into this review. We do not know how long they last for (expiration times) however the demo account is a great way to test out the markets and new strategies without any real risk to your own capital.

Countries Accepted

Details regarding this are not present on the site, if you are thinking of signing up, we would recommend contacting the customer service team to make sure you are eligible prior to opening up an account.

Conclusion

The website isn’t a great one, there are images not loading properly and some of the text is still the default text, this is not a good way to build a good first impression. In terms of the actual trading, it seems like there is just the one account, sadly not all the information regarding it is available, we still do not know what the spreads are or what assets are available, due to not knowing the spreads it means we do not know what the true trading cost of the account is or how expensive it is to trade here. There are limited funding methods, but with no added fees it is a small plus. Based on the site we would probably recommend looking somewhere else, the broken aspects of the site could indicate that they no longer care, or that they are not as competent as they try to make out.

WealthTrade FX is a foreign exchange broker that doesn’t give a lot of information about itself away. Based in the Seychelles, WealthTrade FX has offered some quick stats about itself which include that there are no FIFO rules or restrictions, it offers full hedging capabilities, fast, instant executions on every trade has industry-leading analysis and tools, easy to use funding methods, has practice accounts and has full access to Expert Advisors and scalping capabilities. We will be using this review to learn a little more about the broker and to see how they stand up next to the competition.

Account Types

There are three different accounts available for individuals, these are the Micro, Standard, and Premium accounts. The only information that we have on them at this stage is their required deposit amounts, so we have outlined those below, as we go through the review we will detail any other differences in each individual section, we won’t be looking at the joint or corporate accounts.

• Micro Account: Requires a minimum deposit of $250 to $10,000
• Standard Account: Requires a minimum deposit of $0 to $50,000
• Premium Account: Requires a minimum deposit of $50,000 or more

Platforms

WealthTrade FX uses a platform called WealthTrader FX Pro, however, this is basically MetaTrader 4 with a few changes made by themselves. Some of the features stated include the fact that all Metatrader 4 Expert Advisors (EA) are supported, it has direct STP connections and execution, tight STP spreads and quotes, a true non-deal desk environment, no proximity restrictions when placing entry or exit orders, scalping is available, offers leading analysis tools, and offers full hedging capabilities.

Leverage

When signing up for any of the available accounts, the only option in the leverage section is 1:100, so it appears that all accounts must have this single leverage. This is selected when opening an account and unfortunately cannot be changed.

Trade Sizes

The minimum trade sizes start from 0.01 lots on all accounts, they then go up in increments of 0.01 lots. The next trade would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots. We do not know what the maximum trade size is or how many trades and orders you can have open at any one time.

Trading Costs

We do not know if there are any added commissions, there is no mention of them only of spreads which we will look at later in this review. There are swap charges which differ from one currency pair to another and are determined by the banks. They can be either positive or negative and are charged for holding trades overnight, they can be viewed within the trading platform that WealthTrade FX offers.

Assets

There doesn’t seem to be a full breakdown of the available assets, instead, there is a page detailing forex and a page detailing CFDs, the forex page simply states that most major pairs are available, which doesn’t make it sound like there are any at all. The CFD page states that there are 7 major indices including Nikkei 225, Nasdaq 100, S&P 500, FTSE 100, and Dow Jones 30. There are also some commodities which include Oil, Agriculture, and Precious Metals.

It is a shame that there is not a full breakdown as many potential clients will look to see if their preferred instruments are available. Hiding this information can also give the impression that there isn’t actually much on offer.

Spreads

We do not have much to go on in regards to spreads. There aren’t any actual examples, the only information that we have is that the Standard account has slightly better spreads than the Micro accounts, while the Premium account has better than the Standard and that the spreads are variable. That means that they are influenced by the markets, the more volatility, or if there is less liquidity, the spreads will often widen and be seen larger.

Minimum Deposit

There is no minimum deposit requirement to open up an account as the Standard account does not have a minimum requirement. If you want the Micro account you will need to deposit at least $250, or $50,000 for the Premium account. However, the FAQ does state that the minimum amount required is $500 for the Micro account, which is contradictory to what the account page states.

Deposit Methods & Costs

At the moment only Bank Wire Transfer is available to deposit with. The good news is that WealthTrade FX will not add any additional fees or commissions when depositing, you should, however, check with your own bank to see if they will add any outgoing transfer fees of their own. The site does state that more deposit methods are coming soon.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Bank Wire Transfer is the only method available to withdraw with, just like with the deposits there are no added fees from WealthTrade FX, however, some banks can charge for incoming transactions, especially if they are in a different currency, so be sure to check whether your bank does or not.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

WealthTrader FX will aim to process a withdrawal the same day it is received, if not then it will be processed on the next working day. It will then take between 2 to 4 days for the withdrawal to be fully processed, this will depend on the processing speed of your own bank.

Bonuses & Promotions

There does not seem to be any bonuses active at the time that we are writing this review. You could always check with the customer service team to see if there are any coming up that you could take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

There is no education on the site which is a shame to see, many brokers are now trying to help their clients through education, so it would be good to see WealthTrade FX do something similar. They have information about getting a VPS for your trading platform, however, it is not an offer and instead is just an affiliate link to a VPS provider.

Customer Service

The customer service team is available from 5 pm on Sunday all the way through to 4 pm on Friday (ET). You can contact their support team, trade desk, and deposit/withdrawal department using email, you can also use the direct telephone number or postal address.

Address: WealthTrade FX Ltc, Trident Chambers, Capital City Building, PO Box 1388, Victoria, Mahe, Seychelles.
Support Email: [email protected]
Phone: 877 578 2770

Demo Account

A demo account allows you to test out trading conditions and new strategies without any real risk, they are available from WealthTrader FX, you are only able to get a demo account of the Pro account so the trading conditions will mimic the ones of the Pro account. Other details are not known and we do not know if there is an expiration time on the accounts.

Countries Accepted

This information is not available on the site, so if you are thinking of signing up we would recommend contacting the customer service team first just to make sure that you are eligible for an account.

Conclusion

There isn’t a whole lot of information available on the site and the information that is there is very limited and scattered around. We do not know what the difference is between the three accounts apart from them having slightly different ( yet unknown) spreads. The leverage is fixed at 1:100 which is ok, but not as high as we would have hoped, in terms of assets, what they are is unknown, but it doesn’t seem like there are going to be any instruments or assets available to trade. There is also just one method of depositing, this could greatly limit the potential client base that could use the broker, the good news is that there aren’t any fees for depositing or withdrawing.

Sword Capital is a foreign exchange broker based in the Middle East. Sword Capital has the vision to provide the best financial brokerage services, both locally and internationally, as well as to build a long term relationship with its clients. Their values include integrity, leadership, transparency, credibility, creativity, and innovation. Throughout this review, we will be diving deep into the services on offer to see how they perform and so you can decide if they are the right broker for you.

Account Types

There are a lot of different accounts on offer such as a Personal Account, Corporate Account, IB Account, Hedge Fund account, Premium Account, and Family Office Account. The majority of these would not be relevant to us and only the Personal and Premium accounts would be. There isn’t an overview of the accounts, so throughout this review, we will be looking at the different aspects of the account and trading conditions, any differences between them we will outline in each section.

Platforms

There are three different platforms on offer, two of them you would most likely have heard of, the third maybe not, so let’s see what they offer.

MetaTrader 4: MT4 is one of the world’s most used and most loved trading platforms, being used by hundreds and thousands of users. Offering high levels of accessibility, available as a desktop download (PC and Mac), a web trader and as an application for mobile devices. Some of its features include a market watch, multiple order types, thousands of indicators, a huge number of compatible expert advisors, trading history, analysis tools, multiple charts, automated trading and many more.

MetaTrader 5: MT5 is the younger brother of MetaTrader 4, developed by MetaQuotes Software and released in 2010, MT5 is used by millions and for good reason. Offering plenty of trading and analysis features to aid in your trading. Additional services expand the functionality of the platform making its capabilities almost limitless. MetaTrader 5 offers the built-in Market of trading robots, the Freelance database of strategy developers, Copy Trading and the Virtual Hosting service (Forex VPS). Use all these services from one place, and access new trading opportunities. MetaTrader 5 is also highly accessible with it being available as a desktop download, application for iOS and Android devices and even as a WebTrader where you can trade from within your internet browser.

TWS: This platform is more intended for professional traders or other brokerage platforms, so it is not something that we would really be using and so don’t go into a lot of details on it.

Leverage

The leverage on forex pairs can go up to 1:200, the site doesn’t specify what the leverage is for other instruments such as commodities. The leverage can be selected when opening up an account, it is unknown if it can be changed on an already open account but you should contact the customer service team should you wish to change it.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from as low as 0.01 lots (known as a micro lot), they then go up in increments of 0.01 lots so the next trade would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots.

Trading Costs

When using MetaTrader 4 or 5 there are no added commissions for forex when trading on the Personal or Premium account, the use of a spread based system that we will look at later in this review.

There are some added commissions when trading other assets, we have outlined them below:

• Energy: $5 per lot traded
• Agriculture: $10 per lot traded
• Stocks: $30 per 1,000 trades
• Indices: $5 per lot traded

There is also no mention of swap charges, but we suspect that they will be present and these are charged for holding trades overnight and can be viewed within the MetaTrader platforms.

Assets

We have broken down the available assets into a number of categories so you can have a full overview of what is available to trade with Sword Capital.

Forex: AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, CADCHF, CADJPY, CHFJPY, EURAUD, EURCAD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURNZD, EURTRY, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, GBPTRY, NZDJPY, USDTRY.

Metals: Copper, Silver (tradable against EUR, USD, and GBP), Gold (tradable against EUR, USD, and GBP), Palladium and Platinum.

Indexes: CAC 4, DAX, Dollar Index, Dow Jones, S&P 500, FTSE, Nasdaq Big, Nikkei, Nasdaq Mini, S&P 500 Big and Dow Jones Mini.

Agriculture: Cocoa, Coffee, Corn, Cotton, Orange Juice, Soybean, Sugar and Wheat.

US Shares: Apply, AIG, Amazon, Boeing, Bank of America, Barclays, Citigroup, Caterpillar, Cisco, Walt Disney,m Facebook, GEC, Google, Home Depot, Herbalife, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, McDonald’s, 3M Company, Microsoft, Oracle, Pfizer, AT&T, Twitter, Wal-Mart, ExxonMobil and, Yahoo.

Energy Shares: Heating Oil, Natural Gas, Crude Oil, and Gasoline.

Spreads

There are examples of spreads for all assets, however, we are not clear which accounts they are relevant for so we will just give the examples we have, a small selection includes.

• AUD/CAD: Starting 2 pips, average 4 pips
• CAD/CHF: Starting 2 pips, average 5 pips
• EUR/CHF: Starting 2 pips, average 3 pips

As you can see the average spreads vary from instrument to instrument, the spreads are also variable which means they move with the markets, when there is added volatility they will often be seen a lot higher than the starting figures given or even the average stated.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum amount required to open up an account is $100, this will allow you to open up a Personal account, for the Pro account you will need to make a deposit of at least $100,000 so this will price out the majority of retail traders. It is unknown what the minimum deposit amount is once an account is already open.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Sword Capital does not make it easy to work out what methods are available when you select the deposit & withdrawal button it takes you to a login page, we managed to sneak our way around it to get a view of a couple of methods, however, we do not fully know what methods are available.

The ones that we discovered were by Credit/Debit Card, Bank Wire Transfer, WebMoney, Yandex Money, QIWI Wallet, Cryptocurrencies, and Skrill. They may well be other methods available but we were not able to locate them.

In terms of fees, they are a little complicated, it does not seem like there will be any for depositing but there will be for withdrawing which we will look at below.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

It seems like the same methods are available, but we must note that the information we are getting is from all over the site, as we do not have an account we cannot log in to fully check.

The methods available seem to be Credit/Debit Card, Bank Wire Transfer, WebMoney, Yandex Money, QIWI Wallet, Cryptocurrencies, and Skrill. We have set out a table below detailing the information we do know (or what we can work out).

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

The processing times are unknown to us but we would hope for all withdrawal requests to be fully processed between 1 to 7mworking days from the time the request is made. There is the option to select the Sword prepaid card, which is said to offer fast payment approval, along with a variety of additional perks.

Bonuses & Promotions

The only bonus program that seems to be running is something called Sword Points, when using MetaTrader 4 you can earn points that can then be redeemed and withdrawn. You will earn 1 point for every 3 lots that you trade, there are various physical or financial things you can exchange them for, but the example given is that 10 points will allow you to convert it into $20.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few different aspects to the educational side of the site, there is a training section but this is just a signup form, no real information about the training. There is also some training based on the different platforms but again we did not get to experience any of this. Finally, there are some signals for both MT4 and via SMS, they seem to be showing some growth, but we do not know the full extent of their accuracy or profitability.

There are also some tools available, the firs being an economic calendar detailing any upcoming news events and also indicating what effect they could have on the markets, there is then a new section detailing past news. There are also some charts and daily reports to give a good indication of what could happen next.

Customer Service

The customer service team is available between 10 am and 6 pm GMT over the phone, for better support they recommend using email or the chat feature. There is also an online submission form to fill in.

Middle East Office:
Address: Kuwait Sharq Blk7 Tower44 Floor 19-18
Phone: +965-2246-8817
Email: [email protected]
Opening Times: 9:00AM-7:00PM 6 Days GMT

Asia Office:
Address: Hong Kong – Tower78 Bonham Strand Sheung Wan
Phone: +852-58085069
Email: [email protected]
Opening Times: 9:00AM-4:00PM 5 Days GMT

Africa Office:
Address: Seychelles MahePlaza Eden Suite 208
Phone: +248-4346840
Email: [email protected]
Opening Times: 9:00AM-4:00PM 7 Days GMT

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available and are a great way to test out the servers and new strategies without risking any real capital. Demo accounts are available in both MT4 and MT5 and they come with a balance of $10,000. No other details are mentioned and we do not know if there is an expiration time on the accounts.

Countries Accepted

The following statement is present on the website: “Sword Capital does not offer its services to residents of certain jurisdictions such as the USA, Iran, Cuba, Sudan, Syria, North Korea or any country restricted by FATF.” If you are unsure of your eligibility we would recommend contacting the customer service team to check prior to signing up.

Conclusion

The way the site has been set out doesn’t make it easy to find some of the information we need, in terms of accounts we still don’t truly understand the difference between them apart from a different deposit amount required. There are plenty of assets available to trade which is great and it seems like there are a lot of deposit and withdrawal methods, but it can be confusing as to which ones are actually available, the fees are also a little high. At this time, we would only recommend trading with Sword Capital if you have a reference or know others using the platform, otherwise, we would suggest looking elsewhere.

Welkron markets itself as a new generation broker, using the latest innovation, they state that their main attractions are a strong financial position, supervision by regulatory bodies, attractive prices and execution of commercial transactions, next-generation trading platforms, 24-hour customer support, innovative trading tools and a wide range of instruments to trade. This review is intending to look at the services being offered to see if they live up to their expectations.

Account Types

Welkron is offering four different account types to their clients, each one having slightly different entry requirements and trading conditions, so let’s look at what is on offer.

Mini Account: The mini account requires a minimum deposit of between $500 and $10,000. It has spreads starting from 2 pips and there is no added commission on the account. It is able to trade all available currency pairs and has leverage up to 1:500, it also has access to the online support team.

Standard Account: The standard account requires a minimum deposit of at least $10,000. It has spread starting from around 1.5 pips and has no added commissions when trading. It has access to all available products and has a maximum leverage of 1:200, it also has access to phone and online support.

Pro Account: The Pro account has a minimum deposit requirement of $25,000. The account has spreads starting as low as 0 pips and due to this has a commission added to its trading dependent on the instrument traded. It has access to all products and the account has a maximum leverage of 1:200, it has access to phone and online support as well as a personal manager available 24/5.

VIP Account: This is the top-level account and requires a minimum deposit of $50,000. It has spreads starting from 0 pips and so has a commission added to trading which is based on the trading volume made. It has access to all products and the account has a maximum leverage of up to 1:100. It has access to phone and online support as well as a personal manager available 24/7. It also comes with a personal support channel and legal protection of interests.

Platforms

Welkron is offering a single trading platform to use, luckily it is the ever-popular MetaTrader 4, so let’s see what this trading platform has to offer.

MT4: MetaTrader 4 is compatible with hundreds and thousands of different indicators, expert advisors, signal providers and more. Millions of people use MT4 for its interactive charts, multiple timeframes, one-click trading, trade copying and more. In terms of accessibility, MT4 is second to none, available as a desktop download, an app for Android and iOS devices and as a WebTrader where you can trade from within your internet browser. MetaTrader 4 is a great trading solution to have.

Leverage

The maximum leverage that you receive depends on the account that you are using, they are as follows:

• Mini Account: 1:500
• Standard Account: 1:200
• Pro Account: 1:200
• VIP Account: 1:100

The leverage can be selected when opening up an account and should you wish to change it on an already open account you can do so by getting in touch with the customer service team with your request.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots (these are also known as micro-lots) and go up in increments of 0.01 lots so the next trade would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots. There is no mention of maximum trade size, however, we would recommend not trading in sizes larger than 50 lots, as the bigger a trade becomes the harder it is for the markets or liquidity provider to execute the trade quickly and without any slippage. There is also no mention of how many trades you are able to have open at the same time.

Trading Costs

The Mini and Standard accounts do not have any added commission as they use a spread based system which we will look at later in this review. The Pro account has an added commission which is based on the instrument that you are using, the VIP account has a commission added which is based on the volume of your trading. The unfortunate thing is that what the commissions are is unknown, there isn’t a mention of them on the accounts page, product specification or the terms of service, apart from the fact that there are some. It would have been good to know what they are as trading costs can be a major factor in a new client choosing which broker they will use.

Assets

Welkron have all of their assets thrown into a single list which makes it harder to differentiate what is what, however, we have outlined what the instruments are below:

Currency Pairs: AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, AUDUSD, CASCHF, CADJPY, CHFJPY, EURAUD, EURCAD, EURCHF, EURDKK, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURNOK, EURNZD, EURRUB, EURSEK, EURSGD, EURTRY, EURUSD, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, GBOCHF, GBPJPY, GBPNZD, GBPSGD, GBPUSD, NZDCAD, NZDCAD, NZDCHF, NZDJPY, NZDSGD, NZDUSD, USDCAD, USDCHF, USDCNH, USDDKK, USDJPY, USDMXN, USDNOK, USDPLN, USDRUB, USDSEK, USDSGD, USDTRY, USDZAR.

Commodities: Spot Gold, Spot Silver, Natural Gas, Brent Crude Oil, WTI Crude Oil.

Indices: ASX 200, CAC 50, HSI 50, Nasdaq 100, Stoxx 50, Dax 30, FTSE 100, Ibex 35, Nikkei 225, S&P 500.

Crypto: BTCUSD (Bitcoin).

Spreads

The spreads that you receive are dependent on the account that you are using, the mini account has spread starting from 2 pips, the standard account has spread starting from around 1.5 pips and the Pro and VIP account have spread as low as 0 pips. The product specification page unfortunately just has all instruments set as a minimum 0 pips so we can not see what they actually might be. What we do know though is that the spreads are variable (also known as floating) so this means that when the markets are being volatile, the spreads will often be seen higher. It is also important to note that different instruments and assets have different starting spreads, so while EURUSD may start at 2 pips, other assets like GBPJPY may start slightly higher, 2.5 pips (numbers are estimated).

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit required to open an account is $500 which gets you the mini account, if you want a commission-based account you will need to deposit at least $25,000. It is unknown if the minimum amount drops after the initial deposit but we will be assuming that it does.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are a number of different deposit methods available through the use of a few different payment processors, let’s look at what they are. No deposit fees are a good sign and plenty to choose from, while there are no fees by Welkron, be sure to check with your bank or processor to ensure they do not add any of their own.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Each withdrawal method has a different withdrawal fee, so we have outlined them for you below. It is a shame to see such high commissions added to each withdrawal method, this is something that we would want to see stamped out of future practices.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

There doesn’t seem to be any information about how long processing will take, so to be safe we will say the usual 1 to 5 business days.

Bonuses & Promotions

We could not locate any information on the website in regards to bonuses or promotions so it does not appear that there are any active ones at the time of writing this review. If you are interested in bonuses then be sure to check back regularly or get in contact with the customer service team to see if there are any upcoming bonuses or promotions.

Educational & Trading Tools

The educational side of the site has some basic information on different aspects like trading or analysis, unfortunately, it is only available in Russian, we used a translator to see what it says and it is very basic and not something that will make you an expert trader, you will need to look elsewhere for your educational requirements. There is a basic economic calendar though which details some very basic information on upcoming news events and which markets they will affect.

Customer Service

There isn’t a dedicated customer service page, so we are assuming the main details are available once you sign up, for now, we are left with a basic submission form in the footer of the page, there is also a phone number and email address available in the footer but throughout the website, they are talking about their great support team, you would think there would be more information about it, however, we suspect there is more once you are a client of theirs.

Demo Account

There has been no mention of any demo accounts throughout the site so we do not thin they are currently available, this is a shame as new clients like to sue them to test the servers and trading conditions and existing clients like to sue them to test new strategies without risking their capital, so this is something that Welkron should look at adding to their services.

Countries Accepted

The information about which countries are accepted and which are not is not present on the website, so if you are interested in joining, be sure to get in contact with the customer service team to check if you are eligible for an account or not.

Conclusion

Welkron put a lot of expectations on themselves with their aims, however, it seems they may have fallen a little short. The trading conditions initially looked good from the comparison of the accounts, competitive spreads were a big plus, unfortunately when it came to actually seeing the spreads, there was no information available. Same with the commission, we do not know anything about it apart from the fact that it exists, these kinds of things are vital as the cost of trading is one of the major factors a lot of potential clients look at. Plenty of deposit methods is good with no deposit fees, however, quite high withdrawal fees could be painful when withdrawing your funds. From what we have seen, Welkron didn’t quite hit the heights that they were aiming for.

KB Capitals was founded in 2010 and is a forex trading provider and broker which currently hosts thousands of clients. Based in the Czech Republic, they aim for stability and make every effort to provide trouble-free services, safe and simple trading, financial viability, and strict legal compliance. We will be using this review to dive deep down into the services on offer to see how they compare to the competitions and to find out how transparent they are as a broker.

Account Types

There are eight different account types listed but in reality, there are only four as each account type is listed with a EUR and USD version. We have outlined the main features of each account below.

Silver Account: The deposit requirement for this account is between $250 and $2,999. It comes with leverage up to 1:200 and has fixed, extra-low spreads. It has forex, metals, energies, indices, commodities and CFD shares available to trade and uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform. The account uses market execution and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots and a maximum trade size of 40 lots. The stop-out level is set at 2%, there is no added commission and the account cannot be used as an Islamic account.

Gold Account: The deposit requirement for this account is between $3,000 and $24,999. It comes with leverage up to 1:300 and has fixed, extra-low spreads. It has forex, metals, energies, indices, commodities and CFD shares available to trade and uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform. The account uses market execution and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots and a maximum trade size of 80 lots. The stop-out level is set at 2%, there is no added commission and the account can be used as a swap-free account.

Brilliant Account: The account has a minimum deposit requirement of $25,000. It comes with leverage up to 1:400 and has floating, extra-low spreads. It has forex, metals, energies, indices, commodities and CFD shares available to trade and uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform. The account uses market execution and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots and a maximum trade size of 150 lots. The stop-out level is set at 2%, there is no added commission and the account and the account can be used as a swap-free account.

Managed Account: The account has a minimum deposit requirement of $250. It comes with leverage up to 1:400 and has floating, extra-low spreads. It has forex, metals, energies, indices, commodities and CFD shares available to trade and uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform. The account uses market execution and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots and a maximum trade size of 150 lots. The stop-out level is set at 2%, there is no added commission and the account and the account can be used as a swap-free account.

Platforms

The accounts page indicates that MetaTrader 4 is an available trading platform, however the trading platform page only outlines a web trader, so we are assuming (maybe wrong) that the web trader is in fact MetaTrader 4. At any rate, MT4 is one of the world’s most used trading platforms hosting over 1,000,000 traders worldwide. The platform is compatible with hundreds and thousands of indicators and expert advisors and is fully customizable to your trading needs.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available depends on the account you are using, the Silver account has a maximum leverage of 1:200, the Gold account can be leveraged up to 1:300 and the Brilliant and Managed accounts can be leveraged up to 1:400. The leverage can be selected when opening up an account and can be changed by contacting the customer service ream wit your change request.

Trade Sizes

Trades sizes on all accounts start from 0.01 lots which are known as a micro-lot. They then go up in increments of 0.01 lots until the maximum trade size is reached. Each account has a different maximum trade size. The Bronze account has a maximum trade size of 40 lots, the Gold account is 80 lots, the Brilliant and Managed accounts have a maximum trade size of 150 lots. We would recommend not trading over 50 lots in a single trade though due to execution and slippage issues.

Trading Costs

There are no added commissions on any of the accounts as they all use a spread based structure. There are however swap fees on all accounts, these are fees charged for holding trades overnight and can be both positive and negative and can be viewed within the MetaTrader 4 trading platform. The Gold, Brilliant and Managed account can have a swap-free Islamic version should you not be able to pay or receive interest.

Assets

The assets at KB Kapitals have been broken down into a few different categories, we will now look into each category and outline the available instruments within them.

Forex: EURUSD, GBPUSD, USDJPY, AUDUSD, EURCHF, EURGBP, NZDUSD, EURJPY, USDCAD, USDCHF, AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, CADCHF, CADJPY, CHFJPY, EURAUD, EURCAD, EURNZD, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, GBPNZD, NZDCAD, NZDCHF, NZDJPY, USDHKD, USDSGD, UEURDKK, EURHUF, EURNOK, EURPLN, EURSEK, USDDKK, USDHUF, USDMXN, USDNOK, USDPLN, USDRUB, USDSEK, USDTRY, USDZAR, EURILS, GBPILS, USDILS.

Metals and Energies: Silver, Gold, Brent Crude Oil, Light Sweet Crude Oil, Natural Gas, and RBOB Gasoline are available to trade.

Commodities: Cocoa, Coffee, Copper, Corn, Cotton #2, Orange Juice, Palladium, Platinum, Soybeans, Sugar #11, and Wheat.

Indices: CAC 40, DAX 30, Mini Size Dow Jones, FTSE 100, Nikkei 225, Nasdaq 100, E-Mini S&P 500, ASX XPI 200, DJ Euro Stoxx, China H-Shares, Hang Seng, IBEX 35, STSE/JSE Top 40, STSE / MB, CNX NIFTY, Volatility SP500, US Dollar Future, Tel Aviv 25.

Shares: There are plenty of shares available to trade, some of them include Amazon, Disney, Ferrari, IBM, General Motors and Verizon.

Spreads

The accounts use two different spread styles, the Silver and Gold account used fixed spreads that do not change, while the Brilliant and Managed accounts use a floating spread which moves with the markets when there is added volatility they will often be seen higher.

We do not know the differences in spreads as there is only one set of spreads shown on the asset breakdown page. The breakdown indicates that spreads average 1.8 pips for EURUSD, while other pairs have different average spreads with some like EURCHF having an average spread of 2.9 pips.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit amount is $250, this will allow you to open up either a Silver account or a Managed account. Once an account has been opened, there is no minimum deposit enforced on subsequent deposits.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are a few ways to get your money into KB Capitals, these are Credit / Debit Card (Visa or MasterCard), Bank Wire Transfer and WebMoney. So the selection isn’t the biggest and we do not know if there are any added fees. You should always check with your own bank or processor to see if they add any fees of their own. There are some additional images at the bottom of the screen but the terms and deposit pages do not indicate that they are actually usable as deposit methods.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The same methods are available to withdraw with, for clarification, these are Credit/Debit Card (Visa or MasterCard), Bank Wire Transfer and WebMoney. You must withdraw money back to the original deposit source. There is no indication of any potential fees but you should check with your own processor and bank for any incoming processing fees they may have.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Withdrawal requests can be made at any time. Requests are only processed once we receive all requested or required documentation and verified your account and payment methods. The process usually takes up to four days.

Bonuses & Promotions

There are a few different bonuses available, we will briefly outline a couple of them so you can get an idea of the sort of promotions that KB Capitals offers.

100% First Deposit Bonus: You can receive a 100% deposit bonus up to $1,000 on your first deposit, the site has the following information about the bonus, a trader must make a minimum of 10 trades. It also indicates to look into the bonus policy for more information but there is no information within it in regards to converting the bonus funds into real funds, so we don’t actually know how good the bonus really is.

Protected Trading Account: You can trade risk-free for the first month, this means that any lost trades will be refunded. Again, we do not know the full terms as they aren’t really specified anywhere.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few aspects to the educational side of the site, there are some 1-on-1 forex instructions for people with accounts larger than $1,000, there are also some webinars but we don’t really know how good they are. There is then an economic calendar, this shows you upcoming news events and also indicates which markets the news may affect. Next up is a glossary of trading-related terms, there is a page for video tutorials but the page currently states that it is coming soon. The final section is trading for beginners, but there isn’t much information on it so it isn’t the most helpful page you will come across when trying to educate yourself.

Customer Service

You can contact the customer support team by using the online form, fill it in and get a reply via email. They have also provided their clients with a postal address, phone number, and email address. The phone lines are available between 09:00 and 18:00 GMT+1 each day (except on weekends and bank holidays).

Address: Rybna 716/24, Stare Mesto, 110 00 Praha 1
Phone: +43720817958
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

Demo accounts allow you to test out new strategies and trading conditions without risking any capital, they are an important part of a broker and so it is strange that there is no mention of them anywhere on the site. There may be a way to open a demo account once you have fully signed up, but there is no indication of them on the site.

Countries Accepted

This information is not available on the site and so we would recommend getting in contact with the customer service team to see if you are eligible prior to opening an account.

Conclusion

The available accounts offer a range of trading conditions, while we do not know all of the available spreads, the ones that we do see are around the average in the industry at around 1.8 pips, there is no added commission which is nice but it would be good to see examples of the fixed spreads too. There are plenty of assets available to trade which is a plus. In terms of funding, there is a slightly limited selection of available and this not fully clear if there are any fees added to the deposit or withdrawals.

BullTraders is a foreign exchange broker that was founded in 2009 and is located in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. They provide the ability to trade over 150 different instruments, offer classic trading with low spreads, offer 3 loyalty programs, offer a news feed and an economic calendar as well as other features. We will be using this review to look deeper to see if those things are actually offered and so see how they compare next to the competition.

Account Types

Should you decide to join up with BullTraders, you will have three different accounts to choose from. We have outlined them along with their requirements as featured below.

Micro Account: This account does not have a deposit requirement and so can be opened without a deposit, the account can be leveraged up to 1:200, it has a fixed spread starting at 2 pips and it uses market execution. There are no added fees or commissions, the account comes with a stop out level of 20% and you are able to have up to 20 orders at any one time, the minimum trade size available for this account is 0.01 lots.

Standard Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of at least $1,000, the account can be leveraged up to 1:100, it has a fixed spread starting at 2 pips and it uses market execution. There are no added fees or commissions, the account comes with a stop out level of 20% and you are able to have up to 20 orders at any one time, the minimum trade size available for this account is 0.1 lots.

Pro Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of at least $2,000, the account can be leveraged up to 1:200, it has a fixed spread starting at 2 pips and it uses market execution. There are no added fees or commissions, the account comes with a stop out level of 20% and you are able to have up to 20 orders at any one time, the minimum trade size available for this account is 1 lot.

Platforms

BullTrader uses its own trading platform, it is accessible as a desktop download, mobile application and as a web trader to use with your internet browser. The platform seems to take a lot of influence from MetaTrader 4, however not quite offering as much functionality. It has multiple charts and timeframes, there are also multiple indicators available to help with your analysis and trading needs.

Leverage

The maximum leverage seems to be 1:200, however, there are mentions of 1:1000 on the site for example which is a little strange and could cause some confusion. For clarification, the maximum leverage available is 1:200. This can be selected when opening up the account, we are not sure if it can be changed once an account has been opened, but if you wish to we would suggest contacting the customer service team with a change request.

• Micro Account: 1:100 , 1:200
• Standard Account: 1:100
• Pro Account: 1:50, 1:100, 1:200

Trade Sizes

The trade sizes that you get depend on the account type that you are using, we have outlined the minimum trade sizes below.

• Micro Account: 0.01 lots minimum / 20 max trades at any one time
• Standard Account: 0.1 lots minimum / 20 max trades at any one time
• Pro Account: 1 lot minimum / 20 max trades at any one time

The maximum trade size for all three accounts is 5 lots.

Trading Costs

There are no added fees or commissions when trading as all three accounts use a spread based system that we will look at later in the review. There are also swap charges, these are fees that are charged for holding trades overnight, they can be both positive and negative and can be viewed from within the trading software or from on the BullTraders website.

Assets

The assets have been broken down into a number of different categories, we have outlined them below along with the instruments within them.

Forex: AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, AUDSGD, AUDUSD, EURAUD, EURCAD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURSGD, EURUSD, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, GBPSGD, GBPUSD, NZDCAD, NZDCHF, NZDJPY, NZDSGD, NZDUSD, USDCAD, USDCHF, USDDKK, USDJPY, USDMXN, USDNOK, USDSEK, USDSGD.

Stocks: Plenty of stocks are available to trade, some of them include the likes of Apple, Amazon, Coca-cola, Cisco, eBay, Intel, Netflix, and Microsoft.

Metals: Just Gold and Silver are available to trade.

Indices / Commodities: Brent Crude Oil, WTI Crude Oil, DE30, DX, F40, JP225, UK100, US30, US500, USTEC, MICEX, RTS, Natural Gas, ZC, ZS, KC, SB, CT.

Crypto: Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Bitcoin Gold, Dogecoin, Dash, EOS, Ethereum Classic, Ethereum, IOTA, Litecoin, Neo, QTUM, Tron, Monero, and Ripple.

Spreads

The spreads on the account page state that they start from 2 pips fixed, however looking at the actual spreads the lowest available is 3 pips which are on the EURUSD pair. The spreads are fixed so they do not change and will always remain the same no matter what is happening on the markets. Different instruments will also have different spreads, so while EURUSD has a fixed spread of 3 pips, different pairs such as AUDCHF will have higher spreads, in this case, it is a whopping 10 pips.

Minimum Deposit

There is no minimum deposit requirement to open up an account, the minimum deposit will be dependent on the method you use and your own limits imposed by the payment processor. If you wish to use the Standard or Pro account you will need to deposit at least $1,000 or $2,000 respectively.

Deposit Methods & Costs

The only information displayed on the site is that they accept Visa, MasterCard, and Bitcoin, there was no other information that we were able to find. Scouring the internet we were bel to find out what they also accept some eWallets such as OK Pay and WinPay, but we cannot provide a full list. We were also not able to find out if there are any added fees or commissions when depositing.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

We had just as little information on withdrawals, so we can only say that Visa, MasterCard, and Bitcoin are displayed on the site so we believe they should be available to withdraw with, once again we also did not find any information on withdrawal fees, but when depositing or withdrawing you should check with your own bank or payment provider to see if they will add any outgoing or incoming processing fees.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

As we do not have much information on the withdrawal methods we also don’t have a realistic expectation on how long withdrawals should take, we would hope that withdrawal requests would be fully processed within 7 working days or the request being made.

Bonuses & Promotions

There is a loyalty program available to the clients of BullTrader. The bonus that you get is dependent on the balance of your account.

Standard Level:
Minimum Balance of Equity $1000
For all types of accounts Cashback
1$ per full traded lot
0,5% per month (6% per annum)
Up to 50% bonus to every replenishment

VIP Level:
Minimum Balance of Equity $5000
For Real Standart and Real Pro only
Cashback 5$ per full traded lot
1% per month (12% per annum)
Up to 100% bonus to every replenishment Protection of trading for 1 month

Premium Level:
Minimum Balance of Equity $10000
For Real Pro only
Cashback 10$ per full traded lot
2% per month (24% per annum)
Up to 200% bonus to every replenishment

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few little tools available to use, the first is an economic calendar, this tells you what news events are coming up and the possible impacts that the news events could have on the markets. There is also a section for investment ideas which gives some very basic information on potential trades, finally, there is a news section giving some news about the markets.

Customer Service

The contact us page offers a few different ways to get in touch with them, you can use the postal address that they have provided, there is also a number of different email addresses and a fax number (not a phone number) available to use.

Address: The Jaycees Building, Stoney Ground, Kingstown, P.O. Box 362, VC 0100, St. Vincent and the Grenadines
Email: [email protected].
Fax: + 6564915202

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available for the WebTrader versions of the platform and it allows you to test out the markets and conditions without any risk to your own capital. The trading conditions mimic those of the real accounts.,

Countries Accepted

The following statement is present at the bottom of the site: “BT Technologies Ltd does not provide the services to residents of the United States, Japan, Korea, Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Quebec and Saskatchewan, as well as other areas where these services can not be provided in connection with the existing restrictions of the legislation.“

Conclusion

The three accounts do not offer much different in trading conditions apart from the minimum trade size, the spreads are unfortunately incredibly high, with spreads starting from 3 pips and going to over 10 pips on some pairs it can be incredibly expensive to trade here, there are plenty of assets available though which is a big plus. There is not a lot of information on the deposit and withdrawal methods, so we do not know exactly which methods are available or if there are any added fees for transfers. With those high costs and uncertainty with the funding, we currently find it hard to recommend them as a broker to sue.

BogoFinance is a foreign exchange broker based in Lebanon. It was founded in 2006 and since it was founded they have aimed to redefine the meaning of financial services. Bogofinance tries to see investing from your perspective and make recommendations based on your needs. One of their central goals is to simplify investing for you; along with this they also offer long term values to their customers. Bogo Finance values each and every customer whether they are intending on investing in small or larger amounts. That is what they say about themselves, now we will be looking into the services to see what is actually on offer.

Account Types

There are four different accounts to choose from when signing up with BogoFinance, each one having its own deposit requirement and trading conditions.

Micro Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $100 and has an equity range between $0 and $2,000. The account can be in USD or EUR and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots. There is no added commission on the account and it comes with a spread of 1.4 pips. It has access to forex pairs, commodities, and indices. The margin call level is set at 100% with the stop out being set at 20%. The maximum trade size is 10 lots and hedging is allowed. Swap-free versions of the account are available and it uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform.

Classic Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $2,000 and has an equity range between $2,000 and $10,000. The account can be in USD or EUR and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots. There is no added commission on the account and it comes with a spread of 1.2 pips. It has access to forex pairs, commodities, and indices. The margin call level is set at 100% with the stop out being set at 20%. The maximum trade size is 10 lots and hedging is allowed. Swap-free versions of the account are available and it uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform.

Executive Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $10,000 and has an equity range between $10,000 and $50,000. The account can be in USD or EUR and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots. There is no added commission on the account and it comes with a spread of 1 pip. It has access to forex pairs, commodities, and indices. The margin call level is set at 100% with the stop out being set at 20%. The maximum trade size is 10 lots and hedging is allowed. Swap-free versions of the account are available and it uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform.

Premium Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $50,000 and has an equity range of $50,000 or above. The account can be in USD or EUR and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots. There is no added commission on the account and it comes with a spread of 0.8 pips. It has access to forex pairs, commodities, and indices. The margin call level is set at 100% with the stop out being set at 20%. The maximum trade size is 10 lots and hedging is allowed. Swap-free versions of the account are available and it uses MetaTrader 4 as its trading platform.

Platforms

Developed by MetaQuotes Software and released in 2010, MetaTrader 5 is used by millions and for good reason. Offering plenty of trading and analysis features to aid in your trading. Additional services expand the functionality of the platform making its capabilities almost limitless. MetaTrader 5 offers the built-in Market of trading robots, the Freelance database of strategy developers, Copy Trading and the Virtual Hosting service (Forex VPS). Use all these services from one place, and access new trading opportunities. MetaTrader 5 is also highly accessible with it being available as a desktop download, application for iOS and Android devices and even as a WebTrader where you can trade from within your internet browser.

Leverage

Unfortunately, the leverage is the only bit of the trading conditions which are missing from the site, so, unfortunately, we do not know what the available leverage on any of the accounts is.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots which are known as a micro-lot, they then go up in increments of 0.01 lots so the next trade would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots. We do not know what the maximum trade size is or how many trades you can have open at any one time.

Trading Costs

There are no added commissions on any of the accounts as they all use a spread based system, there are however swap charges which are fees for holding trades overnight. They can be viewed on the website and within the trading platform of choice.

Assets

The assets have been broken down into a few different categories which we will look at for you.

Forex:
EURUSD, GBPUSD, USDCAD, USDJPY, AUDUSD, NZDUSD, AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, CADCHF, CADJPY, CHFJPY, EURAUD, EURCAD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURNZD, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, NZDJPY, GBPNZD, EURDKK, EURNOK, EURSEK, GBPDKK, GBPNOK, GBPSEK, USDDKK, USDNOK, USDSEK.

Metals:
XAUUSD, CAGUSD, CAUEUR, XAGUSD (Gold and Silver).

Indices and Commodities:
DJ 30, SP 500, NAS 100, US Crude Oil, and Brent Crude Oil.

Spreads

The minimum spreads that you get depends on the account that you are using. The Micro account has spread starting from 1.4 pips, the Classic account starts from 1.2 pips, the Executive account 1 pip and the Premium account has a starting spread starting from 0.8 pips. The spreads are variable which means they move with the markets when there is more volatility the spreads will normally be higher. Different instruments will also have different spreads.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit required to open up an account is $100 which allows you to open up a Micro account, we do not know if the minimum amount reduces once an account has been opened.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Unfortunately, the isn’t any information surrounding funding methods so we do not know what methods you can use to deposit your funds into BogoFinance, we also do not know if there are any added fees.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Just like with the deposits, we also do not know what methods are available to withdraw with or if there are any fees. Both of these sections are vital, not having this information means no one will know how they can get their money in or out or how much it will cost to do so.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

As we do not know the methods available, we also do not know how long it will take, we would hope that it would take between 1 to 7 days to fully process depending on the methods available but we cannot guarantee that this is the right information.

Bonuses & Promotions

There aren’t any advertised promotions or bonuses on the site so it does not appear that there are many active ones at the time of writing this review.

Educational & Trading Tools

Many brokers are now trying to give some education or trading tools to their client in order to help them improve their trading abilities, it is a shame to see no such thing here and so BogoFinance should try and do a little more for their clients in terms of learning materials.

Customer Service

You can contact BogoFinance with a few different methods, the first being a submission form, fill it in and you should get a reply via email. There Is also a postal address available long with a phone number and email address.

Address: 6th floor – Aya center, Dora Highway, Metn, Lebanon
Phone: +961-1-265 600
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available but they are provided by FXJet rather than Bogo Finance. The demo account allows you to test out trading conditions and strategies without any risk to your capital.

Countries Accepted

This information is not available on the site so we would suggest contacting the customer support team to find out if you are eligible for an account or not.

Conclusion

The BogoFinance website is a little awkward to use, the site randomly loses its scroll bar so you need to reload the page. In terms of accounts, there is a selection of them but there is very little difference between them, the only visible difference being the spreads, we actually don’t know what leverage is available on them either. There are plenty of assets but things quickly go downhill when we look at the deposit and withdrawal methods, or more that we don’t look at them as there is no information on them which is a massive negative. This information is vital and without it, we can not recommend them as a broker to use at this time.

***IMPORTANT NOTICE***

The IGTFX website (http://www.igtfx.com) is down at the time of this posting. We will continue to check back and will report if the problem was temporary, or if this Forex broker has closed for business. 

IGTFX which stands for FOREX Central Brokerage Services is a foreign exchange broker focusing on currency pairs. Their mission is to be first in providing their clients with the best advantages and to never spare an effort to create a unique service. We will be using this review to look into the services on offer to see how they compare to the competition and to see what really is on offer.

Account Types

It seems like there could be just the one account available from IGTFX, we will outline some of its features here but as we go through the review, we will outline its conditions in more detail.

IGTFX Account: The account requires a minimum deposit of at least $500, it comes with a no dealing desk execution-style and uses MetaTrader 4 as a trading platform. It has interbank spreads which start from as low as 1 pip. The account can be leveraged up to 1:200 and has a minimum trade size of 0.1 lots. The account has full hedging capabilities and does not have any added commissions when trading.

Platforms

There are two platforms on offer and they are both created by MetaQuotes, let’s have loot at what they are.

MetaTrader 4 (MT4): MetaTrader 4 has features such as confidentiality of all trading operations; an unlimited charts quantity, large number of technical indicators and line studies, Experts, Custom Indicators and Scripts, Multi-Language program interface, signals of system and trading actions, getting on-line news from financial markets, internal email system and it is accessible through a desktop download, mobile application, and web trader.

MetaTrader 5 (MT5): Some of its features include level 2 data available for exchange-traded instruments, four types of execution of trading transactions: Market, Instant, Request and Exchange, 21 time-frames, 38 technical indicators, 39 graphical objects, 4 zoom modes, six types of pending orders (Buy Limit, Buy Stop, Sell Limit, Sell Stop, Buy Stop Limit, Sell Stop Limit), trading transactions execution method allowing to perform a flexible trading activity and to set up exact parameters of trading transactions, and automated trading features. Development and usage of the expert advisers, users indicators and scripts are controlled by the integrated MQL5 development framework, which allows users to apply complex advisers and to forecast price movement more accurately.

Leverage

The account can be leveraged up to 1:200 and this can be selected when first opening up an account. Should you wish to change it you will need to send a request to the customer service team.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from 0.1 lots (known as a mini-lot), unfortunately, we do not know what the trade increments are, what the maximum trade size is or how many trades you can have open at any one time.

Trading Costs

There are no added commissions on the account when treading as it uses a spread based system that we will look at later in this review. There are however swap charges which are fees either charged or received for holding trades overnight. These swap fees can be viewed within the trading platform that you are using.

Assets

It seems that only forex pairs are available and the ones available to you depend on the level of your account.

If you are a private investor (most clients): EURUSD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURAUD, EURCAD, GBPUSD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, USDCHF, USDCAD, AUDUSD, NZDUSD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, CHEJPY, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, NZDJPY, CADJPY, AUDCAD.

If you are an institutional client: AUDUSD, AUDSGD, AUDUSD, CADJPY, CADSGD, CHFJPY, CHFSGD, CHFPLN, EURCAD, EURCHF, ERUDKK, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURNOK, EURPLN, EURSEK, EURSGD, EURSUD, GBPSGD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, GBPUSD, JPYSGD, NZDJPY, NZDUSD, USDCAD, USDCHF, USDCZK, USDDKK, USDHKD, USDJPY, USDMXN, USDPLN, USDSEK, USDSGD, USDNO, USDZAR.

Spreads

Spreads on the account start as low as 1 pip, the spreads are variable which means they will move with the markets, the more volatility or the lower the amount of liquidity will cause the spreads to get bigger, while they start at 1 pip they will often be seen higher and different instruments will have different minimum spreads.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum amount required for a first deposit is $500, once an account has been opened this amount reduces and there does not seem to be a lower limit for top-up deposits.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are two different methods available to deposit with, these are Bank wire Transfer and PayPal. When depositing with Bank Wire Transfer there is an added fee of between $15 and $25 for incoming transfers. When using PayPal to deposit there is an added fee of 2.9% + $0.30 (Canadian: 3.9% + $0.30) for each deposit. It is always strange to see deposit fees as usually a broker will try and entice people to deposit by paying for any fees themselves.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Only Bank Wire Transfer is available to withdraw with, as IGTFX does not allow withdrawals using PayPal. There aren’t any stated fees for withdrawals but we would expect a similar fee of between $15 and $25 would be present for withdrawals just like they were for deposits.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

While this is not stated, we would expect withdrawals placed by Bank Wire Transfer to take between 1 to 5 days to fully process, this will, however, depend on both the processing speed ofIGTFX and the processing speed of your own banking institution.

Bonuses & Promotions

There doesn’t appear to be any active promotions or bonuses at the time that we are writing this review. You could contact the customer service team to see if there are coming up that you could take part in if you are interested in potential bonuses.

Educational & Trading Tools

Sadly there doesn’t seem to be any educational material on the site. Many modern brokers are now looking for ways to help their clients improve their trading abilities so it would be nice to see IGTFX do something similar.

Customer Service

You can contact a number of different departments using email these include the accounting department, sales department, customer support, finance department, complaints department, information desk, institutional sales and introducing brokers. You can also use the available live chat or skype username.

Support Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available, in order to open one you will need to download the trading platform. We do not know what the trading conditions are but would expect them to be similar to the live account and we also do not know if there is an expiration time on the demo accounts.

Countries Accepted

This information is not present on the site and so we would recommend sending a query to the customer service team if you are thinking of signing up just to confirm if you are eligible for an account or not.

Conclusion

The trading conditions on paper seem competitive but we did not have any specific examples of the available spreads. There is also a limited number of assets to trade as it is limited to just forex currency pairs. A lot of things with the broker are limited as there is also a limited number of ways to deposit and withdraw, with the added fees for depositing as well as withdrawing it can be quite expensive to trade with IGTFX and we would probably recommend looking for a slightly cheaper broker to use.

TP Global FX is a foreign exchange broker based in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. They claim that some of their main benefits include their excellent trading conditions, variety of markets, they are technology-driven and they offer the best in the class support team. Always looking to improve and innovate, we will be looking at the service they offer to see how they compare to the competition and so you can decide if they are the right broker for your trading needs.

Account Types

There are four different account types available, we will briefly overview some of their features below, as we go through the review we will look into each section in a little more detail.

Standard Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $100, it comes with spreads starting from 1.3 pips and there are no added commissions when trading. Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots, the account can be leveraged up to 1:500 and it uses a market execution-style.

Pro Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $200, it comes with spreads starting from 0.1 pips and there is an added commission of $8 per round lot when trading. Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots, the account can be leveraged up to 1:500 and it uses a market execution-style.

Swap-Free Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $2,000, it comes with spreads starting from 2.3 pips and there are no added commissions on the account. Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots, the account can be leveraged up to 1:200 and it uses a market execution-style.

Institutional Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $500,000, it comes with spreads starting from 0.1 pips and there is an added commission of $2 per round lot when trading. Trade sizes start from 1 lot, the account can be leveraged up to 1:100 and it uses a market execution-style.

Platforms

TP Global FX uses MetaTrader 4 as their trading platform which is available as a desktop download, mobile application or web trader. It is one of the world’s most used trading platforms hosting the trades of over 1,000,000 traders worldwide. Some of its many features include that it is available in 30+ languages, allows the use of EA’s & Robots for trade automation, has options to choose from instruments such as Commodities, Indices, and Forex, has requirement based customization with multiple charting as well as analysis, it also offers daily statement for an account, has the availability of analytical tools those are pre-programmed and had real-time account summary for clients which includes floating profit/loss and account equity, etc.

Leverage

The leverage that you get depends on the account that you are using, if you are using the Standard or Pro account then the account can be leveraged up to 1:500, if you are using the Swap-Free account then you can get leverage up to 1:200 and the Institutional account can be leveraged up to 1:100.

Leverage can be selected when first opening up an account and should you need to change it, you can do so by sending a change request to the customer service department.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes on the Standard, Pro and Swap-Free accounts start from 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. The maximum trade size for these accounts is set at 50 lots which is at a reasonable level. The Institutional account has trade sizes starting from 1 lot, we do not know the trade increments or maximum trade size for this account type. We also do not know how many open trades or orders you can have at any one time for any of the available account types.

Trading Costs

The Pro account has an added commission of $8 per lot traded while the Institutional accounts has an added commission of $2 per lot traded. The industry average seems to be around $6 per lot traded, so the Pro account is just slightly higher than the average. The Standard and Swap-Free account uses a spread based system that we will look at later in the review.

There are also swap charges for the Standard, Pro, and Institutional accounts, these are fees that are either charged or received for holding trades overnight, they can be viewed within the trading platform you are using. The Swap-Free account does not have these charges and instead has a slightly higher spread added to the account.

Assets

The assets at TP Global FX have been broken down into various categories, we have outlined them below along with the available instruments within them.

Forex Majors: EURUSD, GBPUSD, USDJPY, USDCHF, USDCAD, AUDUSD, NXDUSD

Forex Minors: AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, AUDSGD, CADCHF, CADJPY, CHFJPY, EURAUD, EURCADD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURNZD, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, GBPNZD, GBPSEK, GBPSGD, NZDCAD, NZDCHF, NXDJPY, EURPLN, EURSEK, EURSGD, EURTRY, USDDKK, USDNOK, USDPLN, USDSEK, USDSGD, USDTRY, USDZAR.

Metals: Gold (against EUR and USD) and Silver (against USD).

Indices: AUD 200, CHNIND, US 30, EUR 50, FRA 40, GER 30, HKIND, ITA 40, JAP 225, US 100, US 50, SGXSING, SWE 30, SUI 20, SGXTAI, TECH 30, UK 100, US 2000.

Spreads

The spreads that you get depends on the accounts that you are using, we have outlined the different spreads in a list below.

• Standard Account: Spreads starting from 1.3 pips
• Pro Account: Spreads starting from 0.1 pips
• Swap-Free Account: Spreads starting from 2.3 pips
• Institutional Account: Spreads starting from 0.1 pips

The spreads are variable (or floating), this means that they are influenced by the markets, at a time of higher volatility or lower liquidity the spreads will often widen and be seen higher than the starting figures. Different instruments will also have different spreads, so EURUSD will always have a different spread to GBPJPY as an example.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum amount required to pen up ana account is $100 which will allow you to use the Standard account, the other accounts all have different requirements that we have listed below.

• Standard Account: $100 minimum
• Pro Account: $200 minimum
• Swap-Free Account: $2,000 minimum
• Institutional Account: $500,000 minimum

Once an account has been opened the minimum amount required for future top-up deposits is reduced down to $5.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are just two different methods available to deposit with, these are Bank Wire Transfer and Debit/Credit Card. The good news is that there are no added fees from TP Global FX, however, you should check with your own bank or card issuer to see if they are charging any outgoing transfer fees of their own.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The same two methods are available to withdraw with, so those are Credit/Debit Card and Bank Wire Transfer. You can only withdraw as much as you have deposited when using a Card, you will then need to withdraw any extra via Bank Wire. There are also no fees for withdrawals, but again, be sure to check with your own bank for any potential processing fees.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

TP Global FX will process any withdrawal request the same day they are made, however, if not then it will be processed the next working day. It will then take between 1 to 5 days for the money to become available to you depending on the processing speed of your bank or card issuer.

Bonuses & Promotions

We didn’t see any signs of a promotion or bonus so it does not appear that there are any active at this time, this does not mean that there won’t be so if you are thinking of joining and like bonuses, you could always contact the customer service team to see if there are any coming up that you could take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few small tools available to use, the first is a set of calculators including pip, margin, Fibonacci, Pivot and Profit calculators. There is also an economic calendar that details upcoming news events and also the markets and currencies that the news could affect. The final section is a glossary detailing different trading-related terms and their meanings.

Customer Service

The customer service team is available to be contacted with a variety of methods, the first is the usual online submission form, fill it in and you should get a reply via email. You can then also use the available postal address, email address or phone number.

Address: 305 Griffith Corporate Park, Beachmont Kingston, Saint Vincent & the Grenadines
Email: [email protected]
Phone: +1 7754366970

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available and allow you to test out the trading conditions as well as trading strategies without any real risk. When opening up an account you can select leverage between 1:100 and 1:500 and a balance between 1,000 and 1,000,000. We do not know if there is an expiration on these accounts.

Countries Accepted

This information is not stated on the site so if you are thinking of signing up, we would recommend getting in contact with the customer service team to ensure that you are eligible to sign up.

Conclusion

The trading conditions offered by TP Global FX give you a variety of trading conditions to trade with. The spreads are ok, and the commissions are slightly higher than the industry average but it isn’t anything that would really stand out There are plenty of assets and instruments available to trade. When we look at the funding options they are a little limited with just the two methods being available, the good news is that there are no additional fees attached to them. If you use one of the two available funding methods then TP Global FX could be a decent broker to use.

WesternFX is a forex broker serving both individual and corporate client around the world, offering their customers a comprehensive range of options and features such as fast deposit and withdrawals, up to $2000 new account bonus, experienced forex traders available to answer your market questions, industry-leading MetaTrader 5 platform and, convenient funding by credit card, bank wire, online payment gateway and off course by local support via well-trained representatives. In this review, we will be looking into the services being offered to see if they are of the standard stated and so you can decide if they are the right broker for you.

Account Types

There are 5 different accounts available, each one offering their own entry requirements as well as features and trading conditions. Let’s see what they are.

Standard: An entry requirement of $25 makes this account very accessible. It comes with variable spreads starting at 1.4 pips and has leverage up to 1:500 available. It uses the MetaTrader 5 trading platform and the account currency must be in USD. It has bonuses available and uses market execution as its execution method. Minimum trade sizes start at 0.01 lots and the stop out level is set at 10%. There are no commissions and no swap charges on this account.

Prime: The Prime account increases the minimum deposit up to $10,000. The account has variable spreads starting at 1.4 pips and has no added commission. Leverage is available up to 1:500 and it uses the MetaTrader 5 trading platform. You get a dedicated account manager as well as bonus offerings. The minimum trade size is 0.01 lots, uses market executions and the stop out level is set at 10%, the account must be in USD and does not receive any swap charges.

VIP: The VIP account increases the deposit requirement further up to $20,000. The account comes with spreads starting from 0.9 pips and has an added commission. Leverage can be up to 1:100 and it uses the MetaTrader 5 trading platform. It has a dedicated account manager, the base currency must be in USD and it does not have access to any bonuses. It uses market execution with the minimum trade size being 0.01 lots with the stop out level being set at 20%, there are swap charges charged on this account for holding trades overnight.

ECN: The ECN account has a minimum deposit requirement of $250, it has spread starting from 0.2 pips and has an added commission to compensate for this. Leverage can be up to 1:100 and it uses MetaTrader 5 as its trading platform. There is a dedicated account manager available and the currency must be in USD, it is not eligible for bonuses and uses market execution as its execution method. Minimum trade sizes start from 0.01 lots, there are swap charges applied and the stop out level is set at 20%.

Zero Spread: The Zero Spread account starts from $500, it has a variable spread starting from 0.1 pips, it’s leverage is 1:100 and it uses the MetaTrader 5 platform. It has added commissions and swap charges for holding trades overnight. It comes with a dedicated account manager and must be in USD as a base currency. It uses market execution and has a minimum trade size of 0.01 lots with a stop out level set at 20%.

Platforms

WesternFX is offering MetaTrader 5 as their sole trading platform, so let’s see what the platform actually offers.

MetaTrader 5 (MT5): MetaTrader 5 was developed by MetaQuotes Software and released in 2010, MT5 is used by millions and for good reason. Offering plenty of trading and analysis features to ain in your trading. Additional services expand the functionality of the platform making its capabilities almost limitless. MetaTrader 5 is also highly accessible with it being available as a desktop download, application for iOS and Android devices and even as a WebTrader where you can trade from within your internet browser.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available depends on the account type that you are using, they are as follows:

1:500 – Standard, Prime
1:100 – VIP, ECN, Zero Spreads

The leverage can be selected when opening up an account, should you wish to change it on an already open account then you can do so by getting in touch with the customer service team with your request.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes on all accounts start from 0.01 lots which are known as a micro lot, they then go up in increments of 0.01 lots so the next trade would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots. The maximum trade size is unknown to us, however, we would recommend not trading in sizes larger than 50 lots, as the bigger a trade becomes the harder it is for the markets or liquidity provider to execute the trade quickly and without any slippage. It is also unknown how many open trades you are able to have at any one time.

Trading Costs

The Standard and Prime accounts do not have any added commissions as they use a spread based system that we will look into later in this review. The VIP, ECN and Zero Spread accounts have an added commission for each trade. Unfortunately, what the commission amount is is not known to us, we looked through the site and the terms of service but could not see any concrete information on how much they are, just that they exist.

Swap charges are present on the VIP, ECN and Zero Spread accounts, these are interest charges that are incurred for holding trades overnight, they can be both negative or positive and can usually be viewed from within the trading platform of choice.

Assets

WesternFX has broken down their assets into a number of different categories, we have outlined them for you below.

Forex: AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, AUDSGD, AUDUSD, CADCHF, CADJPY, CHFJPY, EURUAD, EURCAD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURNZD, EURUSD, GBPAUD, GBPCAD, GBPCHF, GBPJPY, GBPNZD, GBPUSD, NZDCAD, NZDCHF, NZDJPY, NZDUSD, SGDJPY, USDCAD, USDCHF, USDHKD, USDJPY, USDPLN, USDSGD, USDZAR.

Metals and Energies: Gold Spot, Silver Spot, Natural Gas.

CFDs: Crude Oil (WTI), Crude Oil (Brent).

Indices: Australia 200, France 40, Germany 30, Nikkei, Nasdaq 100, UK 100.

Shares: Apple, Amazon, Intel, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter, Tesco, MasterCard, McDonald’s, Bank of America.

Spreads

The starting spread you get depends on the account you are using and are as follows.

• Standard: From 1.4 pips
• Prime: From 1.4 pips
• VIP: From 0.9 pips
• ECN: From 0.2 pips
• Zero Spread: From 0.1 pips

The spreads are variable (also known as floating) so this means that when the markets are being volatile, the spreads will often be seen higher. It is also important to note that different instruments and assets have different starting spreads, so while EURUSD may start at 1.4 pips, other assets like GBPJPY may start slightly higher.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum amount required to open an account is $25 which gets you the Standard account, if you want a different account the next requirement is for the ECN account which is $250.

Deposit Methods & Costs

The following methods are available for a deposit.

Wire Transfer: Bank Wire Transfer, MegaTransfer

Credit Cards: Visa Credit / Debit, MasterCard Credit / Debit, UnionPay

Online Payment: Neteller, Perfect Money, fasapay, Payza.

There are no added fees for deposits from WesternFX, however, you should check with the bank or processor that you are using to see if they add any fees of their own.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The same methods are available for withdrawal, for clarification these are Bank Wire Transfer, MegaTransfer, Visa Credit / Debit, MasterCard Credit / Debit, UnionPay, Neteller, Perfect Money, fasapay and Payza.

It states that there are specific fees applied for withdrawals but it does not say what they are, so we know there are fees, just not how much, you should also check with the bank or processor that you are using to see if they add any fees of their own.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Withdrawal time will take between 2 to 7 working days for your withdrawals to be fully processed, this included both WesterFXs own processing and the processing of the method used such as your bank’s processing for Bank Wire Transfers.

Bonuses & Promotions

There are a number of different promotions taking place when we looked at the site, while some may not still be available, it will give an idea of the sort of promotions that take place.

Rescue Bonus: This WesternFX Bonus Program is intended to protect accounts from drawdown periods. The Bonus can be lost with no limitations and also used as margin. Under this policy, the Bonus can not be withdrawn.

Benefits:

a. It can be used for increased Leverage.
b. It can be lost so it can actually protect accounts from Margin Calls and Stop Outs during drawdown periods.
c. Effectively makes the stop out level on original balance as zero.

4th Year Celebration Bonus: This WesternFX 4th-year anniversary Bonus Program is intended to protect accounts from drawdown periods. The Bonus can be lost with no limitations and also used as margin. The 30% Withdrawal Bonus will run for a limited time, so deposit as soon as possible in order to take advantage of this exceptional promotion! Under this policy, the Bonus can be withdrawn only after the targeted lots completed.

Benefits:

a. It can be used for increased Leverage.
b. It can be lost so it can actually protect accounts from Margin Calls and Stop Outs during drawdown periods.
c. Effectively makes the stop out level on original balance as zero.

To withdraw the Forex Bonus from your account you need to make a transaction (number of lots) in the amount of X 10% = EXAMPLE: You deposit $1000 and receive a $300 bonus, so the total account balance becomes $1300. To withdraw the received bonus ($300), you need to make a transaction of $1300X10% = 130 lots (only closed deals are taken into account) 12. In the

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few analysis and information sections of the site, however, these have not been updated since 2014 so it appears that they are no longer active in their analysis, there are also a couple of calculators to help you work out trade sizes.

Customer Service

If you want to get in contact with WesternFX you can do so by using the online submission form, simply fill in your query and you should get a reply via email. There is also a phone number available as well as individual email addresses for General Informal, Customer Support, Deposit/Withdrawal and also a contact name for Skype. The support team is open 24/5 and is closed at the same time as the markets over the weekend and on bank holidays.

Demo Account

Demo accounts can be accessed by filling in a form, you can select the deposit amount on this initial form. The trading conditions of the demo account are not stated so it is not clear which account they mimic, there may be a choice of this later in the signup process. There is also no mention of any expiration times so hopefully, they last indefinitely.

Countries Accepted

The information about which countries are accepted and which are not is not present on the website, so if you are interested in joining, be sure to get in contact with the customer service team to check if you are eligible for an account or not.

Conclusion

There are a lot of choices when it comes to WesternFX, lots of different accounts with varying trading conditions, spreads are reasonable however we do not know what the commission charged actually is. In terms of tradable assets, there is a good selection, looking at the deposit and withdrawal methods, lots of options but there are additional fees for some methods which are unfortunately not stated, it is important for clients to know the charges but that information is not readily available. Plenty of ways to get in contact with the customer service team, WesternFX could be a decent broker to use as long as the commissions and withdrawal fees are in line with the industry standards.

ZX Markets is a forex broker located in the United Kingdom and Seychelles. They claim to be one of the finest and most secure trading companies around which is a big claim to make. Their mission is to work with clients all the way from the start to becoming a profitable trader, offering high-quality support and innovation. We will be using this review to look into the services on offer to see if they manage to achieve this or if they fall short.

Account Types

There are three different accounts you can choose from when trading with ZX Markets, we have outlined some of their features below.

X-Standard Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of $200 in order to open, it has standard spreads and a leverage of 1:200. It only has Forex pairs available to trade and uses the X-Web trading platform. There is a free demo account that lasts for 2 weeks and there is limited personal training. You can have a maximum of 25 open trades or orders and there is limited access to online chat support and a personal account manager.

X-Premium Account: This account has a minimum deposit requirement of $2,000. It comes with premium spreads and leverages up to 1:400. It has Forex pairs and metals available to trade and uses the X-Web trading platform along with mobile apps. There is a free demo account that lasts for 1 month and there is complete access to personal training. You can have a maximum of 75 open trades or orders and there is access to online chat support and a personal account manager.

X-Pro Account: This account has a minimum deposit requirement of $5,000. It comes with premium spreads and can be leveraged up to 1:400. It has Forex pairs, metals and commodities available to trade and uses the X-Web trading platform along with mobile apps. There is a free demo account that is unlimited and there is complete access to personal training. You can have a maximum of 200 open trades or orders and there is access to online chat support and a personal account manager.

Platforms

Just the one platform available which is X-Web, the platform is easy to use and does not require any installation or download it can be accessed by clients through a PC or Laptop from anywhere in the world. A few of its many features are its customization, chart analysis, and trading, news and analysis, one-click trading, built-in the economic calendar, and automated trading. It also comes as a mobile application that offers the ability to trade on the move, it’s easy to use and is optimized for mobile devices.

Leverage

The leverage available depends on the account that you are using, the Standard account can be leveraged up to 1:300 and the Premium and Pro accounts can be leveraged up to 1:400. Leverage can be selected when opening up a new account and can be changed on an open account by contacting the customer service team.

Trade Sizes

Trade sixes start from 0.01 lots and go up in increments of 0.01 lots. We do not know what the maximum trade size is but we know that the Standard account can have 25 open trades at once, the Premium account can have 75 open trades and the Pro account can have up to 200 trades/orders at any one time.

Trading Costs

There are no mentions of commissions around the site so we do not believe that there are any. There are however swap charges which are fees for holding trades overnight. These can be both positive or negative and can be viewed within the trading platform being used.

Assets

Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a breakdown or specification of the available assets, we know that there are currency pairs, metals, and commodities available but not which ones. This is a shame as a lot of potential clients may be looking for their preferred instrument, not knowing if it is here could put them off and they will go and look elsewhere.

Spreads

We do not have any examples of the spreads, just the fact that there are Standard spreads, Premium spreads and Pro spreads, what these mean we do not know. The spreads are fixed though which means they do not move no matter what is happening in the markets, they will always remain the same. Different instruments will also have different fixed spreads with some naturally being higher than others.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum amount required to open up an account is $200 which will open up the Standard Account. We do not know if this minimum reduces once an account is already open.

Deposit Methods & Costs

The methods mentioned on the site are Bank Wire Transfer, Credit / Debit Cards and Neteller. There was no mention of any potential fees however you should check with your own bank or processor to see if there are any transfer fees added by them.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The same three methods are available to withdraw with, for clarification these are Bank Wire Transfer, Credit/Debit Cards and Neteller. When using Bank Wire Transfer there may be an added fee of 20 USD depending on the country the bank is located in. Otherwise check with your own bank or card issuer to see if there are any incoming transfer fees or processing fees added by them.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

ZX Markets will aim to process any withdrawal requests within 7 days of receiving the request. We believe that this is the total time rather than just the time it takes for them to process the initial request, so after 7 days the funds should be available for you to use.

Bonuses & Promotions

There are a few different promotions, however, the majority are based around referring people so we are not really interested in those types of promotions. There is one other type of bonus that is related to getting a 50% bonus on your first deposit up to $500. We, unfortunately, do not have knowledge of the terms of promotions such as how to convert the bonus funds into real funds.

Educational & Trading Tools

There is a forex school section of the site, this contains information regarding different aspects of trading such as Forex Basics and Fundamental Analysis, it is good for new traders but those that have traded before will most likely know everything that is mentioned. There is also an economic calendar that details different upcoming news events and also which currencies or markets the news events may affect.

Customer Service

There are plenty of ways to contact ZX Markets, you can use the online submission form and then get a reply via email, or you can email them directly with the address provided. There is also a Skype address, phone number and postal address available to use.

Head Office: Global Investment House Limited. Kemp House, 160 City Road, London, EC1V 2NX. The United Kingdom.
Address: Global Investment House Limited, Suite 3 Jivan’s complex, Mont Fleuri Mahe, Seychelles.
Phone: +442032899941
Email: [email protected]
Skype: ZX.Support, ZXMarkets

Demo Account

A demo account allows you to test out new strategies or the conditions without risking real capital, so it is good to see them available here. The demo accounts have different expiration times depending on the account used, the Standard account has a 2-week limit, the Premium account has a 1-month limit and the Pro account is unlimited. The trading conditions will mimic the account they are using.

Countries Accepted

We could not locate this information on the site, if you are thinking of signing up then we would recommend contacting the customer service team to find out your eligibility prior to signing up.

Conclusion

ZX Markets offers a range of accounts each with their own conditions so you should be able to find one that suits your needs, their trading platform is not the usual but offers a whole host of helpful features. Leverage is at a good level and there are no commissions which is good. We, unfortunately, do not know what the spreads are or what assets are available. There is also a limited number of ways to deposit and withdraw and there was no indication of any potential fees so that information needs to be added. The decision to use them is up to you.

CapitalXP is an online foreign exchange broker that is based in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. While they do not give a lot of information about themselves away, they do state that they pride themselves in their transparency, the fact that they offer great support, provide insightful education, they are secure, user-friendly and offer an innovative service. Throughout this review, we will be looking into the different aspects being offered to see if they manage to live up to those things and so you can decide if they are the right broker for you to use.

Account Types

CapitalXP does not indicate whether they have more than one account type or not, so as we go through this review we will outline any potential differences in each section, otherwise, everything that we write will be relevant to the single available account.

CapitalXP does have a selection of VIP accounts available though, these different accounts offer different benefits but they do not seem to change the trading conditions offered.

Basic: This account comes with a platform introduction, a dedicated account manager, access to educational webinars, and you get a financial market introduction.

Silver: The Silver account comes with all the benefits of the Basic account as well as sentimental analysis, fundamental analysis, technical analysis, a one on one tutorial, access to long and short strategies, risk management, a personal skype service, and a bonus.

Gold: This account comes with all the features of the Basic and Silver account as well access to advanced trading strategies, better spreads, trading signals, a one on one MT4 session, and access to a senior account manager.

Platinum: This account comes with all the features of the Basic, Silver, and Gold accounts, as a daily market brief, access to VIP webinars, a private webinar with an expert, and access to live trading with an expert.

Diamond: You will need to contact an account manager in order to find out what benefits you would get by using this account.

Platforms

CapitalXP uses MetaTrader 4 as its sole trading platform which is good news as it is one of the world’s most used trading platforms. Some of its main features include the fact that it is available as a desktop download, mobile application, and web trader, it also gives you access to over 100 instruments when trading with CapitalXP. It supplies over 50 indicators, trading signals, charting capabilities and customizable EA features, trades are highly protected and secure as the platform is encrypted by 128-bit keys, it also gives you access to Real-Time News and benefits of instant trade executions.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available seems to be 1:100, this can be selected when you first open up ana account and should you wish to change it, we would recommend contacting the customer service team with the change request.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from 0.,01 lots which are known as a micro lot and are equal to 1,000 base units of currency. The trades then go up in increments of 0.01 lots so the next trade would be 0.02 lots and then 0.03 lots. We do not know what the maximum trade size is or how many open trades and orders you can have at any one time.

Trading Costs

CapitalXP is not providing any information surrounding their commissions so it is not known whether or not they add commissions to their trades. What we do know is that swap charges are present, these will be charged when holding trades overnight and can be both positive or negative, they can be viewed from within the MetaTrader 4 trading platform.

Assets

The assets have been broken down into a number of different categories that we have outlined for you below.

Forex: Unfortunately, the only currency pair that is mentioned is EURUSD, there are of course far more available to trade, but no further examples are given on the forex page.

Indices: The Indices page has a few more examples given and they are Nikkei, Dow Jones, S&P 500, Nasdaq, FTSE 100, CAC 40 and the DAX 30, there may be more available but those are the only ones mentioned.

Commodities: Once again there isn’t a full list available, the commodities mentioned dare Cattle, Cocoa, Sugar, Coffee, Corn, Orange Juice, Wheat, Gold, Silver, Platinum, Copper, Brent Crude Oil, US Crude Oil, and Natural Gas.

Stocks: There aren’t any actual examples of the available stocks, just a page to indicate that they are available to trade.

Spreads

We had to use the demo account to work out the spreads, they seem to be sitting around 1 pip at their lowest point when trading EURUSD, the spreads were variable which means they moved with the markets, the more volatility, the higher they will be. Different instruments also had different spreads, so while EURUSD was sitting at around 1 pip, other instruments like AUDUSD were sitting slightly higher.

Minimum Deposit

We are not sure what the minimum deposit is, so we do not know how much you will need to deposit in order to open up an account.

Deposit Methods & Costs

We could not locate any information surrounding the available deposit methods, we also could not locate any information on potential fees and commissions. This information needs to be added as potential clients need to be able to know how they can deposit and also what it will cost them to do it.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Just like the deposit methods, there is no information on the withdrawal methods, so clients do not know how they can get their money out or if it will cost them to do it, this is not good as someone may deposit with a method that is not available for withdrawals, they would then struggle to get their money out, you also do not want to deposit only to find out it will cost a lot of getting it back out.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

As we do not know the methods or processing times we cannot give an accurate prediction, we would hope that any requests would be fully processed within 7 days of the request being made.

Bonuses & Promotions

On the VIP account page, there is a mention of a bonus however we do not know what the terms of this bonus are, it could well be a deposit bonus, but again we do not know for sure. If you are after bonuses, then connecting the customer service team could be the best bet to get more information and to see if there are any other upcoming promotions or bonuses that you could take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few different aspects of the educational side of the CapitalXP site. There is a video course, which has a number of different videos going over various subjects such as forex trading, market analysis, trading strategies and more. There is also a webinar page, however, the calendar shows that there aren’t any coming up so we do not know if this part of the site is still active. You are able to download a number of ebooks which include subjects like “succeeding with Forex trading”, and “ Trading cryptocurrencies: the basics”. There is also a glossary of trading terms which you can refer back to if you come across something that you do not know the meaning of.

There are also a number of tools available, the first being an economic calendar, this will outline different upcoming news events as well as the potential impacts that they could have on the markets. There is some market news which is being updated daily, there is also some market reviews each week along with a watch on Bonds, Commodities, Stocks, and Currencies as well as an outlook of them all.

Customer Service

The customer service team is available 24 hours a day 5 days a week and is closed over the weekend at the same time that the markets are.

When you want to contact them, you can use the online submission form, they have also provided a postal address to send physical mail to and an email address. The only thing that seems to be missing is a phone number in order to speak to someone directly.

Address: Hames Street, Kingstown, Saint Vincent, and the Grenadines
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

Demo accounts allow you to test out the trading conditions and also new strategies without any risk to your own capital. They are available with CapitalXP and we tested them out, the servers seemed stable and the trading conditions were the same that we mentioned throughout the review (in fact we got some of the information fro the demo accounts). We do not know if there is an expiration on the accounts.

Countries Accepted

The following statement is present on the website: “CapitalXP does not offer Contracts for Difference to residents of certain jurisdictions such as the USA, Belgium, France, Iran, Canada, and North Korea.” If you are still not sure of your eligibility, the customer service team will be able to let you know if you are eligible for an account, so we would suggest getting in contact with them.

Conclusion

CapitalXP is not very forthcoming when it comes to their trading conditions, we had to use the demo account to find some of them out and we still do not fully know what they are. The spreads seem to be starting at an acceptable level of 1 pip, we do not fully understand if there are any commissions, there also isn’t a full list of the available assets. The main concern that we have is the complete lack of information on funding, both deposit and withdrawal methods are not clear and so we do not know if it will cost us to deposit or withdraw or even how we can do it. Without that information and with the other bits not being fully understood, we would have to recommend looking for a slightly more transparent broker.

GWFX is an online foreign exchange broker that caters to forex, crypto, and CFD traders. Some of the main features that they state about themselves are that they offer a customer service centre, offer a professional service, they are transparent, offer safety of funds and take pride in their reputation. We will be looking into the services on offer to see how GWFX matches up to the competition and so you can use the information provided to see if they are the right broker for you.

Account Types

There isn’t an account comparison page or information surrounding the available accounts, so as we go through this review, we will outline any potential differences between any accounts within each section of the review, if there are no differences noted then there may just be the one account available to use.

Platforms

GWFX offers a couple of different trading platforms, the first is their own trading platform which comes with a number of different features.

• Tiered Margining: Tiered Margin required based on the number of open positions. Effectively avoid substantial risks in trading.
• Multi-tiered Market Depth: Connect with high liquidity global financial markets ensures the real-time quotes can always be optimal.
• Comprehensive order functions: Take-profit and stop-loss orders setting and Lock Positions are available. Sophisticated DOM quick operation is also available.
• Powerful charting and analysis tools: Provide various professional technical indicators and charting tools to meet the needs of investors in technical analysis.
• Hassle-free registration: Register by simply using email addresses or mobile phone numbers. Just a few steps needed for opening trading accounts.
• Risk-free Demo Account: Provide US$10,000 viral fund to you for experiencing the benefits of trading and testing trading strategies without any risks.
• Trade with Higher flexibility, minimum trading lot size from 0.1 lots, Initial margin as low as USD 20.
• 99% of orders can be executed within 0.03 of a second, enabling you to hold the opportunities all the time.

They are also offering MetaTrader 4 as a trading platform, they do not give much information about the platform away but we know that MT4 is one of the worlds most used trading platforms and offers high levels of accessibility, customization and has access to signals, expert advisors and indicators to help with both your trading and analysis.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available is 1:500, you are able to select the leverage that you want on the account when first opening one up. You can also request a change of leverage on an already created account by contacting the customer service team. The leverage is slightly different for different asset types.

• Forex: Up to 1:500
• Metals: Up to 1:100
• Energies: Up to 1:100
• Indices: Up to 1:100
• Crypto: Up to 1:5

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start from 0.01 lots for all products including Forex, Indices, and Commodities. We do not know what the trade increments are or what the maximum trade size is, it is also not clear to us how many trades or orders you can have open at any one time.

Trading Costs

There is no extra commission when trading as the account uses a spread based system that we will look at later in this review. There are, however, swap charges when you hold a trade overnight this interest charge is added to the account, it can be both positive or negative and can be viewed within the trading platform that you are using.

Assets

The assets have been broken down into various categories, they have also listed all the assets that they have available, and if this is all that is available then there isn’t much available to trade at all.

Forex: USDJPY, EURUSD, GBPUSD, USDCAD, AUDUSD,CADUSD, USDCHF, AUDJPY, NZDUSD, NZDJPY,USDCNH, EURJPY, AUDNZD, GBPCHF, GBPAUD,EURAUD, EURCHF, EURGBP

Metals: Gold and Silver.

Energies: US Oil, UK Oil, Natural Gas

Indices: FRA 40, JPN 225, TECH 100, HK 50, DJ 30，SP 500, UK 100, GER 30. CHINA 300

Cryptocurrencies: ETHUSD, BCHUSD, BTCUSD, LTCUSD

Spreads

The spreads seem to start from 1.2 pips when looking at EURUSD or 1.3 pips when looking at AUDUSD. There is mention of a VIP account having spreads as low as 0 pips but no further information. The spreads available are variable which means they are influenced by the markets, the more volatility the higher the spreads will be.

Minimum Deposit

We actually did not find any information regarding the amount needed to open up an account so we cannot comment on the minimum deposit requirements.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There are a few different methods available to deposit with, these are Credit/Debit Card, Help2Pay, Skrill, PayPal, and Bank Wire Transfer. GWFX states that there are no added commissions on the deposits, you should, however, check with the method that you are using just in case they add any outgoing transfer fees of their own.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

There are only three methods available to withdraw with, these are Help2Pay, Skrill and Bank Wire Transfer. Just like with the deposits, GWFX has not added any commissions on to the withdrawals, however, your own bank or processor may charge for processing incoming transactions, so be sure to check with them.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

The different available methods have slightly different withdrawal times, we have listed them below.

Help2Pay: 2-3 Days
Skrill: 2-3 Days
Bank Wire Transfer: 5-7 Days

Bonuses & Promotions

There was no information on the site mentioning bonuses or promotions, so it does not appear that there are any active at the time of writing this review.

Educational & Trading Tools

There is not an educational side to the site which is a shame as many brokers are now looking to help their clients improve on their trading abilities so it would be nice to see GWFX do something similar.

Customer Service

There aren’t too many ways to get in touch, the first most prominent method is the online chat feature where you can speak to someone directly. There is also a WhatsApp phone number available and an email address to email them directly.

WhatsApp: +886 989029990
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

There aren’t any details regarding a demo account that we could see, which is a shame as demo accounts allow clients to test out the markets as well as new strategies without any real risk, so this is an aspect that GWFX should add to their arsenal if they are in fact not available.

Countries Accepted

The following statement is present on the GWFX website: “We do not provide financial services to residents of the USA, United Kingdom, New Zealand, China, Chinese Taipei, and Hong Kong, China.”

Conclusion

There isn’t a whole lot of information available, while we can see some of the basics in regards to trading conditions we do not know the full trading costs as there aren’t any live examples of the spreads, just what the broker mentions (which are always a little lower than they actually are). We do not know what the minimum deposit amount is but we do know the methods available, there are enough to cater for most clients with no added fees for depositing or withdrawing either. There are not a lot of assets to trade so there may be some downtime which is a shame. You now have the information to tell if they would be the right broker for you or not.

IC Finance is an international forex broker based out of Vanuatu. They aim to provide a trading platform that gives you access to a wide range of tools and services. Offering over 200 trading tools indicators and charts. They don’t offer much more information about themselves so we will use this review to find out more info and to see what services really are on offer and so you can decide if they are the right broker for you.

Account Types

There are three different accounts available that are based around the type of instrument that you wish to trade.

Standard Account: The standard account requires a deposit of at least $250, it comes with a floating spreads starting at 0.3 points and has no added commission. The leverage on the account goes up to 1:500 and the base currency must be in USD, EUR or GBP. The account also has negative balance protection as well as using market execution. The minimum trade size for this account is 0.01 lots.

Gold Account: This account also requires $250 as a minimum first deposit, it comes with spreads starting from 0.3 pions and they are variable spreads. There is no commission on this account and the base currency must be in XAU (Gold). The account comes with negative balance protection and uses market execution as its execution type. Leverage on the account can go as high as 1:500.

Bitcoin Account: This account has a minimum deposit requirement of 0.01 BTC, and so the base currency must be in BTC. The account can be leveraged up to 1:500 and it comes with no commission and a spread starting from 0.03 pips which is a floating spread. It uses market execution and has negative balance protection.

Platforms

It is hard to tell what platform they are offering, a lot the information makes us think it is either MetaTrader 4 or MetaTrader 5 however we are not entirely sure as it is not stated anywhere, the information that we do know is that the platform comes with over 200 trading tools, 70 trading indicators and, 130 tools for working with charts. It is accessible as a desktop download, a mobile application or as a web trader. It sounds very much like one of the MetaQuotes software, but as we said, we cannot be 100% sure.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available on the accounts is 1:500 which is applicable to all accounts. The product specification states 1:1000 but we will stick to the 1:500 suggested by the accounts themselves. Leverage can be selected when opening up a new account and the customer service team will need to be contacted should you wish to change it on an already open account.

Different instruments also have different maximum leverages, we have outlined them below:

• Forex: 1:500
• Metals: 1:500
• Stocks: 1:50
• Commodities: 1:100
• Indices: 1:100
• ETFs: 1:50
• Crypto: 1:2

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes start as low as 0.01 lots and go all the way up to 1000 lots in increments of 0.01 lots. 1000 lots is far too high and we would recommend not trading over 50 lots in a single trade due to execution times and slippage. Different instruments have different minimum and maximum trade sizes so we have listed them below for easy understanding.

• Forex: 0.01 lots / 1000 lots
• Metals: 0.1 lots / 1000 lots
• Stocks: 1 lots / 10,000 lots
• Commodities: 1 lot / 10,000 lots
• Indices: 1 lot / 10,000 lots
• ETFs: 1 lot / 10,000 lots
• Crypto: 1 lot / 100 lots

Trading Costs

There is no added commission on any of the accounts available from IN finance, instead, they all use a spread bases structure that we will look at later in this review. It seems like there are swap charges, these are an interest fee for holding trades overnight. They can be both positive or negative and are normally viewable within the trading platform you are using.

Assets

IC Finance has broken down its assets into a number of categories which we will now look at.

Forex: AUDCAD, AUDCHF, AUDJPY, AUDNZD, AUDUSD, CADCHF, CADJPY, CHFJPY, EURAUD, EURCAD, EURCHF, EURGBP, EURJPY, EURNOK, EURNZD, EURPLN, EURSEK, EURTRY, EURUSD, GBPAUD, GBPCHF, GBP CAD, GBPJPY, GBPNZD, GBPSEK, GBPUSD, NOKSEK, NZDCAD, NZDCHF, NZDJPY, NZSUSD, USDCAD, USDCHF, USDCNH, USDJPY, USDMXN, USDNOK, USDPLN, USDRUB, USDSEK, USDSGD, USDTRY and, USDZAR.

Metals: Gold is available to trade against USD.

Stocks: Plenty of stocks available including Barclays, Adidas, BMW, Peugeot, Amazon, Apple, and Facebook.

Commodities: Brent Crude Oil, WTI Crude Oil and Natural Gas.

Indices: CAC 40, DAX 30, FTSE 100, DJI 30, Nasdaq 100, S&P 500, Nikkei 225, MICES and, RTS.

EFTs: iPatd S&P 500 and, Samsung.

Cryptocurrencies: BTCUSD, XRPUSD, LTCUSD, BCHUSD, ZECUSD, XMRUSD and, ETHUSD.

Spreads

All three accounts state that their spreads are starting from 0.3 pips which is very low for a commission-based account, unfortunately, actual examples of them are not present on the site. As the spreads are variable (which means they move with the marketS) we would expect them all to be a little higher than 0.3 pips. Different instruments will also have different spreads, so the spread for EUR/USD will be different from that of USDZAR.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit required to open up an account is $250, if you want to deposit via Bitcoin then the minimum deposit requirement is 0.01 BTC. It is unknown if the minimum deposit amount reduces for any further top-up deposits.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Unfortunately, there isn’t any information on deposit methods which is a real shame as it is very important for potential clients to know how they can get their money into the broker and how much it will cost them. We understand that Bitcoin will be an option due to one of the accounts being a Bitcoin account, but nothing else is known.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Just like with the deposits, there is no relevant information for withdrawals, again this is vital information, not knowing how you can get your money back or if it will cost you to do so is not a good way to build trust with potential new clients, this information needs to be added as soon as possible.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

As you may have guessed there is no information regarding this either, we would hope that any requests would be fully processed between 1 to 7 business days from the request being made depending on the methods that are available.

Bonuses & Promotions

It does not look like there are any active promotions or bonuses at the time of writing this review, if you are interested in them, we would suggest contacting the customer service team to see if there are any upcoming promotions you could take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

The website states that there are lots of trading tools available, however, we believe that this is just referring to the tools that come with the trading platform, there doesn’t appear to be any additional education or trading tools on the site. Many modern brokers are looking to help their clients improve their trading with education, so it would be good to see IC Finance do something similar.

Customer Service

The customer support team is available 24 hours a day, 5 days a week, they are closed over the weekends and on bank holidays. You can get in contact using the online submission form, the other option is to use the available email. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be any further ways to get in contact with them such as telephone.

Demo Account

We could not locate any information about demo accounts so unless we just missed them they do not seem to be available, this is a shame as demo accounts allow potential new clients to test out the markets and trading conditions while allowing existing clients to test new strategies without risking any of their capital.

Countries Accepted

There is not a list of accepted countries, so if you are thinking of signing up for an account, get in contact with the customer service team prior to signing up, just to be sure you are eligible for an account.

Conclusion

The trading conditions on offer form IC Finance seem very good on paper, however, the spreads are not stated on the site, they simply say that they start from 0.3 pips, however, we believe they will be a lot higher than this. There are plenty of assets and instruments to trade and the trading platform, while we do not know which one it is, seems accessible. There is a distinct lack of ways to contact the customer service team which can be a little concerning, what is even more concerning though is the complete lack of information surrounding deposits and withdrawals.

Not knowing how you can get your money in or out and how much it will cost you will instantly make it impossible to build trust with new clients, so simply for not having that information available we find it hard to recommend IC FInance as a broker to sue at this present time.

Gold FX is a Cambodia based forex broker regulated by the Kingdom of Cambodia. Gold FX offers a secure network, trader academy, online customer support, company events, and more to their clients. They are aiming to be the leading financial service in Cambodia, throughout this review we will be delving deep into the services on offer to see if they can achieve this and so you can decide if they are the right broker for your trading needs.

Account Types

If you decide to join Gold FX you will have to choose from one of the two available accounts, they each have a different entry requirement and trading conditions so let’s look at what they are.

Customer Account: The customer account has a deposit requirement of $100 and must be in the USD currency. It comes with a leverage of up to 1:100 and the account has a maximum balance of $50,000. There is no commission added to the trading on this account and the margin call level is set at 100% while the stop out level is set at 50%. You can have an unlimited amount of positions open at any one time.

VIP Account: The VIP account increases the minimum deposit up to $10,000 and once again must be in USD. It comes with a leverage of up to 1:100 and the account has a maximum balance of $50,000. There is no commission added to the trading on this account and the margin call level is set at 100% while the stop out level is set at 50%. You can have an unlimited amount of positions open at any one time.

Platforms

The use of MetaTrader 4 is available with Gold FX and for good reason, it is one of the most accessible platforms with a desktop download available as well as mobile applications and a web trader. Some of its other features include it being user-friendly, it has multiple languages, its equipped with advanced communication tools, provides personal information such as account balances, trade history, it works with all kind of currency, has advanced real-time charts, provides indicator, technical analysis, order management tools and customizable high tech chart, its a highly secure platform, and has the use of thousands of expert advisors and indicators to help with your trading and analytical needs.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available to both accounts is 1:100, this can be selected when first opening up an account, should you wish to change it on an active account, you should contact the customer service team with your request.

Trade Sizes

The minimum trade size available is 0.01 lots which is known as a micro-lot, the trades then go up in increments of 0.01 lots until they reach the maximum trade size of 1 lot. This is a little on the low side as many traders may look to make trades larger than this. It is not known to us what the maximum number of open trades or orders you can have at any one time is.

Trading Costs

We know that the account uses a spread based system and there doesn’t seem to be any mentions of any potential commissions on the accounts. There are however swap fees that are charged for holding trades overnight and these can be viewed within the MetaTrader 4 trading platform.

Assets

Unfortunately, there isn’t a full breakdown or product specification available, this is a shame as a lot of potential customers will be looking to see if a broker has their preferred trading instruments, so not having a list available can cause those traders to look elsewhere for a broker that does.

Spreads

We know that the accounts use a variable spread system, but unfortunately, we do not know what the spreads are or what the starting figures are for them. Variable spreads mean that they move with the markets, the more volatility in the markets the higher the spreads will be.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit required to open up an account is $100 which will allow you to open up a Standard account, should you wish to use the VIP account you will need to deposit at least $10,000.

Deposit Methods & Costs

It appears that only Bank Wire is available as a deposit method. Looking through the site there is no mention of any deposit fees being added by Gold FX, but you should check with your own bank to see if they will add any of their own. All deposits must be in USD.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Similarly to the deposit methods, all withdrawals must be in USD and there is only Bank Wire transfer available as a withdrawal method. Again, there doesn’t seem to be any mentions of potential withdrawal fees but contact your bank to see if they will charge for any incoming transfers.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

We do not know what the processing times are, but as the only available method is Bank Wire Transfer we would expect a request to be fully processed within 2 to 5 working days from the withdrawal request being made.

Bonuses & Promotions

The promotion page does indicate some promotions however they may have expired because the links no longer lead anywhere except for a deleted Facebook post. So it does appear that bonuses and promotions are taking place if you are after any you could always contact the customer service team to see if there are any promotions coming up that you could take part in.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are a few different aspects to the education and trading tools side of the site. The first section is some videos based on different strategies and how to trade them. There is also a section detailing a few different trading strategies. There is some research and analysis information, but this is pretty irrelevant as it has not been updated for 2 years now. Finally, there is an economic calendar, this details upcoming news events and also shows which markets they may affect.

Customer Service

You can contact Gold FX in a few different ways, the first being a postal address, there is also a phone number and email address available should you wish to get in contact that way. We do not know what opening times of the support team are but we suspect that they will be closed over the weekends like the markets are.

Address: GoldFX Investment Co, Ltd, Sun City Building, 2nd Floor, #255, St.51 Corner St. 370, Sangkat Boeung Keng Kang 1, Khan Chamkamon, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Phone: (+855) (0) 23 213 686
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

Demo accounts are available, you can open one up by downloading the Gold FX MetaTrader 4 trading platform and then creating a demo account from within the platform. The conditions should match the trading conditions mentioned above and there does not seem to be an expiration time on them. The demo accounts can be used to test out the markets and strategies without any added risk to your capital.

Countries Accepted

The following statement is present on the site: “While we welcome clients from all over the globe, governmental restrictions along with our company policies prohibit GoldFX from opening accounts originated from the following restricted and/or OFAC sanctioned countries: Afghanistan, Botswana, Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Cuba, Cyprus, Egypt, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea Bissau, Guinea Conakry, Iraq, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya Mali, Niger, North Korea, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Syria, Tajikistan, Togo, Turkmenistan, The Democratic Republic of Congo The former Liberian Regime of Charles Taylo, Uzbekistan, Yemen, and Zimbabwe.”

Conclusion

It was hard for us to find any information about some of the trading conditions over at Gold FX and unfortunately, we still managed to not find some. We do not know the full extent of the costs of trading there, the spreads and potential commissions are unknown along with a lack of information on the tradable assets. This information is important to know, as you don’t want to join a broker and then find it’s expensive to trade. The deposit methods are also limited to bank transfers which can limit a lot of people who prefer to use other methods, the fees were also not clear. With all this information missing it is hard for us to recommend Gold FCX as a broker to use at this point in time,

BTC Globe FX is a Saint Vincent and the Grenadine based foreign exchange broker that claims to be one of the most accessible ways to become richer, a bold claim and also one that could mislead. We have seen the layout and features of the site before as they are using a white label setup. They aim to provide outstanding customer service, offer a multi-product bouquet, provide advanced trading platforms, to give tight spreads and to be run by an experienced founding team. We will use this review to look into the services offered to see how they compare to the competition and so you can decide if they are the right broker for your trading needs.

Account Types

There are four different account types, they do not go over the trading conditions, instead, they are outlining additional features that come with each., so let’s look at what they are.

Standard Account: This account requires a deposit of at least $250, the account does not come with any additional features.

Classic Account: The Classic account requires a minimum deposit of at least $2,500, it comes with online chat and access to all platform features.

Gold Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of at least $20,000, it comes with online chat, access to all platform features, has access to Autochartist, SMS signals, a VIP manager and an individual telephone line.

Premium Account: This account requires a minimum deposit of at least $50,000, it comes with online chat, access to all platform features, has access to Autochartist, SMS signals, a VIP manager, an individual telephone line, special promotions on one on one trading and personal reports on the stock markets.

Platforms

MetaTrader 4 is the sole platforms offered by BTC Globe FX and it is one of the worlds most used trading platforms and for good reasons, a few of its many features include multiple order types, Market watch window, a navigator window, lots of pre-installed indicators and analysis tools, multiple chart setups, the ability for automated trading and order execution capabilities. The platform is also highly accessible, as you can use it as a web trader in your internet browser, a mobile application or as a desktop download.

Leverage

The maximum leverage available is 1:200, we believe that all accounts use the same leverage so they all have access to this amount. It can be selected when opening up an account, we are not sure if it can be changed once an account has been opened.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes at BTC Globe FX start from 0.01 lots on all accounts and go up in increments of 0.01 lots. We do not know what the maximum trade size is or what the maximum number of open trades you can have at any one time is.

Trading Costs

We did not see any mentions of commissions for any of the accounts so it appears that there aren’t any, especially with the spread (later in this review) starting so high. There are however swap charges which are fees for holding trades overnight and these can be viewed within the MetaTrader 4 trading platform.

Assets

There, unfortunately, isn’t a full breakdown of the available assets, this means we do not know what is available to trade. This can be quite off-putting to potential new clients who will often look to see if a broker has their favorite instruments to trade, not knowing will make them look elsewhere. We do not even know how many potential assets there are.

Spreads

The only spread that we have to go on is what is mentioned on the homepage of the site. It states that the spread for EUR/USD is 1.6 pips. This is the starting spread as they are variable which means they will move with the markets, more volatility or less lucidity will make them grow larger, different instruments will also have different starting spreads, 1.6 pips is the smallest they will be.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit required to open up an account is $250 which will allow you to use the Standard account, if you want a higher tier account then you will need to deposit at least $2,500. We do not know if the minimum amount reduces after an account has already been opened.

Deposit Methods & Costs

There is not a dedicated page for funding, the only information we have is some images at the bottom of the website, they indicate that Visa, Maestro, MasterCard, Neteller, and AstroPay are available to use, but we have no confirmation of this, we also do not know if there are any added fees when depositing but you should check with whatever method you are using to see if any are added by them.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

We also do not know much about withdrawals such as the methods available (although Visa, Maestro, MasterCard, Neteller, and AstroPay are most likely available), or any additional fees for withdrawing. If you are using BTC Globe FX, then we would suggest checking with whatever method you use to see if they have any incoming transfer fees of their own.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

We do not know the exact processing time from BTC Globe FX, however, we would expect any withdrawal requests to be processed within 1 to 5 working days from the date the request is made, this will depend on the methods available to use.

Bonuses & Promotions

There is a 30% bonus available, the only details about the promotion are on the account sign up page which states that you can get a 30% bonus on your first deposit. There is no more information surrounding it such as how to convert the bonus into real funds or what the maximum bonus available is.

Educational & Trading Tools

There is a news section of the site which details news from around the world which could be affecting the markets. Autochartist is a tool that is also available, this offers features to help with your trading, it can identify and react to market movements, check the quality and competitiveness of your broker’s pricing, manage your cash exposure, optimize your stop loss and take profits, capitalize on known outcomes of news events and identify and react to market movements that are not typical.

Customer Service

The customer service team can be contacted in a number of ways, there is the online submission form, fill it in and you should get a reply via email. There is also a phone number, email address, postal address and Skype username available to sue.

Address: Suite 305, Griffith Corporate Centre, P.O. Box 1510, Beachmont, Kingstown, St. Vincent and the Grenadines
Phone: +442080788663
Email: [email protected]
Skype: btcglobefx.com

Demo Account

We did not see any information surrounding demo accounts, so we are not entirely sure if they are available, if they are not then it is a shame as demo accounts allow you to test out the markets and strategies without any real risk.

Countries Accepted

This information was not located on the site, however, if you are thinking of signing up, we would suggest that you contact the customer service team first just to check that you are eligible for an account.

Conclusion

The information provided by BTC Globe is scattered around the site and does not give the whole picture about what is offered. All four accounts seem to use the same trading conditions which use a spread based system, the spreads start from 1.6 pips so they aren’t incredibly high, but also not ultra-competitive. We do not know what assets are available or concrete information on what deposit and withdrawal methods are available. Not having those bits of information can make it hard for us to recommend them to trade, as it is vital to know how you can get your money in and out and also how much it will cost you.