Tag: Forex

Alfa Forex is a currency exchange broker that is based out of Moscow, Russia. At first glance, there are plenty of negative aspects about this broker, such as their limited instruments, geographical constraints, and restrictive leverage. Having said that, the resourceful educational material, tight spreads, and highly advanced trading platform can make this broker reliable in the eyes of some traders. This article will cover these aspects in detail, allowing you to make a comprehensive judgment on whether or not to open an account.

Account Types

To open an account, you have to submit documents on Alfa Forex’s website. The whole process takes a few hours. If the broker requires additional information or documents, it could take up to 2 days to get started.

• Minimum Deposit: None
• Spreads: From 0.16 pips
• Commission: Variable swap rates for different currency pairs

There are no deposit requirements to start trading with Alfa Forex. You could fund your account with just what is needed to buy or sell their minimal trade size (0.01 lots). This broker doesn’t charge commissions on trade, but you do incur swap fees on overnight positions. These costs vary from one currency pair to another. In addition, short and long positions come with their own fees for each FX instrument. One of the main positives of using Alfa Forex is their low spreads, which start at 0.16 pips (USD).

Platforms

Alfa Forex traders will use MetaTrader 5 (MT5). The state-of-the-art and market-leading platform gives you access to more than 80 graphs and technical analysis tools. You can also change the timeline of the charts, ranging from 1 minute to 1-month graphs. Traders can program their own robot so that it opens and closes positions based on pre-established market conditions.

MT5 makes it possible for traders to access and emulate the strategies and algorithms that others utilize. On Alfa Forex’s website, you can download MT5 to your Windows browser, alongside the smartphone apps for iOS and Android devices. Mac users will have to install MT5 from the platform’s website, directly, as that option is not available on Alfa Forex’s website. Afterward, they can immediately start trading, just as users of other devices can.

Leverage

The maximum leverage amount that this broker offers is 1:50, which is incredibly low when compared to others. However, this is mostly out of Alfa Forex’s control as Russian law sets a limit on how much leverage they can provide. You can increase your leverage, but doing so means that the broker will raise your stop-out level to minimize risks and potential losses.

Trade Sizes

Alfa Forex has micro lot sizes, with 1 contract being worth 1,000 of the base currency. For example, if your account’s default currency is USD, then 1 lot of the EUR.USD pair would be 1,000 Euros. You can enter trades that are as small as 0.01 lots.

Stop-Out: 85%

If you want to use Alfa Forex’s fixed leverage, which is 1:40, then you will be stopped out at the 85% margin requirement. Leverages of 1:50 and 1:100 have a stop-out level of 100% and 200% the initial margin, respectively. The broker doesn’t provide variable or floating rates, with each currency pair having a fixed 1:40 leverage (which, as mentioned, can be adjusted). This prevents you from losing all of your capital and having a negative balance.

Reaching the stop-out level means that Alfa Forex will immediately close your position to bring your account down to 80% of the margin requirement. You will have to either deposit more funds into your account or continue trading at lower leverage or margin (depending on how much capital you have left after being stopped out).

Trading Costs

We previously mentioned that Alfa Forex doesn’t charge commissions and, instead, traders incur swap fees when they keep positions open overnight. The swap fee depends on the exchange rate and interest. On the broker’s ‘Trading Conditions’ page, you can see the current swap fees for every currency pair that they offer. However, these costs are subject to change if certain news events or developments arise. The EUR.RUB (Russian Rubble) has the highest swap fees on long trades, while the USD.CHF is the most expensive pair to short.

Assets

We found the very limited access to currencies and other financial instruments to be one of the main downsides of using Alfa Forex. There are only 29 currency pairs, which is far below what other brokers offer. In addition, there are no CFDs, commodities, stocks, or cryptos that you can trade on Alfa Forex. Apart from the majors, you can find currency pairs with exotics such as the Russian ruble, Mexican peso, and South African rand.

Spreads

You can access a full list of spreads on Alfa Forex’s website. The broker has unique tools that allow you to view spreads, swap fees, and lot sizes in either the USD, EUR, or RUB. Since each currency is different in value, it is very useful to look at spread sizes based on your account’s default one. For example, EUR.USD has a 0.16 pip spread in US dollars, but it is 0.14 and 10.19 if your account’s currency is in the Euro and Russian ruble, respectively. The highest spread is 0.45 pips (USD), which is the case for the GBP.NZD. Given that the difference between the lowest (0.14 pips) and highest (0.45 pips) spreads are relatively tight, Alfa Forex traders enjoy a good degree of certainty (as opposed to dealing with fluctuating spreads).

Minimum Deposit

Alfa Forex only requires a deposit that is enough to trade the smallest contract size (0.01 lots). Otherwise, their website makes no mention of any deposit size that is needed to open an account. If you have enough funds to bid for a contract (regardless of how small), then you can start trading.

Deposit Methods & Costs

You can only deposit funds in Russian rubles. There are 3 ways to do so, all of which take 1 to 2 business days to process. You can wire funds online from your bank through Alfa Click (the broker’s software) and there are no fees associated with this method. Another option is to transfer funds through the broker-affiliated Alfa Bank. The cost per transaction depends on the branch location and department. Lastly, you can wire deposits into your Alfa Forex account through your bank, which can be done online or in person. Alfa Forex doesn’t charge any fees, but your bank or financial institution might.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

You can only withdraw funds via bank transfers and there are 2 ways to do so: Either to an Alfa Bank account or another financial institution. If you want to transfer money to Alfa Bank, there are no fees. Other financial institutions might charge you for each transaction, but the broker doesn’t.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Both withdrawal methods (via Alfa Bank or another institution) take 1 to 2 business days until they are processed.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are various educational and trading resources that Afla Forex makes available to account holders. In fact, we find those to be very resourceful and easy-to-use. First, Alfa Forex offers video webinars about trading strategies, how the currency exchange market functions, and Q&A sessions where analysts interact with account holders. A calendar of upcoming webinars is going to be posted on their website in the near future. Alfa Forex also provides training courses that are developed and designed by the Bank of Russia (the country’s central bank).

As far as trading is concerned, there are several existing and soon-to-be rolled out tools that you can access. The website provides the live exchange rates and prices of each currency pair that they offer to account holders. Additionally, there are daily and weekly economic calendars that outline major events from all over the world. You can customize the list based on country, category (central banks, employment, confidences indexes, …etc.), and volatility (ranging from 1 bar/least volatile to 4 bars/most volatile). In addition, you can choose the date range that you prefer and monitor upcoming (as well as previous) events.

Customer Service

Alfa Forex can be contacted in person, by phone, via live chat, or through filling out a form on their website. Their service hours are from 7 am to 11 pm (Moscow time) on weekdays, which also includes their live chat’s availability. If you want to visit the broker in person, they are located in Moscow, Russia. Traders who contact them outside of their regular hours will hear back from the customer support team sometime during the next business day. A map with their exact location is available on the website.

Phone: +7 (499) 215-79-79 or 8 (800) 100-62-02
Email: [email protected] or [email protected]

Demo Account

Alfa Forex recommends using a demo account alongside their training webinars and online courses. This allows beginner traders to test their strategy and develop it as they grow their knowledge of the FX markets. More specifically, through combing educational materials and paper trading, users can learn from their mistakes and duplicate their successes until they feel confident enough to start investing their actual funds.

Countries Accepted

Only Russian citizens can open an account with Alfa Forex. In fact, you even need to have a Russian passport, which is part of the required documents in the application. Even if you live in Russia but aren’t a citizen, you can’t open an account with this broker. Other requirements include being 18 years old and not having any criminal or legal problems that would prevent you from participating in the financial markets. Reviewing Russian investment laws is highly recommended, especially for inexperienced traders who are new to the market.

Conclusion

The obvious elephant in the room is that only Russian citizens who live in Russia can open an account with Alfa Forex. If this happens to be you, then you will greatly benefit from the tight and well-defined spreads that the broker offers. Having said that, there are only a few ForEx pairs that you can trade. Additionally, other financial instruments are unavailable, including cryptos. Alfa Forex doesn’t have any minimum deposit requirements and you can start trading with just enough funds to buy a 0.01 lot contract.

Leverage, meanwhile, is incredibly low, even with the room for potential increases. Expanding your leverage means that you have to trade with a more strict stop-out level. Just as importantly, transfers come with difficult-to-ignore fees, unless you use the broker-affiliated Alfa Bank.

All in all, even if you are a Russian passport holder, some of Alfa Forex’s features are highly undesirable and traders can find better options elsewhere. The available tools are only suitable for a small number of traders, especially beginners who want to access informative educational content and those who don’t mind the very restrictive leverage (i.e., traders with a low risk tolerance). Otherwise, Alfa Forex is definitely not the best option for you.

Dividendcare is a broker that focuses on new trading technologies and providing market liquidity through fast order executions. Account holders can enter and exit positions through the MT4 platform, a state-of-the-art ECN that leads the ForEx market. Some of the main advantages of using Dividendcare include its strong leverage offerings, a generous initial bonus, and the personalized attention that account holders receive. Having said that, some traders might find their minimum deposit requirements to be too high. Just as importantly, there is a limited number of currency pairs and the broker is not available in most of North America.

Account Types

Dividendcare has 3 types of accounts: Standard, Premium, and VIP. Forex traders have to install MetaTrader 4 (MT4). Regardless of which account you choose.

Standard Account:
Minimum Deposit: $10,000
Commission: $0
Leverage: Up to 1:400

Premium Account:
Minimum Deposit: $100,000
Commission: $0
Leverage: Up to 1:400

VIP Account:
Minimum Deposit: NA
Commission: NA
Leverage: Up to 1:500

The broker doesn’t have a specific minimum deposit for the VIP Account. When you apply for one, they will look at the amount of your capital, expected future deposits, and how often you plan to trade. To get a VIP Account, traders have to contact Dividendcare’s customer support team. While Standard and Premium traders enjoy zero commissions, the fee is unspecified for VIP clients.

Platforms

You can download MetaTrader 4 (MT4) directly from Dividendcare’s website to your Mac, Windows, iOS, or Android device. The MT4 platform provides traders with in-depth technical analysis tools that include various indicators, chart types, and diagrams. It is available in English, Spanish, Russian, French, German, Arabic, Turkish, and other languages. You can also download datasets and historical performance metrics. MT4 can be accessed and managed directly from your phone, but the desktop version has more features and tools.

Leverage

Standard and Premium traders have up to 1:400 in leverage. The VIP Account comes with 1:500. Nonetheless, all 3 types have relatively high leverage that only a few brokers in the industry can match.

Trade Sizes

Margin levels vary, they largely depend on the specific instrument and how much leverage you use. Dividendcare may change the margin requirements if you incur significant losses. Similarly, they don’t issue any margin calls and will immediately liquidate all your positions if you fall below the required maintenance amount.

Trading Costs

Standard and Premium are not charged any trading commissions, but they do incur spread fees. The VIP Account has much narrower spreads, but traders may have to pay commissions. Dividendcare will charge a swap fee when you keep your positions open overnight.

Assets

You can trade ForEx pairs, commodities, bonds, indices, options, and stocks on Dividendcare. Standard and Premium account holders can trade up to 27 different currency pairs, while the number of available ForEx instruments is not specified for VIP Accounts.

Minimum Deposit

As previously outlined, each account type has its own minimum deposit requirement, which is $10,000 and $100,000 for Standard and Premium, respectively. To open a VIP Account, your available capital and trading experience will be assessed. There is no specific minimum deposit requirement.

Deposit Methods & Costs

You can deposit funds via Visa, MasterCard, Bitcoin, or CryptoCoins. If you want to make a deposit by transferring money from your bank account, you should contact Dividendcare’s customer service team for detailed instructions. Transfers from your debit or credit card are immediately available for you to trade, while it can take the broker up to 3 days to process bank wires. Dividendcare doesn’t charge any fees for depositing funds.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Similarly, you can use a debit/credit card or a bank transfer to withdraw money from your Dividendcare account. The broker doesn’t charge any fees for credit or debit card withdrawals, but your bank or the card-issuing institution might. Their website doesn’t mention anything about bank transfer withdrawal fees, apart from the fact that the VIP Account doesn’t incur any charges through using this method. You should contact their customer support team to make sure that your account type and bank transfer fees suit what you’re looking for.

Bonuses & Promotions

Traders get a 10% bonus when they create an account, install MT4, and deposit funds. For example, if you deposit $200,000 into your account, you receive a $20,000 bonus (10% of $200,000). There are no other promotions or bonuses that are currently offered by Dividendcare.

Educational & Trading Tools

You can access live charts, economic calendars, and daily market analysis reports through Dividendcare. The VIP Account comes with free, one-on-one training that the broker offers. In addition, all account types can access training courses that thoroughly explain how the financial markets work and specifically focus on different Forex concepts.

Customer Service

Whether you open a Standard, Premium, or VIP Account, Dividendcare’s customer support team is available 24 hours per day and 5 days a week. Similarly, you can request a bank transfer anytime and someone will be there to process it for you around the clock during weekdays. The website is available in English, Spanish, and Russian. You can contact the broker via phone, email, or by filling out a form on the website.

Phone: +852 589-85-264
Current clients: [email protected]
24 hour (weekdays) customer support: [email protected]

Demo Account

Through MT4, you can open a demo account and immediately start trading. This will give new traders the chance to develop their approach and test their strategy, while those who are unfamiliar with the MT4 platform can take the time to learn how to use its various tools. Demo accounts have access to more than 200 financial instruments.

Countries Accepted

Dividendcare is headquartered in the Caribbean country of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Traders from all over the world can open an account. However, the broker is not available to residents of the US and Canada.

Conclusion

All in all, we found that Dividendcare’s features will largely depend on your personal trading strategy and risk tolerance. This is an essential part of determining whether or not this broker is the right fit for you. Traders who have a sizable amount of funds and are willing to take risks can enjoy Dividendcare’s generous leverage. This applies to beginner and experienced market participants, especially because of the dedicated and personalized account supervision features that the broker provides. Additionally, the 10% initial deposit bonus can come in handy.

However, if you prefer access to more currency pairs, cryptos, and the latest MetaTrader platform (MT5, instead of MT4), then you might find better options elsewhere. Just as importantly, if you don’t have the minimum $10,000 deposit requirement, you can’t open an account with Dividendcare. Therefore, you must weigh all aspects, negative and positive ones alike, and determine which of them matters most to you.

LMFX is an offshore Forex broker offering Forex trading services out of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. This firm offers a wide variety of assets, including currencies, commodities, indices, and more within their version of the MetaTrader 4 trading platform. The LMFX review that follows will provide you with the latest information regarding this FX broker, including current trading conditions, deposit & withdrawal information, trading costs, and more.

Account Types

LMFX offers three distinct account types to their clients. The three available options are as follows:

Premium: This account type can be opened with a deposit in the amount of $50. All subsequent deposits can be as small as $25 each. Premium account holders are treated to the platform’s largest leverage ratio (up to 1:1000) and will trade on spreads starting at 1 pip. There are no commission charges on this account type. The margin call and stop-out levels are 50% and 20%, respectively.

Fixed: This account is named such due to the fact that it provides the account holder with access to fixed spreads. The same as the Premium, Fixed is not associated with any commission charges. A Fixed account can be opened with a deposit in the amount of $250, with all subsequent deposits needing to be only $50 or more. The maximum leverage here is 400%. The margin call and stop-out levels are 30% and 15%, respectively.

Zero: This account is named such due to the fact that it offers spreads as low as 0.0 pips. The minimum deposit requirement for this account is $100, with subsequent deposits needing to be in the amount of $50 or more. The leverage maximum here is 1:250, while margin call is set to occur at 30% and stop-out at 15%.

Although not listed along with the primary account types, Islamic accounts are an option for those of faith. In order to open an Islamic account, one would need to fill out an application that differs from the standard application. The LMFX support team can provide you with complete details regarding this type of account.

Platforms

LMFX has opted to offer the MetaTrader 4 platform to its clients. They also offer this platform in app and WebTrader formats. The apps are available for Apple (iPhone and iPad) devices, along with a separate version for Android. The MT4 software download is provided for both Windows and Mac, and the broker does provide a user guide for each. With LMFX MT4, end users have access to more than 50 total advanced indicators and tools to help with the analyzation of price dynamics across nine separate time frames.

Leverage

The maximum leverage varies by account as follows:

• Premium Account: Up to 1:1000
• Fixed Account: Up to 1:400
• Zero Account: Up to 1:250

Even the Zero account provides a respectable leverage maximum, so there are no problems to report here. Just be certain to select the Premium account if you plan to make use of seriously high leverage ratios.

Trade Sizes

At LMFX, most trading conditions vary by account type and allowed trade sizes are no different. The smallest allowed size is 0.01 (micro) lot, and this applies to all account types. The maximum trade sizes are broken down as follows:

• Premium Account: 60 Lot Maximum
• Fixed Account: 75 Lot Maximum
• Zero Account: 100 Lot Maximum

The firm also has maximums in place when it comes to the number of positions that can be open simultaneously. Those maximums are shown below.

• Premium Account: 100 Lot Maximum
• Fixed Account: 150 Lot Maximum
• Zero Account: 200 Lot Maximum

Trading Costs

There are no commission charges on the Premium and Fixed accounts. However, you will need to pay up if you opt for the Zero account. With this account, there will be a cost of $4 per lot traded. All accounts, aside from Islamic, are subject to Swap or Rollover fees. These come into play whenever a trade remains opened before 21:00 GMT that are left to run after market hours. As always, these costs will vary from asset to asset, but each individual cost can be viewed within the trading platform using either a demo or live LMFX account.

Assets

Currently, there are 80+ assets to trade on, including:

(48) Forex Pairs
(9) Indices
(5) Commodities
(7) Metals & Oil
(15) Shares

It is worth mentioning that the currency list does not include any cryptocurrencies. This will certainly be disappointing for some. A comprehensive asset list can be accessed from the broker’s website.

Spreads

Spreads vary (you guessed it) by account type, with the lowest available spreads being as follows:

• Premium Account: As low as 1 pip
• Fixed Account: As low as 0 pips
• Zero Account: As low as 0 pips

LMFX does provide an account comparison page on their website and this proves quite helpful when breaking down what each account offers. Simply select the asset of interest and then click on ‘Spreads’ to see the details for each.

Minimum Deposit

The smallest acceptable deposit is $50, which is for the Premium Account, whereas the largest is $250, which is for the Fixed Account. Between the two is the Zero Account, which requires a minimum deposit in the amount of $100. After the initial deposit, there are smaller minimum requirements for adding funds. Those are as follows:

• Premium – Reload $25 or More
• Fixed – Reload $50 or More
• Zero – Reload $50 or More

Bonuses & Promotions

There are two options for LMFX bonuses. One is offered in the form of a deposit bonus, while the other is known as a “Phoenix Recovery Bonus” (or redeposit bonus). The deposit bonus offers a 100% match on all first-time deposits in the amount of $100 or more. The Phoenix bonus is equal to 15% of the total first deposit amount and will only be added to the account if the entire first deposit is lost. Obviously, both bonus types have terms and conditions to go with them, so be sure to read up on those before accepting bonus funds.

At the time of this LMFX review, there were three live contests taking place:

LMFX Crystal Ball Contest: Predict the most accurate future exchange rate of the currency pair of the week to win one of several prizes up to $1,000.

LMFX Ultimate Traders: Show off your trading skills by competing with other traders and have the chance to win $1,000 monthly.

Learn & Earn Contest: A demo account contest, this contest offers a risk-free way to compete for cash prizes.

LMFX is also one of the few forex brokers to offer ongoing contests, so this is certainly a plus. Clearly, bonuses and contests should not factor strongly into the broker selection decision, but they do go a long way in highlighting the FX brokers that are quite client-centric.

Deposit Methods & Costs

LMFX accepts several different deposit methods, which certainly is a plus at a time when many brokers struggle to offer more than one. Even better, there are no deposit fees, regardless of the payment method chosen. Below, you’ll see a complete list of the accepted deposit methods, along with the minimum deposit amount required for each.

• Visa – $50
• MasterCard – $50
• Wire Transfer – $250
• Skrill – $50
• Neteller – $50
• Fasapay – $50
• VLoad – $50

Credit/debit and e-payments offer the fastest way to fund an account. These types of payments typically clear within only a few minutes. Wire transfers are the slowest option, typically taking 2 to 5 business days to arrive.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

LMFX charges no withdrawal fees, not even on wire transfers. The list below outlines the available withdrawal methods and the smallest allowed withdrawal amount that is associated with each method.

• Visa – $10
• MasterCard – $10
• Wire Transfer – $1,000
• Skrill – $10
• Neteller – $10
• Fasapay – $10
• VLoad – $10

As you can see, most of the minimums are more than reasonable. Even the highest requirement for wire transfers is understandable, as this payment method tends to be the most costly and labor-intensive for Forex brokers.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Any withdrawal request that is submitted prior to 10 am server time will be reviewed and if approved, paid out on the same day. The anticipated average wait time for payment to arrive can be seen below.

• Visa – 2-15 days
• MasterCard – 2-15 days
• Wire Transfer – 2-15 days
• Skrill – Same day
• Neteller – Same day
• Fasapay – Same day
• VLoad – Same day

Educational & Trading Tools

LMFX does offer several educational tools, along with some attractive trading tools as well. Video tutorials, an economic calendar, market analysis, and more are provided. An impressive seven total Forex calculators are also provided on-site. The platform itself contains a variety of indicators and other helpful analysis tools for traders to make use of.

Customer Service

This broker offers customer support 24-hours a day, 5-days a week (Monday to Friday). The available contact options include telephone, email, and live chat. There are several different contact numbers available and those are provided below.

• Business Phone: +44 2035192105
• General Support: +44 2035192105 or [email protected]
• Sales: +44 2035192105 or [email protected]
• Affiliates: [email protected]
• Trading Desk: +44 2035192105

The available departmental email addresses are as follows:

• Sales Department: [email protected]
• Affiliates Department: [email protected]
• Customer Support: [email protected]

Demo Accounts

LMFX does offer free demo accounts, but traders should note that these do not provide the exact same trading conditions as the live platform. They do, however, mirror the conditions closely and are unlimited. Furthermore, they can be opened in the platform of your choice and do allow for the testing of expert advisors (EAs) and strategies. New Clients must first register an account in order to open a demo trading account. Existing clients, on the other hand, can log into their Wallet and open the practice account directly from there.

Countries Accepted

LMFX has decided not to extend services to residents of Belgium, Bulgaria, Macedonia, and Cyprus. It appears that all others (including residents of the United States) are welcome as of the writing of this LMFX review. Broker rules and regulations do change rather quickly though, so do check with the broker should you encounter any issues with registering a new account.

Conclusion

After completing a large number of Forex broker reviews, it becomes quite easy to quickly spot a scam broker. LMFX most certainly does not come off as anything more than a brokerage that wants to keep its clients happy and wants to do what it takes to remain in business (which they have managed to do since 2017). The FX industry is tough on brokers and those who do not remain trustworthy are quickly ousted. As for the conclusion of this LMFX review, we are recommending them. This could change in the future, of course, but as of now, they appear to be one of the better offshore brokerage options in operation.

This broker is available across the globe and has offices that cater to local traders in different locations. FIBO Group’s different account types all require minimal deposits, which means that traders can easily choose the one that best fits their strategy and needs. In this article, we will highlight important aspects of this broker, including the available assets, transfer costs, platform features, and other information that you should know before you open an account with them.

Account Types

FIBO Group offers five different types of accounts. Traders also have the option of opening an Islamic account.

MT4 Cent:
Minimum Deposit: $0
Spreads: From 0.6 pips
Commission: $0

MT4 Fixed:
Minimum Deposit: $50
Spreads: From 2 pips
Commission: $0

MT4 NDD:
Minimum Deposit: $50
Spreads: From 0 pips
Commission: 0.003% of the transaction amount

MT4 NDD (No Commission):
Minimum Deposit: $50
Spreads: From 0.8 pips
Commission: $0

cTrader NDD:
Minimum Deposit: $50
Spreads: From 0 pips
Commission: 0.003% of the transaction amount

MT5 NDD:
Minimum Deposit: $1,000
Spreads: From 0 pips
Commission: 0.005% of the transaction amount

What makes this broker unique is that each account type is related to the trading platform used. More specifically, you can choose between MetaTrader 4 (MT4), cTrader, and MetaTrader 5 (MT5). The main difference between the 2 MT4 DD accounts is that one offers no commissions, but has a spread that starts at 0.8 pips. The other one has a commission of 0.003% the transaction amount, but no spread. In addition, each of the 6 account types is different in terms of the default currency options, available assets, and trades sizes. All of which will be outlined in more detail in this article. The Islamic Account has the exact same features as the others. However, it doesn’t have the rollover bonuses while swap fees for overnight positions are only charged on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Platforms

You can trade through the MetaTrader 4 (MT4), the modified MetaTrader 5 (MT5) platform, and cTrader. Each of these platforms has its own distinct features and you should pick the one that is most in line with your trading strategy. MT4 gives you access to over 50 different technical indicators and allows you to code your own trading signal.

MT5 is more advanced than MT4 because it gives you access to more order types and lets you manage several account features from one screen. Both platforms can be installed on Macs, Windows, iOS, and Android devices. You can download them directly from FIBO’s website. Keep in mind, though, that if you want to download MT4 on your Mac, you might have to do so directly from the platform’s website because it requires specific software. Only the windows version of MT5 can be downloaded through the broker’s website.

In addition to those 2 platforms, FIBO Group gives you access to cTrader. Just as with MT4 and MT5, you are able to use a wide variety of technical indicators, code your own trade signals, and execute orders at a very high speed through cTrader. The platform is also available in 14 languages.

Leverage

FIBO Group offers incredibly high leverage that is amongst the best in the market. MT4 Cent account holders have up to 1:1000 in leverage, which is almost unheard of in the industry. MT4 Fixed Accounts only have 1:200, but the other 4 give you up to 1:400 in leverage, which is still higher than what other brokers have to offer.

Trade Sizes

Lot and trade sizes are dependent on the type of account you choose. The minimum lot size is the same across the board at 0.01. Only MT4 Cent has a maximum volume requirement; traders can’t have more than 50 open positions at the same time and each trade has to be 100 lots or less. All accounts, however, have restrictions on volume per trade, which varies from one currency pair to another.

Stop-Out: 20% (MT4 Cent, MT4 Fixed, and cTrader NDD) and 50% (Both MT4 NDD accounts and MT5 NDD).

When the stop-out level is reached, FIBO Group will give you 30 minutes before the markets close to exit some/all of your positions or deposit additional funds. Otherwise, the broker will close all or some of your positions to bring it to that level. It is important to note that, during weekends, FIBO Group might increase the margin call and stop-out as well as minimize the maximum leverage. The changes will depend on the market’s volatility and how risky your trades are.

Trading Costs

FIBO Group will charge you either a commission or the spread fee. MT4 Cent, MT4 Fixed, and MT4 NDD have a spread of 0.6 pips, 2 pips, and 0.8 pips, respectively. Meanwhile, the other 3 account types (MT4 NDD, cTrader NDD, and MT5 NDD) have 0 spreads. The commissions are charged based on the trade or transaction size. For example, buying 1 standard lot of the USD.CAD (which equals $100,000) will come with a 0.003%/$3 USD commission (MT4 NDD and cTrader NDD) or a 0.005%/$5 commission (MT5 NDD). Overnight positions also mean that you have to pay the swap fees, which depend on interest and market developments that pertain to the currency pair that you are trading. Islamic Accounts, for religious reasons, do not incur spread fees. The only exceptions are positions that are open overnight on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Assets

You can trade over 60 ForEx pairs through FIBO Group, alongside various CFDs, spot metals, and cryptocurrencies. However, access to these assets depends on the account type you choose. Only MT4 Fixed allows you to buy or sell 60 currency pairs. MT4 Cent and MT4 NDD (with commission) provide you with 38 and 32 currencies, respectively. MT4 NDD (no commission), cTrader NDD, and MT5 NDD give you access to 45, 41, and 42 currency pairs, respectively. Just as importantly, only MT4 Fixed and MT4 NDD (with commission) let you trade CFDs. The available default currency options also vary.

• MT4 Cent: USD cent and GLD (SPDR Gold ETF) cent
• MT4 Fixed: USD, GBP, EUR, CHF, and RUR (Old Russian ruble)
• MT4 NDD: USD, EUR, and GLD
• MT4 NDD (No Commission): USD, EUR, GLD, BTC (Bitcoin), and ETH (Etherium)
• cTrader NDD: USD and EUR
• MT5 NDD: USD only

Spreads

Accounts that don’t pay commissions will have to incur spread fees. While FIBO Group’s spreads are relatively low, they can vary from one currency pair to another. In addition, two different account types may have a different spread on the same currency pairs. Generally speaking, MT4 Cent has the lowest minimum spreads at 0.6 pips. MT4 Fixed has the highest, ranging from 2 pips upwards, which is way above what other brokers offer.

Minimum Deposit

FIBO Group’s deposit structure is very flexible, especially because all accounts can be easily accessed. The largest minimum deposit is $1,000 (MT5 NDD), which is much lower than what other brokers require, especially those that have different account types. Most of the time, the industry requires 10s, if not 100s, of thousands to open an account with desirable or competitive features, All accounts on FIBO Group have a minimum deposit of $50 or the equivalent in the base currency you choose. Opening an MT4 Cent account, however, doesn’t have a minimum and you can start trading with a deposit that is just enough to buy the smallest available lot size (0.01).

Deposit Methods & Costs

GIBO Group doesn’t charge fees for deposits via bank transfers and debit/credit cards, but they do so when it comes to certain methods.

• Bank Wire Transfers: 2 to 5 days; Only bank fees apply ($35 to $50); USD & EUR deposits
• Credit/Debit Card and Connectum: Instant processing; No fees; Maximum 3,000 EUR per transaction or 10,000 EUR within 24 hours; USD & EUR deposits
• RegularPay: Instantly processed during business hours; No fees; Not available in several countries (including the US and Canada); USD & EUR deposits
• Paysafe Card: Instant processing; No fees; Only available in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the UAE; Only USD deposits
• Bitpay: Instant processing; No fees; No minimums or country limitations; Only Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash deposits
• Blockchain: Processed during business hours after confirmation by Bitcoin chain; Blockchain main charge fees; Only Bitcoin deposits
• Neteller: Instant if the Neteller account has the same email as the FIBO Group one (if not, it is only processed during business hours); No fees; Minimum deposit of $1.29 only; USD and EUR deposits
• WebMoney: Instantly processed; No fees; Maximum deposit of $100,000 per transaction; USD and EUR deposits
• Skrill: Instant if the Skrill account has the same email as the FIBO Group one (if not, it is only processed during business hours); 3.9% fee; Minimum deposit of $1.00 plus the transfer fees; Only USD deposits
• CashU: Instant processing; 7% fee; Only USD deposits
• Fasapay: Instant during business hours or, otherwise, processed on the next day; 0.5% fees ($0.01 minimum and $5 maximum per transaction); Minimum transfer size of $0.10 and maximum of $1,000,000 per transaction; Only USD and IDR (Indonesian rupiah) deposits
• EcoPayz: Instant processing; No fees; $2,500 deposits per transaction if the account is not verified; Only available in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries; Only USD deposits
• Perfect Money: Instant processing; Perfect Money might charge transfer fees; Only available in Afghanistan, India, and Pakistan; Only USD deposits

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

You can withdraw funds by using most of the deposit methods. However, the fees charged by FIBO Group vary.

• Bank Wire Transfers: Bank fees may apply (between $35 and $50); Minimum of $80 per transaction; USD, GBP, EUR, and CHF withdrawals
• Credit/Debit Card and Connectum: Fees of 2.5% the withdrawn amount plus 1.5 Euros per transaction; Maximum of $3,000 during a 24 hour period and $10,000 per month; USD and EUR withdrawals
• RegularPay: $10 fee per transaction; No minimums or maximums; USD and EUR withdrawals
• Neteller: 2% fee per transaction (minimum of $1.29 and maximum of $30); Minimum of $10 withdrawn per transaction (plus fees); USD and EUR withdrawals
• WebMoney: 0.8% fee per transaction (maximum of $50 USD or 50 EUR); Minimum of $5 or 5 EUR withdrawn and maximum of $10,000; USD and EUR withdrawals
• Skrill: 1% fee per transaction; Minimum of $1.00 withdrawn (plus the 1% fee); Only USD withdrawals
  QIWI: 1% fee per transaction; Minimum of 5 RUR and maximum of 15,000 RUR or $200; Only USD and RUR withdrawals
• Bitcoin: 0.001 BTC fee per transaction (plus Bitcoin fees); Minimum of 0.01 BTC per transaction; Only BTC withdrawals
• Perfect Money: 0.5% fee per transaction; No minimums or maximums; Only USD withdrawals Keep in mind that, for each withdrawal method, the same country-specific and geographical restrictions apply. For example, only traders in Afghanistan, India, and Pakistan can deposit or withdraw funds via Perfect Money.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

• Bank Wire Transfers: Within 3 days
• Credit/Debit Card and Connectum: Instant transfers, but, at times, it can take up to 3 days (especially if the transaction was made after business hours)
• RegularPay: 10 business days
• Neteller: On the same day if the transaction is made during business hours. Otherwise, it will be processed on the next business day.
• WebMoney: 1 day
• Skrill: On the same day if the transaction is made during business hours. Otherwise, it will be processed on the next business day.
• QIWI: Instantly processed
• Bitcoin: Takes several hours to process
• Perfect Money: Takes only a few minutes for funds to transfer

Bonuses & Promotions

FIBO Group doesn’t offer any bonuses or promotions. However, their website has a ‘Promotions’ page with a form that you fill out to signup to their email newsletter. If you are interested in the promotions, you can subscribe and get email updates on when the next bonus or promotional program becomes available.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are analytical tools that benefit both short and long-term traders alike. Their analytics articles include content about different currency pairs and events that can impact the market. At the moment, their ‘Long Term Forecasts’ section doesn’t have any posts. However, their ‘Interest Rates’ page is very useful. It has a list of the current rates that the central banks of 15 different countries have set, alongside the date of their last meeting and upcoming policy decisions. You can also access a live economic calendar and customize it based on country, degree of importance, and your desired timeframe.

Customer Service

FIBO Group’s website is available in 14 different languages, including English, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Arabic, and others. Their global offices cater to traders in local areas across the world, with a unique phone number and email for each. The Austrian phone number and email is the unified contact information for clients in all locations (apart from those where FIBO Group has an office). They can be reached 24 hours a day during weekdays. The other offices are open during the business hours of the location that they serve.

Phone: +43 720 02 23 55
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

You can open a demo account with MT4 or cTrader, depending on your preference. Each of the 2 platforms allows you to create a demo that enjoys the same features and accessibility to financial instruments that the live ones do.

Countries Accepted

FIBO Group is regulated and licensed in Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands. The broker has offices in Austria, Kazakhstan, Germany, Ukraine, and China. The broker is in compliance with financial market regulations across the world. However, it is not available in the US, UK, Australia, Belgium, Austria (even though they have an office in the capital, Vienna), Iraq, and North Korea.

Conclusion

Unless you live in one of the countries where this broker is unavailable, FIBO Group provides plenty of competitive and resourceful tools. The low deposit requirements and wide range of available platforms give traders a lot of flexibility, while deposit methods make FIBO Group ideal for fiat and crypto enthusiasts alike. In fact, apart from a few restrictions, we find this broker to be one of the best options on the market. As this article has shown, you can enjoy minimal trading costs, access to many resourceful educational materials, and a customer service team that is very easy to reach.

Whether you prefer traditional currency pairs or cryptos, Hispamarkets offers you access to many financial instruments and CFDs. The broker also has various deposit requirements, making it easier for you to compare different account types and choose the one with the leverage that you prefer. Having said that, Hispamarkets doesn’t offer a lot of information about key features and trading conditions, including those related to margin and transfer processing. In addition, if you have a low level of risk tolerance, it is important to carefully study how Hispamarkets can protect you against potential hefty losses. This article contains the important details that will help you evaluate this broker.

Account Types

Hispamarkets offers 3 account types, alongside the newly introduced Crypto Account. The way each account is structured makes this broker ideal for both beginner and professional traders.

Bronze Account:
Minimum Deposit: $2,000
Leverage: Up to 1:500

Plata Account:
Minimum Deposit: $5,000
Leverage: Up to 1:300

Gold Account:
Minimum Deposit: $10,000
Leverage: Up to 1:100

Crypto Account:
Minimum Deposit: $2,000
Leverage: Up to 1:500

The Bronze Account suits inexperienced traders who are just starting out because it offers a fixed margin rate and allows you to choose your leverage (up to 1:500). In turn, users can access all financial instruments (including cryptos) while minimizing their risk. The Crypto Account is similar to the Bronze one in terms of the minimum deposit and leverage. However, it also utilizes blockchain technology, making it perfect for cryptocurrency traders.

Plata and Gold are designed for seasoned traders who prioritize low spreads and dedicated support. There are 2 differences between the Plata and Gold accounts. First, minimum deposits are $5,000 for Plata and $10,000 for Gold. Second, by opening a Gold Account, you get access to trading reports, advanced account management tools, and customized, one-on-one consultations with Hispamarkets’s analysts. The Silver Account also enjoys access to customer support, but traders don’t have the same detailed reports and individualized consultations that the Gold Account has to offer.

Platforms

This broker uses MetaTrader 4 (MT4), which is one of the most sophisticated and advanced trading platforms in the world. MT4 gives you access to a wide variety of financial instruments. You can also create a custom algorithm that automatically trades on your behalf. Moreover, MT4 comes with valuable technical signals and enables users to integrate their preferred indicators.

The platform is very easy to use and can be accessed via Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android, making it ideal for experienced and novice traders alike. You can download and install MT4 directly from the platform’s website.

Leverage

When you open an account with Hispamarkets, you can choose your own leverage (up to a certain maximum). Bronze and Crypto users get up to 1:500 in leverage while Plata and Gold have 1:300 and 1:100, respectively. Hispamarkets’s website doesn’t specify why there are differences between the accounts. Yet, it might be safe to assume that, because Bronze traders have less capital than the other account types, they are provided with larger leverage in order to realize meaningful profits. Similarly, many brokers offer low leverage to accounts that have a sizable amount of funds in order to control risk.

The broker’s website also doesn’t mention anything about margin requirements. However, if you get a margin call, Hispamarkets requires you to immediately transfer funds in order to meet the maintenance amount. Otherwise, they will liquidate one or all of your trades.

Trade Sizes

The smallest lot amount that you can trade is 1,000 in the currency unit (a micro lot). Hispamarkets’s website doesn’t specify maximum volume levels. As mentioned, this broker, unfortunately, doesn’t provide a lot of information about leverage, margin calls, and stop-outs. You will be notified when a margin call is issued, which could happen even if you are hedging to minimize your losses. Should a trader fail to respond to the margin call, there is a risk that their account balance will turn negative and that they lose their entire deposit. The broker could automatically close some or all of your positions if the losses reach that level.

Assets

Hispamarkets gives traders access to ForEx pairs, equity CFDs, and commodities. The brokers allow you to trade over 80 currency pairs and the Crypto Account gives you access to 16 cyber currencies. These include BitCoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, and others.
This broker also focuses on Over the Counter (OTC) products and instruments. The commodities offered are oil, spot gold, and spot silver. Additionally, you can trade other commodity futures that are available on the MT4 platform, as well as the CFDs of stocks traded in the US market and around the world.

Minimum Deposit

As mentioned earlier, the minimum deposits are $2,000 for Bronze and Crypto, $5,000 for Plata, and $10,000 for Gold. After you open an account, you can always upgrade it by depositing additional funds. For example, if you start with a $3,500 deposit, you get the Bronze Account. Afterward, if you transfer an additional $3,000 and bring your balance to $6,500, you can switch to the Plata Account.

Deposit Methods & Costs

You can deposit funds into your Hispamarkets account from your bank via a wire or an Automatic Clearing House (ACH) transfer. You can also use your Visa or MasterCard. Whichever one you choose, it is important to keep in mind that you will need to use the same method to withdraw funds. For example, if you deposited money into your Hispamarkets account through a bank wire transfer, you can only make a withdrawal through a wire transfer to the same bank account.

Hispamarkets charges no fees for depositing money. But before doing so, you need to provide a copy of a government-issued ID and a proof of address document (such as a utility bill or bank statement) that is no more than 3 months old. If Hispamarkets runs into any issues when verifying your identity, address, or ownership of the payment method, then both deposits and withdrawals might be delayed.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

As we just mentioned, you can only withdraw money through the same payment method that you used to make a deposit. Just as with other essential information, Hispamarkets’s website offers limited details about withdrawal fees and processing times. We can assume that withdrawals follow the same mechanisms that deposits do, but you should contact the broker to make sure what the process entails. Otherwise, you risk facing larger than expected withdrawal fees and lengthy transaction times.

Educational & Trading Tools

Even though Hispamarkets barely provide you with currency spreads, margin requirements, and other similar information, they do have a blog that is rich with content. Each article covers a specific topic or concept that is related to ForEx investments (as well as cryptos, stocks, CFDs, and futures). Beginners will find this to be especially useful, while experienced traders can access market analysis and news updates. Hispamarkets’s website is available in English, Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, French, Portuguese, and Italian.

Customer Service

You can contact Hispamarkets via phone, email, or by filling out the contact form on their website (displayed on the home, contact, and almost every other page).

Phone: +541151925656
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

Hispamarkets allows you to open a demo account directly from their website. Since MT4 also offers demos, you want to make sure that this account is opened through the platform and that you have access to the same tools and financial instruments as live traders. You can familiarize yourself with MT4’s functionalities and develop your strategy before risking your real money.

Countries Accepted

The broker is registered in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, a nation island in the Caribbean. Hedging is only available in countries where the practice is regulated and legal. To find out if Hispamarkets is available in your country, contact them directly because their website doesn’t provide this information.

Conclusion

Obviously, the main negative point about Hispamarkets isn’t related to its features, about it mostly has to do with the lack of information about them. The website is unreliably vague, which is a massive red flag. Yet, because this broker offers diverse account types and competitive access to different currency pairs and cryptos, traders who care about these features might find it worthwhile to further consider this broker. Luckily, there are plenty of ways to get in touch with the customer service department.

When it comes to other areas, Hispamarkets doesn’t offer a stop-out level that prevents your account from going negative. In other words, you could easily lose all of your capital if you aren’t careful with the leverage. Many brokers in the industry tend to issue a margin call and a stop-out level to ensure that this doesn’t happen. Certain details about how Hispamarkets processes transfers are missing while the broker is unclear about its margin requirements and trading costs (including commissions). Again, the lack of these specifics can be enough for many market participants to steer clear.

Based out of Vanuatu, TradeFred is a global brokerage firm that offers competitive bonuses, high leverages, and access to almost 50 different currency pairs. In fact, the best part of using TradeFred has to do with its diverse tools, various deposit methods, and the availability of local customer service teams in multiple countries. Having said that, traders in the US, Canada, New Zealand, and several other locations cannot open an account with this broker. Similarly, withdrawals can take a relatively long to time process. After reading this article, you will be able to thoroughly evaluate the pros and cons of TradeFred and determine whether or not you should open an account with this broker.

Account Types

There are 4 different types of live accounts on TradeFred. You also have the option of opening an Islamic Account. There are 3 base currencies that you can choose from: USD, GBP, and EUR. Traders are able to open more than 1 account with different base currencies. However, after the account is active, you can’t change the currency.

Silver Account:
Minimum Deposit: $250
Spreads: From 1.7 pips

Gold Account:
Minimum Deposit: $2,500
Spreads: From 1.7 pips

Platinum Account:
Minimum Deposit: $10,000
Spreads: From 1.7 pips

VIP Account:
Minimum Deposit: $30,000
Spreads: From 1.7 pips

All of the above options provide traders with a personal account manager, training, daily market analysis, and access to different trading signals. However, only VIP Account traders get private consultations and the lowest available spreads. Platinum and VIP enjoy training benefits, such as an Ebook and complimentary webinars. You can open a business account with TradeFred and manage your company’s portfolio. To do so, contact the broker’s customer support department and they will tell you what documents you need to provide.

Platforms

After you pick your account type and signup, you have to install the MetaTrader (MT4) platform. You can do so on your Mac, Windows, Android, or iOS. TradeFred’s website allows you to directly download and install MT4. The desktop version provides you with competitive tools, customer support features, and detailed market analysis. Through the mobile version, traders can manage their account, open/close positions, and access the same tools that desktop users do. However, the desktop version has more expanded features.

Another key platform that TradeFred provides is the social trading program, which is especially useful to beginners. This platform allows you to simulate the trades and algorithms of other investors in a manner that is aligned with your personal approach. First, you have to answer questions about your risk tolerance and objectives. Afterward, you can access the social platform and follow the trading techniques of experienced professionals that have a similar attitude towards risk.

Leverage

With all types of accounts, you can choose between 1:200 to 1:400 in leverage. The higher end of the range is considered competitive in comparison to what other brokers on the market offer. This, however, only applies to ForEx pairs. The minimum leverage for cryptos is only 1:2. Precious metals, energy assets, and other commodities have between 1:50 and 1:200 in leverage. Aluminum, however, only has a 1:10 rate.

Trade Sizes

The standard Forex lot size is 100,000 in the base currency, but all account users can open positions that are as low as 0.01 lots. A crypto’s lot size is 1 contract. The Initial Margin ranges between 0.5% and 1%.

Margin Call: 50%
Stop-Out: 25%

TradeFred’s goal is to prevent traders from having a negative account. Their margin call and stop-out levels are designed to ensure that. At the margin call level (50%), you have to either deposit more funds or liquidate existing trades. If you fail to do so and your account goes down to 25% the margin level, the broker will automatically close all of your positions to prevent you from losing more than what you initially deposited.

Trading Costs

This broker, like many others, doesn’t charge any commissions. Instead, they make their money through the spreads and swap fees. Spreads vary from one FX pair to another. You also incur overnight swap fees and each currency pair has its own long and short costs. Some of them are only a few cents per lot, while others can reach double digits. Bitcoin has a standard $150 per night swap rate, regardless of whether your short or long. Islamic accounts do not incur any swap charges, regardless of how many days you keep a position open.

Assets

You can trade 24 hours a day from Monday to Friday in the ForEx market. TradeFred provides account holders with access to almost 50 currency pairs, including major ones as well as exotics from developing countries. In addition, you can trade Bitcoin against 3 different currencies. The pairs are BTC.USD, BTC.GBP, and BTC.EUR. All of which are available 24 hours and 7 days a week (as opposed to ForEx pairs, which can only be traded during weekdays).

You also have access to US stocks (listed on the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq) and UK shares that are on the FTSE. Moreover, users can invest in indices futures, precious metals, and different types of commodities that include cotton, cocoa, coffee, soybeans, and platinum. This selection of commodities is not offered by many other ForEx brokers, which makes it worthwhile for traders who prefer these assets to look into TradeFred.

Spreads

Spreads depend on which currency pair you want to trade. Some are as low as 1.7 pips. However, exotics and certain major pairs have a higher spread. Bitcoin has a much wider spread of $150.

Minimum Deposit

To open a silver account, you need to deposit no less than $250. Gold, Platinum, and VIP require deposits of $2,500, $10,000, and $30,000, respectively. If you don’t use the US dollar, then the required funds are the equivalent value in your default currency of the minimum deposit for each account.

Deposit Methods & Costs

All deposits into your TradeFred account are free, regardless of which type you want to open (Silver, Gold, Platinum, or VIP). However, each method has a different processing time.

• Bank Transfers: 3 to 5 business days
• Transfers from another broker: 3 to 5 business days
• Debit or credit card: Instantly available
• WebMoney: Instantly available
• Qiwi: Instantly available
• Skrill: Instantly available
• Neteller: Instantly available

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Withdrawals, too, are for free, regardless of the method you choose. Transfers out of your account takes 5 business days, even those with an instant deposit time. Because transfers take a full business week to process, you should take into consideration that weekends and holidays might delay the time until the funds become accessible. Additionally, your bank or financial institution might take more time to process withdrawals. You should check their policies and make sure that they have all the information that they need in order to make this process easier.

Bonuses & Promotions

The different types of bonuses and rewards that TradeFred offers are very competitive. They include cash rewards, birthday checks, and swap refunds. The cashback offers are available after you execute 100 trades during a quarter. This bonus can range up to 50%, depending on your account type, and the funds are directly added to your balance. Only ForEx trades are eligible for this bonus.

While larger accounts receive more in cashback rewards, those with a smaller deposit can also get an exclusive refund on their spread fees. If you deposited 1,000 or less in the base currency (so 1,000 USD, GBP, or Euro), TradeFred will give you a refund on all the spreads you incurred during your first 14 days of trading with the broker. Positions that are held for less than 3 minutes, however, are ineligible for the refund. Hedged trades (where you long and short the same currency to protect yourself against losses) will only count as 1 trade and receive the refund accordingly. You will have the swap fees deposited into your account within a week after your 14th day with TradeFred.

TradeFred will also send you a $25 check on your birthday. While it is not as lucrative as other bonuses and rewards, it is still a nice token of appreciation that shows that the broker truly cares about traders. To be eligible for this, you must close at least 25 trades per quarter. Only accounts that have been active for 3 months or more will receive the birthday check.

There are two additional rewards that TradeFred provides you with: A First Deposit Credit and a Registration Reward. The First Deposit Credit is awarded to you based on how much funds you put in your account when you get started with the broker. The minimum amount is 300 of your base currency. Traders who deposit 300 to 499 receive a 100 currency unit credit, which proportionately increases with larger deposits. The maximum credit is 14,000, awarded to traders who initially fund their accounts with 40,000 in their base currency or more. The Registration Award is only available to Australian traders, who would receive $25 when they open an account. It is rewarded in USD.

Educational & Trading Tools

The TradeFred Academy educates traders about basic market concepts. This includes an introduction into Forex and CFD trading and an overview of technical analysis and fundamentals. Platinum and VIP account holders have free access to ebooks and webinars. Just as importantly, all accounts provide you with a personal trainer who actively oversees and, if requested, manages your portfolio. When it comes to live trading tools, TradeFred will provide you with daily market reviews, newsfeeds, economic calendars, and access to different technical signals.

Customer Service

You can get in touch with TradeFred via phone, email, or by filling out the contact form on their website. They offer an email address and phone number that traders from all locations can use, as well as support lines for account holders in specific countries.

• Email: [email protected]
• Phone (Universal): +61-280734453
• UK: +44-1613942198
• South Africa: +27-129428155
• Ireland: +353-766701255
• Denmark: +45-78733115
• Sweden: +46-500729267

Demo Account

Demo accounts are active for 14 days and you start with $10,000 in paper funds. The demos have the same features and instruments that live account traders access, as well as complimentary educational content. This will help beginners define their strategy and test different approaches before putting their actual funds at risk. In fact, TradeFred’s blog has an article with comprehensive and detailed reasons that show you how you can best benefit from your demo account experience.

Countries Accepted

TradeFred is regulated by the Vanuatu Financial Services Commission, the governmental body that oversees financial markets in the Republic of Vanuatu (an island that is not too far away from Australia). The broker’s services are available across the world, but they are not accessible to traders in the US, Canada, New Zealand, Japan, and Belgium.

Conclusion

If lucrative promotions and access to a wide range of financial instruments are important to you, then TradeFred is an excellent option. You will enjoy rewards in different forms, competitive leverage rates, and various account type options. Traders who want to be able to quickly withdraw their profits, on the other hand, might not appreciate how long it takes for outbound transactions to process. Similarly, crypto enthusiasts can only trade 3 Bitcoin currency pairs. Just as importantly, regardless of which of these features you like or dislike the most, TradeFred cannot be used in certain countries.

This broker can be a perfect fit for some traders, but others will find it to be completely inconvenient or inaccessible altogether. All of this is based on your trading strategy and the features that revolve around it.

Swissquote has established itself well in the industry and has managed to maintain a high level of popularity. Swissquite is regulated by FINMA, which, for those of you who don’t know, is the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority. In addition to offering Forex trading services, they are also renowned for their banking solutions, from regular online banking to mortgage solutions.

Account Types

Swissquote offers just one account to trade Forex, Cryptocurrencies, Stocks and more. The minimum deposit for this trading account is $1,000, which immediately gives the sense this trading service is for the more experienced/elite traders who are well-practiced and confident to deposit such an amount.

Platforms

With Swissquote, you may choose to use MetaTrader 4 or 5, or alternatively, you may use Advanced Trader, which is their very own customized platform.

Leverage

Note that leverage options are the same on both MetaTrader and Advanced trader (their own tailor-made platform). For trading the Forex Major pairs, leverage is 1:100. For all other pairs, you will need to refer to a PDF found on the website to calculate leverage according to the margin requirements of each pair.

Trade Sizes

Minimum trade sizes with Swissquote are 0.01 lot, on the MetaTrader platform, however for the Advanced Trader platform, the minimum is 1.000 lot. The maximum order sizes are dependent on the pair you are a trader. There is a full list set out on the website.

Trading Costs

Swissquote does not charge trade commissions, as they make their profit via the spread and rollovers. Swap fees are all set out on the website, a complete list is available, showing the swaps according to each currency pair.

Assets

Swissquote offers a fair variety of tradable assets being 138 Forex currencies and 7 Commodities. Swissquote does not offer Cryptos, Indices, or Stocks.

Spreads

Spreads vary according to the amount you have in your account; the higher you deposit, the better spreads you will have access to. For example, if you deposit $50,000, you will have access to the best spreads available.

Minimum Deposit

The minimum deposit requirement is $1,000 or the equivalent in an alternative currency. This could be an indication this broker is more suited to those traders with more experience.

Deposit Methods & Costs

You may fund your account via visa/Mastercard debit/credit card or via bank wire via Swissquote e-banking. Broker charges are not mentioned however your banking provider may apply charges so bear this in mind and check before completing the transaction.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

To withdraw fromSwissquote, you may send your funds to your Swissquote e-bank account. The only other alternative is an external bank wire transfer. There are no alternative options, according to the website. It makes sense to first be a Swissquote bank account holder and client before becoming a trading client also. The cost of a bank wire withdrawal is 2 EUR/CHF(external bank wire transfers), but for express transfers, it is 5 CHF. Depending on particular currencies, fees can vary and a full list is available via the website.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

All withdrawals are processed on the same day, however, no exact time scale could be provided by the live chat agents.

Bonuses & Promotions

Swissquote does not offer any deposit bonus schemes or similar promotions.

Educational & Trading Tools

Since Swissquote does not specifically target their service to traders but more on the banking side, it is not a surprise that they do not offer forex education training tools alongside their platform. Having said that, there is an array of free training material to be found online.

Customer Service

You may contact Swissquote via telephone, email, or live chat. The hours of operation are 9:00 – 18:00 CET Monday through to Friday.

Demo Account

You may open a demo account to test Swissquote trade conditions for yourself. This is always good practice before opening a live account to ensure a broker is suited to your style of trading.

Countries Accepted

It is not specific on which countries are restricted and which are accepted and when we asked live chat support, we were advised you will only know once you register when you will need to select your residing country from the list available. Should your country not appear, then you will not be accepted as a client.

Conclusion

Swissquote remains to be a very popular choice among traders, due to their strong quality of service they provide as well as the fact they are regulated. We believe this broker may be more suitable for those who have more experience and for those wishing to trade with higher capital since the minimum deposit requirement is rather high compared to the majority of Forex brokers.

For beginner traders, the website is not entirely easy to use and finding information is not easy. We communicated a lot with customer support live chat as a result of this, which made pinpointing basic information very time-consuming. All in all, the trade conditions offered are fair, and this broker offers a strong variety of assets to trade.

Belight Capital Group Limited is a Cyprus Investment Firm (CIF) regulated and supervised by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission. They operate under CIF Licence number 364/18 and Company registration number HE 345448, offering Forex services to all, but are seemingly targeting new traders. The BelightFX review that follows will shed light on the platform and services that this broker is currently providing.

Account Types

Accounts can be opened with a default currency of EUR (Euro), GBP (Pound Sterling) or USD (US Dollar). There are two types of accounts available to customers:

-Company Account
-Individual Account

When you register as a client with Belight they will perform an appropriateness test on you. They will test your knowledge, financial background, and experience in regard to financial services. Based on the scoring you receive, you will be informed whether you are eligible to receive their services and become one of their clients. You will also be informed of the maximum level of leverage you are entitled to.

One thing to be aware of is if your account is not used for 4 months then Belight reserve the right to start charging you fees to keep the account open. So if you do decide to stop using your account with them I’d advise you to close your account.

Platforms

No mention anywhere on their site on which platforms or web traders they use. I’ve contacted their customer support and have not had a response regarding this. A quick Google search tells me that they only provide a web trader and do not allow their clients to use MT4 or MT5.

Trading Conditions

You can place trades from your computer/device or alternatively, you can place trades over the phone. Belight is quite strict when it comes to the types of trading they allow. The following are not allowed and are classed as “Abusive Trading”

• Placing “buy stop” or “sell stop” orders prior to the release of news relevant to the Underlying Market or Asset.
• Arbitrage, manipulations or exploitation of any temporal and/or minor inaccuracy in any rate or price offered on the Trading Platform.
• A combination of faster/slower feeds.
• Abuse of the cancellation of trades features available on the Platform.
• Use (without the prior and written consent of the Company) of any robots, spiders or other automated data entry system with the Platform.
• Any software, which applies artificial intelligence analysis to the company’s systems and/or platform(s) and/or Client Account.

Leverage

Your maximum leverage will be determined when you sign up based on how you perform in the appropriateness test.

Trade Sizes

Traders can use standard lots, micro-lots and mini-lots. The actual minimum size of an order may be different for each type of account.

Trading Costs

Belight charge commission and/or adds mark-ups on quoted prices of CFDs (unless explicitly stated). They also obtain the price for swaps (in relation to any given type of CFD) from third party external reference sources such as its liquidity providers and (unless explicitly stated) does not add a mark-up on the swap prices it quotes. They claim that you will never find trading fees lower than theirs.

Assets

BelightFX will allow you to trade the following markets:

• Forex
• Indices
• Commodities

Spreads

There is no mention of the spreads on their website.

Margin Rules

When the margin level reaches 10% (ratio of equity to Margin in the Client Account), the client positions will start closing automatically at market prices (Stop Out level of 10%).

Liquidity Providers

BelightFX uses different liquidity providers and performs due diligence on them. The company places great significance on the choice of its liquidity providers as it strives to offer, on a consistent basis, best execution to its clients. Some of the parameters that the company evaluates include the following:

• Pricing frequency – how many ticks per second does the liquidity provider provide.
• Speed of communication/execution – How fast are the prices received/orders executed.
• Occurrence and frequency of price freezes.
• Depth of liquidity – What is the liquidity provided by the liquidity provider.
• If dealing back-to-back is the overall cost (i.e. total consideration paid by Clients) competitive compared to the industry.
• If dealing with back-to-back symmetry of slippage should be evaluated in detail for every order type.

Minimum Deposit

There is no information regarding the minimum deposit on their website.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Belight offers multi-currency deposits via two payment methods:

• Bank Transfer. Belight does not charge a fee to top up your account via bank transfer but does not guarantee that your bank will not charge fees.
• Secure Online Payment with Visa / Mastercard

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

There is no mention of withdrawal methods, cost and waiting times on their website.

Bonuses & Promotions

There is no mention of any bonuses or promotions on their website.

Educational & Trading Tools

After an apparent 5 minute long signup and deposit process, Belight will instantly provide you with educational material. What form this material is in is not made clear. You will also be given access to their Forex-centric blog where you can join others to share insights and ideas.

Customer Service

Belight has a contact form where you can get in touch with them. I tried this method for the purpose of the review as there is a fair bit of information missing on their website. After 4 days there has been no response.

You can also phone them on +357 222 71 830

If snail mail is you preferred contact method then you can contact them at:

1st floor
Flat 101
33 Larnakos Avenue
1046
Nicosia
Cyprus

All such communications are recorded by Belight Capital Group Ltd. Any such records shall be provided to you upon request.

There is a complaints procedure whereby you may submit a complaint in writing. The complaint will be acknowledged within five (5) business days from the receipt of your complaint.

Demo Account

There doesn’t appear to be the option of opening a demo account.

Countries Accepted

There are no restricted countries mentioned on the Belight website and they just state that you should not use their services if it is contrary to your local laws or regulations.

Conclusion

There is a fair amount of information missing from the Belight website such as trading platforms, spreads, minimum deposits, and withdrawal methods. This doesn’t make them a bad broker it just means they have some work to do in the web design department.

Of slightly more concern is the apparent lack of demo accounts. This is crucial, especially when they appear to only allow trading via their own web browser. Traders need time to get used to unfamiliar software and mistakes could be costly.

By far the biggest negative is the lack of response to all of my support requests. This is one area that any broker worth its’ salt should get right. It’s an easy fix and when they can’t get this right it’s a big reds flag for me.

Trade Centrum is part of the Goldenburg Group Limited group and provides investment services in several countries around the world and provides access to the financial markets. Clients have the ability to trade a large number of financial instruments. Trade Centrum consists of professionals who are willing to provide first-class service to clients. They claim to be one committed team always ready to help and have fast customer support (we’ll be testing that).

Trade Centrum is a Cypriot Investment Firm (CIF) supervised and regulated by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC). They are licensed to provide investment and ancillary services in relation to financial instruments.

Account Types

There are two account types available to open with Trade Centrum.
Personal Account – To open a personal account you will need to provide documentation to confirm your identity. Your passport or driving licence will be sufficient. You will also need to provide proof of address. This can be a utility bill or bank statement.

Business Account – If the client is interested in establishing an account for a business or other type of business entity, there are a few more hoops to jump through with regard to documentation. Documents such as Certificate of Incorporation, Memorandum (and Articles) of Association, Company Charter will all need to be supplied.

Platforms

Trade Centrum offers MT5 as their trading platform and this can be downloaded to any desktop PC, Android device or iOS device. You can also access your trading account from any Internet browser.

Leverage

Trade Centrum offers a default highest leverage of 1:30 when you open an account with them. You may request higher leverage up to a maximum of 1:100 and this request will be granted based on your knowledge and experience.

Trade Sizes

You can trade with standard lots only.

Trading Costs

Swap Fees – Swaps will be charged at the end of each business day. Triple swaps will be charged on Wednesday.

Management Fee – Holding physical stocks leads to the management fee which will be charged at the end of each business day. Please note, that on Wednesdays the fee will be tripled.

Maintenance Fee – This is a charge of up to EUR 40, which will be charged if the trading account is inactive or dormant for 6 months. The maintenance fee will be charged on a monthly basis.

Assets

A quick glance on their website shows the following tradable assets:

Forex – 62 Forex pairs.

Commodities – Trade in commodities like petroleum, gold, precious metals or different cereals.

Shares – Buy shares in a company. You become a shareholder of the company. Thus, the share represents a share in the ownership of the company and, at the same time, the right to participate in the profit.

Indices – Indices are a statistical indicator that measures the development and performance of the entire market. They represent a set of stocks within a whole and can be considered as their average price.

Shares CFD – Trade shares with the largest investment companies like Google, Amazon or Apple. Trading in shares in the form of CFDs is one of the most common trading methods. CFD offers traders an opportunity to open both long and short positions because the traders themselves do not physically own the shares and the subject of the deal is just a contract that copies the price of the underlying asset.

Spreads

Spreads are variable which means they fluctuate and market conditions may cause widening or narrowing of spreads beyond the boundaries of typical spreads. Spreads for EUR/USD can be as low as 3 pips.

Margin Rules

At a 100% margin level, clients are alerted by the platform that they are close to automatic liquidation of their position. Clients will receive an automatic notification only if they are logged on to the platform. Therefore, clients are warned to log on regularly to the platform and monitor the value of their assets and relevant notifications. Clients are also warned that if their margin falls below 50%, the platform automatically closes their positions.

Liquidity Providers: There is no information on their website regarding their liquidity providers.

Deposit Methods & Costs

The following deposit methods are available to you with Trade Centrum:

• Bank Transfer
• Visa Credit Card
• Dotpay

Trade Centrum does not charge fees for any of the deposit options above. However, they don’t cover 3rd party charges and state that “all fees for payments and transfers of a third party will be borne by the Client and the Company will deduct the respective amount from the Client Account.”

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Only one withdrawal method and that is by Bank Transfer. The minimum withdrawal amount is $250. Trade Centrum does not charge fees for withdrawals but will not cover 3rd party fees as mentioned above.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

There is no indication as to how long withdrawals take on their website.

Bonuses & Promotions

Trade Centrum does not currently offer a signup bonus or any other promotions.

Educational & Trading Tools

Trade Centrum provides clients with a few educational tools. These include webinars and videos to explain the basics of using the business platform and to introduce basic business strategies. There is an economic news page on their website detailing upcoming news events along with a daily Forex analysis page. They also provide newsletters to keep clients informed.

Customer Service

Trade Centrum have the following customer support options:

• Telephone – Contact number is +357 2505 6478
• Fax – Fax number is +357 2202 2664
• Email – [email protected]
• Website Contact Form – You can send your query using this method if you don’t have access to your email client.
• Snail Mail – Physical address is: 1 Siafi Street, Porto Bello BLD, 3042, Limassol, Cyprus. (I tested the email support option to ask a few questions for the purpose of this review and after a week of waiting, I am still to get a response.)

Demo Account

The demo account is limited to 30 days, after that, you have the option to switch to a LIVE account.

Countries Accepted

No mention of any restricted countries on their website.

Conclusion

There are plenty of assets to trade at Trade Centrum which is always good to see. They have a few deposit and withdrawal options which are another plus. On the negative side, they fall down where many other brokers fall down and that is with their customer support offering. Waiting a week for an email to be answered is not good customer service. Also, traders should be allowed to use demo accounts indefinitely and not be time-restricted.

Opened for business in 2014, Tallinex operates from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, relying strongly on fund segregation and attractive trading conditions to appeal to Forex traders in search of a broker. The firm acts as a true ECN/STP broker, eliminating any dealer intervention. In the Tallinex review that follows, we’ll tell you exactly how attractive those conditions actually are, and also provide information regarding their banking procedures, trading platform, account types, and more.

Account Types

Tallinex offers the following three types of trading accounts:

• ECN-MICRO
• ECN-PRO
• PRO-MANAGED

The Tallinex ECN-MICRO account was designed with new FX traders in mind, thus providing the following:

• Variable spreads starting at 1.8 pips
• Average spread is 2.5 pips
• Commission-free trading
• Leverage from 1:1 to 1:1000
• Smallest trade size is 0.01 lots (1,000)
• Smallest increment is 0.01 lots (1,000)
• Minimum opening deposit is $100 / EUR 100
• No dealing desk intervention
• Margin call / Stop-out levels: 150% / 100%
• No re-quotes

The Tallinex ECN-PRO account offers raw-spreads and ideal trading conditions for professional and institutional traders, including:

• Variable spreads starting at 0.0 pips
• Average spread is 0.6 pips
• ECN commission of $6 per 100,000 round turn
• Leverage from 1:1 up to 1:500
• Smallest trade size is 0.10 lots (10,000)
• Smallest increment is 0.01 lots (1,000)
• Minimum opening deposit is $2,000 / EUR 2,000
• No dealing desk intervention
• Margin call / Stop out levels: 150% / 100%
• No re-quotes
• Hedging allowed
• Pricing to 5 decimals
• True ECN liquidity

PRO-MANAGED accounts are for traders who want to earn money from Forex, but wish to do so without spending lots of time learning how to be an advanced trader. Tallinex’s PAMM system allows Money Managers to trade your account for you, all without having direct access to it. As the owner of this type of account, you will be allowed to monitor trades live as they happen, and review past activity. Features of the PRO-MANAGED account include:

• Variable spreads starting at 0.0 pips
• Average spread of 0.5 pips
• Leverage from 1:1 up to 1:500
• Smallest trade size is 0.01 lots
• No dealing desk
• Margin call / Stop-out levels: 150% / 100%
• No re-quotes
• Pricing to 5 decimals
• 100% bonus for all deposits
• True ECN liquidity

Platform

Tallinex provides the MT4 trading platform, making it available to international clients in 32 languages. Its built-in technical analysis tools help with the prediction of price fluctuations and the tracking of real-time market movements. Dedicated servers and high-tech software work together to ensure fast response times, efficient trade processing, and the highest possible level of liquidity. The firm uses an STP model with real-time market and price feeds provided by FSA regulated banks. Hedging is allowed, as are scalping strategies and all types EAs, with no restrictions.

Leverage

Currently, 1:1000 is the maximum leverage limit for ECN-MICRO account types. There is a maximum leverage ratio of 1:500 for ECN-PRO accounts. We did note the following in small print on the Tallinex website, “Leverage above 1:400 for Micro accounts / 1:200 for Pro accounts is subject to assessment” and wondered how this assessment is completed and by whom. With this statement in place, we can only assume that there could be at least some possible leverage restrictions when attempting to use higher levels of leverage.

Trade Sizes

The smallest trade size is 0.01 lots for the ECN-MICRO account and 0.10 lots for the ECN-PRO account. The PRO MANAGED account also has a minimum trade size requirement of 0.01 lots. No information is provided with regards to the largest allowed trade size, but the MetaTrader 4 base platform has a maximum allowance of 1,000 lots. Do check with the Tallinex support team if you’re planning on entering into large positions and need to know the exact maximum allowed size.

Trading Costs

If you opt for the ECN-PRO account, you’ll be asked to pay a commission charge of $3 per $100,000 per trade side, or in other words, $6.00 per lot ($100,000) round-turn. There is no commission charged on the ECN-MICRO account, but you can expect higher spreads with this account type. There is no mention of any commission charges in relation to the PRO-MANAGED account type, so we are going to assume there aren’t any until we’re told otherwise.

Assets

The Tallinex website states that 49 currency pairs are offered, but there is no asset listing provided. It could very well be that there are no other asset types and no cryptocurrencies to trade on, and it would be nice if the firm would provide a bit more information on the assets that it provides. It should be possible to contact their support team to request a comprehensive asset listing though, and we do recommend doing this to ensure that you’re preferred assets are going to be accessible.

Spreads

The minimum spread on the ECN MICRO account is 1.8 pips, while the minimum on the ECN PRO is 0.0 pips. The average spread on the EUR/USD pair with the MICRO account is 2.5 pips and 0.6 pips on the PRO account (this varies between 0.0 and 1.0, depending on the time of day and market conditions). The best way to assess a full breakdown of Tallinex spreads is to register for a free demo account, which provides the same trading conditions as the real platform.

Minimum Deposit

When clicking on the “Depositing” link to find information related to account funding, we were re-directed to an accounts information page. On that page we were able to find the minimum deposit requirements, which were:

ECN-MICRO – US$ 100 / € 100
ECN-PRO – US$ 2 000 / € 2 000

We then ventured over to the PRO-MANAGED account page in seek of the minimum for that account and were unable to locate any minimum deposit requirement.

Deposit Methods & Costs

It was equally as difficult to find any information related to deposit methods and costs. However, we did locate one deposit-related question within the FAQ’s which told us that currently, wire transfer is the only accepted deposit method. If this is the case, then it is definitely a drawback to using this broker. There was no mention of any fees or costs related to using this payment method to fund an account.

UPDATE: At a later time, we did find an area of the site that stated the following, “Various deposit & withdrawal options are available, such as bank wire transfer, credit/debit card, etc.” Even so, the FAQ clearly stated that bank wire was the only option, so there is conflicting information being offered to prospective clients.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The “Withdrawing” page of the website also redirects to an accounts page where there is no information to be found regarding withdrawals. We can assume that if bank wire transfer is the only accepted deposit method, it stands to reason that it will be the only available withdrawal method. With most brokers, there is a fee for wire withdrawals, but no such information was provided by Tallinex. Because of this, we recommend contacting their support team prior to funding an account with them.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Once again, no information was to be found. We did take the time to read other Tallinex reviews online to see if we could find any credible information related to payment processing with this broker and were unable to find any recent information to pass along. What we do know is that once a withdrawal request is reviewed, approved, and paid out, the wait time for payment to arrive ranges anywhere from 2 to 14 business days. The average wait time is somewhere between the two, usually around 5 to 7 business days.

Bonuses & Promotions

All clients are automatically eligible for a 100% withdrawable deposit bonus. Each deposit of new funds is recorded in the Tallinex system and can be earned back as cash after meeting the required trade volume. The volume requirement is currently set at 0.50 lots per currency unit traded, and there is no time limit for meeting the full requirement. The Tallinex website goes on to state that, “Account withdrawals (up to the full account balance) are permitted without affecting qualification progress – to resume bonus qualification, simply deposit additional funds and begin trading again. Full details are available on our Terms of Use page.”

Educational & Trading Tools

The Tallinex education center does provide a number of guides, an e-book, Forex trading instructions, FX strategies, and more. A news section is also provided on the company website, but this does not appear to be updated frequently. Most tools are built into the platform itself, but the firm does offer free Forex signals that are apparently available to all clients, regardless of their chosen account type.

Demo Account

Free demo accounts are provided by Tallinex and these will not expire, provided that they are being used. Any unused demo account will be automatically deleted after a period of 30-days of inactivity. According to information found on the broker’s website, demo accounts behave exactly like live accounts, sharing the same specifications and price feed. This is excellent, as it allows one to experience exactly what it would be like to trade with this FX broker, all without taking on any financial risk.

Customer Service

Multi-lingual support in English, Spanish and Russian is provided. Support is offered via live chat, phone, and email (via an on-site ticket system). No specific customer service hours were provided, so we’re unsure as to when the support staff will be available. By phone, the broker can be reached by calling +1-855-241-2214. When not using the ticket system, general inquiry emails can be sent to [email protected].

Countries Accepted

The broker’s website has the following to say regarding service location restrictions, “Tallinex does not solicit residents of the United States of America, Canada, Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands, US Virgin Islands, United States Minor Outlying Islands or St Vincent and The Grenadines in relation to the provision of retail Forex services, and no option exists for residents of those countries to apply for retail Forex services due to regulatory requirements.

Conclusion

We’re conflicted about this one. On one hand, the broker has been in operation for a number of years now. Longevity tends to be a sign of reliability. On the other hand, key information which would assist one in making a decision about which Forex broker to select is missing from the broker’s website. So much was missing, in fact, that this Tallinex review seems incomplete in many ways. Our advice? Reach out to the Tallinex support team, ask questions, and have a lengthy discussion before making your final decision on whether or not to partner with this FX broker.

Hamilton Club is a forex and CFD broker that is located in Saint Vincent & the Grenadines. On their website, the company explains that they have had more than ten years of experience in the Forex market and that their attractive trading conditions have helped them to form a large client base. The broker also takes credit for helping their clients earn 2.5 million daily and has earned awards, both for being innovative and for Best Russian Broker 2018. After investigating, our research revealed that this broker is ideal for one specific type of trader. Keep reading to find out if you belong in that category, or if you should continue looking elsewhere.

Account Types

In total, Hamilton offers four different account types, with the choices being Standard Micro, Standard, Professional Micro, and Professional accounts. This broker assigns status levels to each account type, based on a certain deposit minimum that is made. Status levels range from the default Silver and top out at Diamond status. So, for example, the most basic account would be a Silver Standard account, while a Diamond Professional account would be the account type with the lowest trading costs, but we will explain how costs are affected in more detail later.

One of the main differences for the account types would be that the Micro account options both offer trading on currency pairs, raw materials, and metals. Meanwhile, both of the main account types offer trading on currency pairs, raw materials, metals, stocks, indices, and cryptocurrencies. The Professional account types offer lower spreads and commissions than those available on the Standard accounts, but exact details differ, based on the status level we mentioned earlier. The accounts share the same leverage options.

Platform

Like many of their competitors, this broker exclusively features the MetaTrader 4 platform as their sole trading platform. Allow us to catch you up to speed if you aren’t already aware of what this trading platform offers. Many traders would point out the easy to use, customizable user-interface as a clear advantage to choosing this platform, while others would mention the built-in programming language, which allows one to create your own advisors and indicators. MT4 also comes with many built-in tools, technical indicators, analytical objects, and more.

The platform is highly accessible, so traders should have no problem accessing it from anywhere, even on the go. The program can be downloaded on PC, Mac, iOS, and Android. Keep in mind that this also means you can access MT4 from your smartphone, tablet, or any other device that supports the App Store or Google Play. To access the download links, you can select the ‘Trading Platform’ from the website’s main menu.

Leverage

Regardless of which account type you choose, you’ll have access to the same leverage options, starting from 1:1 and including 1:50, 1:100, and the highest option, 1:500. Generally, many professional traders feel that choosing leverage of around 1:100 is ideal. However, those that enjoy high-risk, high-reward trading prefer high leverages, so the 1:500 option would be perfect. Overall, this broker is offering an excellent selection of leverages, including the most ideal option, and an option that is high above average. Whatever your situation is, you should be satisfied with these choices.

Trade Sizes

The smallest allowed trade size would be one micro lot on all account types. Micro accounts limit the maximum trade size to 1 lot, while there is a limit of 50 lots on the other account types. Also, only one open position is allowed on the Micro accounts, but there is an unlimited amount offered on the main account types. Therefore, you’ll want to avoid Micro accounts if you prefer a larger trading volume and opening multiple positions at once. The stop-out level is set at 30% on Micro accounts and 20% on the main account types.

Trading Costs

On the website, one can use an interactive chart that shows what type of commission would be charged. First, you would choose a status level: Silver is the default, then there is Gold, Platinum, and Diamond. Next, you would choose an account type, with the options being Standard + Standard Micro and Professional + Professional Micro. Finally, you can select an instrument from a drop-down list in order to view the applicable commissions and spreads. From what we learned, opening a Professional account, including the Mini version, grants commission charges that are always 0.002% lower than those charged on the Standard account types. Below, we have provided some examples for different scenarios, but you can also use this chart to compare the results yourself.
Silver Status: 0.013% for the majority of instruments on Standard account types, going as high as 0.16%; conditions are always 0.002% lower on each asset for the Professional account types. (Default)

Gold Status: 0.011% for the majority of instruments on Standard account types, going as high as 0.14%; conditions are typically 0.002% lower on each asset for the Professional account types. (Requires a $10,000 deposit)

Platinum Status: 0.09% for the majority of instruments on Standard account types, going as high as 0.12%; conditions are typically 0.002% lower, or more, on the Professional account types. (Requires $50,000 deposit)

Diamond Status: 0.007% for the majority of instruments on Standard account types, going as high as 0.1%; conditions are typically 0.002% lower on the Professional account types.

In addition to the applicable commission charges, one should be prepared to pay rollover interest on any positions that are held overnight.

Assets

The Micro account versions of the Standard and Professional account types offer the least variety of tradable instruments, with options bring limited to currency pairs, raw materials, and metals. The Standard and Professional account types offer trading on all of these options, including a larger variety of metals, stocks, indices, and cryptocurrencies. The website doesn’t offer more specific information on the assets in each category, so we cannot go into further detail about each category.

Spreads

Remember earlier, when we explained how the interactive chart on the website can be used to view commission charges? The same exact chart can be used to gain examples of spreads. However, the differences in the spread on each account status and account type vary more greatly. From what we learned, it seems that each status level affects the spreads, as well as whether the account is Standard or Professional. Of course, the spreads are highest on the Silver account status and are best on the Diamond status.

The Professional account types also seem to offer spreads that are significantly lower than those offered on the Standard account types. It seems that spreads are higher than average on all of the Standard account options, but can be lower than average on all of the Professional account types. Comparing all of the options can be exhausting, so we provided an example using the AUD/CAD currency pair below. Note that spreads are floating. If you’d like, you can use the interactive chart by choosing ‘Trade on Forex’ under ‘Products and Services’.

The spread on AUD/CAD is 2.5 pips on the Silver status Standard account types. On the Professional account types of the same status, the spread is 1.2 pips. On the same asset type, the spread is 2.3 pips on the Gold Standard accounts and from 1 pip on the Professional account types. The same asset type has spreads starting from 2.1 pips on the Platinum Standard accounts and from 0.8 pips on the Professional account types. The best status level, Diamond, offers spreads from 1.9 pips on the Standard account types and from 0.6 pips on the Professional account types.

Minimum Deposit

All account types are automatically assigned the Silver status level, which doesn’t seem to require a minimum deposit. To earn the Gold account status, you’ll need to make a deposit of $10,000. The next best account would be the Platinum status level, with a minimum deposit of $50,000. The very best status would be Diamond. A $100,000 deposit is required to earn this title, so acquiring this status level will be beyond many trader’s reach. As we explained earlier, this broker offers the very best conditions to those that can afford the higher deposits. This isn’t uncommon in the Forex world, but we wish that it was more realistic for an average trader to afford one of the better two account types.

Funding

This broker does not offer much information about their funding methods and procedures. We do know that MNP, Visa/MasterCard, WebMoney, Qiwi, and Rhaekc are all listed on the website, so we assume that these are the methods currently offered for funding and withdrawing. The website doesn’t offer details until your account has been approved, so we can’t say much more from there. The best advice for this situation would be to be prepared in case there are any withdrawal fees and to try to request withdrawals in advance of when you’ll actually need the funds. Otherwise, you could reach out to support for more information.

Bonuses & Promotions

All promotional offers are valid on all account types. Terms and conditions apply to all of the options, but those details are not available on the website, so be sure to contact your account manager to ask for the details. Keep in mind that there are likely conditions, like a certain deposit requirement to apply for a bonus, limits on when the client can withdraw funds, etc. that you’ll want to consider if you’d like to qualify for any of these offers. All opportunities have been listed below.

-Deposit Bonus: Get an additional 25%-100% added to your trading account, based on your deposit amount. The broker applies status levels to each deposit amount and the status level determines how much of a deposit is needed. Note that these status levels are given different names that the main status levels, and really only matter with regards to this section. The levels are as follows:

• VIP White: $10,000 deposit = 25% bonus
• VIP Blue: $50,000 deposit = 50% bonus
• VIP Black: $100,000 deposit = 100% bonus

-Trade After Pay: Begin trading for bonus funds and the company will provide 10 days to replenish the funds.

-Commission Compensation: Broker will refund two times the amount paid in commission fees directly to the client’s trading account.

-Interest on Deposit: Earn 1-2% per month on your deposit, adding up to a total of 12%-24% paid back in interest. Note that 12% interest is paid back for VIP White status, 50% for VIP Blue status, and up to 24% for VIP Black status.

Educational & Trading Tools

We’ll start by highlighting the educational opportunities available on the company’s website. First, there are free 14-day Forex courses that are aimed towards providing one with enough knowledge to be prepared for trading. The company offers a Basic, Advanced, and Professional course, so these can be beneficial for traders of all different skill levels. In addition, you’ll find a Forex Glossary, which is filled with helpful definitions. All of the technical tools include Copy Trading, Analytical Research, an Event Calendar, Trading Forecasts, AutoChartist, Prime News, Macroeconomic Indicators, and FxWirePro.

The latter is a professional information service that allows you to receive the actual stream of news from the financial markets directly. Copy Trading provides the ability to choose for your account to automatically copy the trades of a selected professional trader. This could be a golden opportunity for those that don’t have much knowledge, although you may want to test this feature with caution, just to be sure that your chosen trader really knows what they’re doing.

Demo Account

Considering the fact that the website does not mention demo accounts and we could not find anywhere to sign up, we must conclude that this broker simply doesn’t offer the ability to open practice accounts. Sadly, these account types can be extremely beneficial for those that need experience trading. This isn’t enough of a reason to choose another broker, but we do wish this broker would add these account types in the future.

Customer Service

Hamilton provides customer support 7 days a week via email, phone, ticket, or social media. All clients will use the same email address to contact support, but there are multiple phone numbers listed, so you’ll need to use the best one based on your location. A ticket can also be created by choosing ‘Questions’ under ‘Support’ when logged into your account. This broker is also active on social media and updates their Facebook regularly. Support can be messaged directly via Telegram as well. All contact information, including links to social media accounts, have been listed below.

Email: [email protected]

Phone:

• United Kingdom: +44 (8000) 698-465
• United States: +1 (888) 718-65-94
• Canada: +1 (888) 718-65-94
• Russia: +7 (800) 200-00-51
• Mexico: +52 (800) 269-44-52
• France: +33 (805) 0-888-59
• Japan: +81 (120) 963-036

Address: First Floor, First St. Vincent Bank Building, James Street, Kingstown, St. Vincent & the Grenadines.

Social Media:

• VK: vk.com/hamiltonclub
• Facebook: Facebook.com/hamilton-club-480213925679638
• Ok: Ok.ru/group58415991160893
• Telegram: t.me/HamiltonResearch_bot

Countries Accepted

Hamilton Club’s convenient location in St. Vincent & the Grenadines makes it possible for them to provide less restrictive rules. Therefore, all countries appear to be accepted. We were especially happy to note that the United States is included in this list, and the company even provides a direct phone line to clients located in the US.

Conclusion

Hamilton Club is a forex and CFD broker that offers trading on various assets, including cryptocurrencies, on four different account types. Some of the highlights would be the flexible leverage offers on all account types, the fact that clients from all locations are accepted, and the great educational offers and trading tools available. However, the best trading conditions are reserved for the clients that can make larger deposits. Another downside would be the lack of information on the site about funding.

This broker definitely rewards those that afford to make larger deposits. If you can afford the $10,000-$50,000 deposit requirement that grants a better account status level, then you’ll have access to the very best trading costs. Otherwise, you may have a harder time profiting under the conditions on the most basic account types. This is an excellent broker for those that are more established, but we are always looking for advantages for the underdogs.

Genetrade is an offshore broker located and regulated in Belize. As one of the attractive solutions for broker companies that seek an easy entry and regulation, Belize regulatory authority – International Financial Services Commission (IFSC) has a sound name but not much to offer in terms of client protection. Genetrade is one such brand under Genius Trading LTD company, using its own payment processing company in Cyprus. Owning such a company makes easier approvals for VISA and MasterCard transactions.

Genetrade has a good and polished website where information is structured and covers important topics for investors. Although, a lot of redundant, empty marketing words are used, common for brokers that just fill the page without any argumentable, defined content. Genetrade highlights the high leverage level and bonus promotion, one of the two most effective lead collectors for offshore brokers. Still, this can be understandable considering Genetrade needs some popularity. This review will evaluate whats great about this broker as many that try to break through the competition offer good value for money.

Account Types

From the moment you open the Account Types page, Genetrade wants to point to benefits traders will have. Transparency, fast executions without re-quotes, no Dealing Desk, MetaTrader 4 platform, Global customer support, and Account Manager. This is what most traders want to hear, we will test these claims in the next sections. Account types are limited to two, and they differ by lot trading sizes, and that’s all.

Micro Account allows trading in 0.01 lots or micro-lots, while Standard Account contract size is 100.000 units or one lot. Available base currencies for both Account types are USD, EUR, GBP, JPY, HUF, PLN, and ZAR. Furthermore, accounts are commission-free, have low spreads, and swap-free for Islamic clients. Genetrade does not restrict trading styles such as scalping, hedging, or news trading. Overall, great offer without many Account types with different packages and scaling deposit levels which is common with other brokers.

Platforms

Genetrade is focused only on the MetaTrader 4 platform. MT4 is available as a direct web browser version without any installation which looks like the ordinary desktop MT4 variant. Mobile versions are supported for Andriod and iOS and desktop for PC and Mac. Once launched, the MT4 Platform will log in with blazing speed. The communication lag to the server was a very fast 40ms on average.

Everything is set to default except the one-click trading buttons are turned on. The execution times are averaging a bit above 100ms which is very good compared to other brokers. Traders will have the latest version of the platform that feels really responsive to Genetrade’s servers. The margin levels will not reflect the leverage you have selected during the registration so traders will have to remember what is set during the sign-up process or calculate manually. MT4 is the standard among brokers and actually trading quality depends on how good is the broker network connection.

Genetrade has one more web platform, Sirix This platform has a social module integrated and is shown on the right side as a social feed of other traders. This way clients that do not have any skills can copy the trades of others, follow them and analyze them to develop their ideas. This platform is available for real accounts.

Leverage

One of the selling points of Genetrade Is the leverage up to 1:1000. This is available for both account types and all assets. This also means Gold leverage is up to 1:1000, which is rare to see in the industry. This kind of leverage cannot be allowed within regulated brokers in the EU or USA and can be attractive to some high-risk traders. It is not obligatory to use this leverage, clients can change it to lower values.

Trade Sizes

Trade sizes are divided by the two account types, Standard and Micro. The minimal trading volume is 0.01 lots for the Micro as the name suggests. Volume steps are also in 0.01 lots giving traders to employ low risk, precision scale in and out strategies. The maximum volume for one trade is 50 lots. The Standard Account has the minimum volume set to 1 lot and apparently is catered for bigger deposits. Combining this with high leverage also opens the trading field for a lower deposit, high-risk traders.

Trading Costs

Genetrade does not charge commissions for any of the account types. Trading costs in terms of swaps for non-Islamic accounts are under normal levels. Not all swaps are negative, For EUR/USD the swap is +2.19 and –9.21 points for a long position. Gold has -10.14 long and -0.42 short position swap, although the majority of forex pairs have a negative swap. Genetrade is very transparent for fees and trading costs and presents all instrument swap table. We have checked the accuracy and found out the table is not updated to the levels in the MT4 platform. After 100 days of trading inactivity, the client’s account will be regarded as dormant and a $10 fee will be charged every month.

Assets

Probably one of the weakest points of Genetrade is the assets offer range. This is Forex focused broker, there are no commodities, shares, indices or crypto. Precious metals are limited to two, spot Gold and Silver. A total of 57 currency pairs reveals that at least the Forex category is fully developed. Apart from the major pairs, there is a fair number of exotic pairs. Traders can find USD/RUB, USD/PLN, USD/HUF, USD/HKD, USD/HKD, USD/ZAR, USD/CNY, USD/TRY and Scandinavian currencies under US Dollar-denominated exotics.

Furthermore, the options are extended with the EUR denominated combinations and also some with GBP. Certainly, Forex traders do not need to look elsewhere.
If you stumble under the Indicies category on the Genetrade website, you may see that it is available, in practice it is not yet introduced. The Genetrade staff informed us that they plan to expand soon.

Spreads

When brokers promote variable spreads from 1 pip the statement will hold even if it is 50 pips. Genetrade 1 pip spread was never reached even for the most liquid pair. Although, the EUR/USD pair spread is around 1.7 pips which is acceptable. The spread level for other currencies varies considerably, so, for example, the GBP/JPY has a 4.5 pip spread, AUD/NZD 4.9, EUR/NZD 8.5 pips and the GPB/NZD has a wide 10.8 pips spread in normal conditions. Taking a look back at the “from 1 pip” offer will make traders aware that it is just pure marketing. For the spot Gold and Silver, the spread is around 4 pips, making it one of the top 50 spreads offered for these assets.

Minimum Deposit

Since Genetrade is still new and offers basically one account type, it tries to attract new traders to the pool. If low spreads and assets range does not work, the minimum deposit will. For $5 you can apply for a live account for both types, although we are not sure if a $5 deposit is normal for the 1 lot minimal trade Standard Account sets.

Deposit Methods & Costs

The payment options for withdrawal and deposit vary from area to area. Clients can see the options once they login to the Members area. Globally, Genetrades will accept deposits from Bank Wires, Credit /Debit Cards, Skrill, PayTrust, Bitwallet, and Netteler. There are no fees for any deposit method except for Skrill charged 2% of the deposit amount.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

The minimum withdrawal is $10, no fees are charged by the Genetrade. When clients request multiple withdrawals is a short time, Genetrade will process it as one to minimize the transaction costs. In the Terms and Conditions document, there is a statement that enables Genetrade to impose fees and limits to their system at any time. The support staff told us that this case has never happened, probably it Is set there for future changes or just as a legal safety.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Processing time is usually instant, for Bank Wires It depends on the client’s bank and will take between 3-5 days. Genetrade will process the request in a few hours. Interestingly, If the client has used the Credit/Debit Card for deposit, any profits made will be sent by Bank Wire, but also a client can choose his e-wallet. Most brokers will only use the Bank Wire method for profits. Withdrawals are possible even when the markets are closed.

Bonuses & Promotions

Genetrade has a very interesting bonus that is not based on the trading volume. A simple idea, 50% Deposit Bonus up to $5,000 will be credited without any deposit minimums. After a withdrawal request, the bonus will be canceled and any profits gained are available for withdrawal too. This kind of bonus is additional equity that enables bigger positions and potentially a bigger share of profits. What is great about this bonus is that there are no special conditions or funds lockup. For the broker, it affects the number of withdrawal requests as traders want to utilize the bonus funds as long as possible.

Educational & Trading Tools

Apart from the mentioned Sirix social trading platform, Genetrade has no educational material available. Also no news or analysis section. Genetrade probably does not see immediate value from this and want to keep focused on assets expansion.

VPS service is available for free. This feature is online 24/7 but has certain requirements. Traders need to maintain at least $5000 equity and trade at least 5 lots per month. This is valid for all client’s accounts cumulatively. Even if you do not qualify for free VPS, it is still available for $28 per month.

Customer Service

Genetrade support is available, although not 24/5 as described. The chat was not always available, and when it was there was no waiting queue. Support representatives act politely and give relevant answers to our questions, still, there is a room for improvement to give better answers. Genetrade is also reachable via email but we did not find a phone line that is stated on the web site. Overall, the support this broker provides is better than average.

Demo Account

The demo registration process is easy after filling the email and other details. To our surprise, Genetrade had internal server errors that blocked us to make one. Only the real account worked. We have approached the support with the issue just to receive a reply to try again later. We are unsure if this is just a mechanic to open a real account instead since it just requires $5.

The demo is not time-limited if traders are active. After 90 days of inactivity it will be closed automatically, but another one is always possible. You can maintain up to 5 demo accounts at one time.

Countries Accepted

Genetrade does not have a long list of banned countries. Full information on this is not disclosed on the website or the legal documents. The list we got is from their support: United States, North Korea, Syria, Sudan, Cuba, Iran, Belize, Burundi, Iraq, and Mali.
Interestingly, Japan is not on the list, and as we are told, clients form Japan are Genetrade’s target group. This is further confirmed by the Japanese version of their web site.

Conclusion

Genetrade is an ECN STP model broker that utilizes the regulatory liberty to provide high leverage, better deposit/withdrawals, account types conditions, bonus model and wider global client coverage. As a new broker, it does not have a large client pool and the situation may change as it gets bigger. Traders will not enjoy tight security but will have more freedom, both for trading and off trading. The main drawback, for now, could be the lack of other trading instruments categories.

Looking at the benchmark sites, this broker does not have notable reviews except the one about the possible fake arbitrage trading foul that Genetrade does not allow. Genetrade is a good example of how bonuses could be made to benefit both the trader and the broker without complex, unethical rules. Furthermore, trying out this broker service is affordable considering the low deposit requirements. In the long term, traders will need to understand the risk of a growing and changing broker such as Genetrade to the extent that conditions offered now might quickly change tomorrow.

VT Markets is a brand of Vantage International Group Limited, under a Vantage Global Prime Pty Ltd company regulated by ASIC. This group also has VantageFX and KlimexCM brands under their control. VantageFX is much more popular than newly established VT Markets and this is an attempt to get around more restrictive ASIC regulation for overseas operations. This caused Vantage International to open different brands under different regulators like the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority (CIMA).

VT Markets internationally are regulated by this authority yet also regulated by ASIC for Australia clients. VT Markets is a kind of an extension of VantageFX to Asia-pacific region setting targets to China, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore markets. Although still new and unpopular, judging by other brands, this broker has a solid set up to bring quality service to traders, developed IT solutions and structure for features, and a good business model for sustainability. We will research each section to see what makes VT Markets stand out.

Account Types

VT Markets offers VIP ECN Account and Standard STP (Straight Through Processing) Account. The VIP Account is still not available and as to when will more options come online is unknown. It is said that traders will have a lot of account types to choose from, based on their trading style. Unfortunately, it is just one – Standard STP for now. This account encompasses all the styles, EAs, scalping, hedging, news trading, all allowed. The opening process is simplified, primarily oriented to Asian clients, where VT Markets is focused on. This is a Metatrader 4 platform only account, no commissions, with low spreads.

VT Markets put a lot of effort to connect with as many liquidity providers as possible to get the best spreads but also fast executions. Over 13 large and well-known LPs are listed, among them, JP Morgan, Bank Of America, Barclays, Citi Bank, Deutsche Bank, and more are connected via oneZero Financial Systems company’s MT4 Liquidity Hub. This is one of the leading choices brokers worldwide decide to implement for connection to liquidity providers. The MT5 platform accounts will be possible in the future and it is one of the VT Markets objectives. In the next sections, we will test the technology this broker speaks about and if it holds to the words on the transparent and informative website.

Platforms

As already mentioned above, Metatrader 4 is the only available platform available in all of its iterations for desktop and smart devices. MT4 web is also set up for those that do not want to install anything. The MT5 is announced to be adopted as Metaquotes slowly develops the support for that platform, although many brokers have adopted MT5 a long time ago. VT Markets MT4 is in default settings, latest build, pinging to the North Virginia server in 1.15ms, although the first issue we have noticed is the black, waiting for update chart on USD/CHF currency pair. The reason behind this is that the normally quoted-pair is called USD/CHF-VIP instead. We assume this is because of VT Markets preparation for the VIP ECN Account package, yet, this pair is not exotic in any way.

Whatsoever, almost all of the Forex pairs have the VIP suffix, leaving us confused about VT Markets decisions on account types range. The execution times are above 200ms mark averaging 250ms showing mostly slower executions times compared to other brokers, especially concerning STP ECN types where VT Markets belong. Whatsmore, the Take Profit order we have set on AUD/JPY pair has not executed when reached for unknown reasons.

VT Markets also features its App for mobiles but not available from Google Play Store or Apple. The app is all in the Chinese language and it is specifically designed for that region, where English is not well adopted. The App features K chart, Stop Loss/Take Profit orders, alarm module, data analysis and reporting system, Forex forum and social elements.

Leverage

VT markets feature 1:400 leverage on the Standard STP accounts. Of course, this is valid for Forex, the leverage will vary from asset to asset. Metals leverage is 1:100, Commodities 1:50. Generally, this leverage is high comparing to other brokers allowing small deposits a high-risk breakthrough to thousands. Even for Gold 1:100 leverage is very attractive. Indicies leverage is also 1:100.

Trade Sizes

Trading sizes are optimal, starting from micro-lots minimum order size (0.01 lot) to 50 lots for Forex. Volume steps are also in micro-lots allowing full precision in trading and flexible money management. Stop Gold follows the same levels, up to 50 lots maximum and Silver up to 25 lots. Stops level is at 20 points.

Trading Costs

VT Markets will not charge conversion fees, commission or any other fees related to trading. Apart from spreads, swaps are the only type of cost traders will face when trading. The swaps are all under normal levels and it is common to see positive values on many instruments. In fact, we had trouble finding a Forex pair without a positive swap on one side. EUR/USD has -10.57 and +6.62 points on the short side, GBP/JPY +3.08 long swap and -6.33 short, AUD/NZD has +0.08 on long and -0.99 points on the short overnight swap. For sure, this is a good sign for traders that the broker is not obsessive with profits even though swaps are marginal costs.

Assets

This category is probably the weakest point of VT Markets. There is a bit of everything for all sets and we are not sure if some instruments are available for VIP ECN Accounts only as their name suffix implies. Forex has a total of 38 currency pairs are on the list with the VIP suffix. Without the VIP mark, there are just 5, EUR/USD, AUD/USD, USD/JPY, GBP/USD and a pair that is more interesting for the Asia-Pacific zone – USD/HKD. For anyone looking for exotics, SGD is present across all major pairs like SGD/JPY, NZD/SGD, etc. Some Scandinavian currencies and TRY are listed, giving enough instruments for classic Forex traders. 

Precious metals range is different than what is announced on the VT Markets website. Namely, Palladium and Platinum are not listed in the MT4 platform. Spot Gold, Silver and Copper are available though, but taking into account that Silver and Gold move almost in sync, metal traders will not have another asset to diversify. 

Indicies range is good, covering all the majors and as expected, more indices specific for the Asia-pacific zone. A total of 15 indices counting the VIX and US Dollar Index are on the MT4 platform. APAC zone traders would like the ASX SPI200, Hang Seng Index, China 50, ES35, and Nikkei 225 index. 

The commodity offer is better than average in the industry. A total of 10 commodities are tradeable as CFD. Including Orange Juice, Cotton, Cocoa, Sugar, and Coffee. Energies set is also extended and traders can find WTI, Brent Oil, Natural Gas, Heating oil, Low Sulphur Gasoil, and Gasoline. If we could pick a broker type based on the asset offered, VT Markets would certainly be a commodity broker.

Shares offer range is good, although it is also oriented towards the APAC zone traders. The shares range is equally divided into US and HK companies with over 100 total listed. The biggest from both sets are selected including banks, oil and tech giants many are familiar with. We do not see any VIP suffix here meaning that shares are open for all account types. Traders that want to trade companies not listed elsewhere will probably find them with VT Markets if it is in the Asia-Pacific region.

Spreads

Like with some other ECN STP brokers, VT Markets also states spreads from 0.0 pips. This is not correct and by our estimation, the minimum variable spread recorded was 1.1 pips. That spread is for EUR/USD currency pair although it is surprising that the spread did not go over 3 pips for any other pair. For example, AUD/SGD is 2 pips, SGD/JPY 1.5 pips, and even GBP/JPY is 2 pips. The biggest spread was for GBP/HKD pair at 31 points which are good for their Average Daily Range. Both Silver and Gold had spread of around 3 pips and Oil around 4. Looking at other assets we can conclude that the spreads are not the best, certainly not form 0.0 pips but very even and competitive. 

Minimum Deposit

This amount is very obscure and is hard to find. What we could get from the support and the Product Disclosure Statement is that the minimum is 200 AUD or equivalent. VT Markets describe themselves transparent, and with most of the information, this is truly making us wonder why the minimum is not published on the website. 

Deposit Methods & Costs

Depending on the jurisdiction and where the trader comes from, the deposit methods will vary although all will be listed from the VT Markets client portal. All the possible methods are Bank Wire, VISA, MasterCard, BPAY, Neteller, Poli, and Skrill. VT Markets does not charge fees for deposits and the costs may arise from the client’s bank or payment service.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

In accordance with AML, VT Markets will do all reporting relevant transactions to AUSTRAC and process the withdrawal using the methods listed in the client’s portal available from the website. There are no fees except the fees associated with the currency conversion and the client’s bank.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Banks transfers that are local in Australia will be finished in 2 days. International transfers will take up to 7 days. E-wallet and Credit/Debit Card are usually instant. Withdrawal processing time for VT Markets is 1 business day.

Bonuses & Promotions

VT Markets has a rebate scheme that is directly credited to the MT4 platform on a daily basis. Now this rebate program is available for the Standard STP Account although what amounts are in question is undisclosed. VT Markets has bonus promotions from time to time and mostly targeted for Chinese clients. We have found a $100 bonus for new deposits program in 2018, as per bonus requirements, traders only had to trade 2 lots to claim the bonus. For now, no bonuses are offered.

Educational & Trading Tools

VT Markets does not have any education material or at least not at the moment of writing this review. It is stated on the website that” a plethora of content under both the News and Education menu tabs.” These tabs do not exist yet. On the other hand, VT Markets have a Tools section with a few different products. MT4 Smart Trader Tools is a package of additional apps that could be inserted into the Metatrader 4 platform. The exact content of this package is not disclosed, the page reserved for this product is not yet complete. 

EAs are supported and encouraged. MT4 is the main base for new EAs and from the description on the VT Markets website, VPS service is available for free. Still the “VPS page” is mentioned but nowhere to be found. For now, clients will have to check with the support for this service.

Trading Central signal service is offered and sent by email to live clients. MT4 signals are also described that come with Metaquotes by default. The signals that come from Trading Central are not deeply described just the statement that TV Markets are not responsible for any losses made from using the signals.

The economic calendar page is created and contains the classic Metaquotes calendar. This calendar is basic in features without any kind of filters. The events are described well with the addition of a chart of historic levels. The impact of an event is marked as well as expected values. There is nothing special about this calendar. 

Customer Service

VT Markets customer support is available through phone, email, and chat. The broker boasts about “24h award-winning support”, this is not what we have encountered. The chat is offline and the email response takes longer than 24 hours. Yet we are certain that the support staff is well trained to answer all the questions and concerns.

Demo Account

The demo account is easy to make with an email confirmation process. It is limited to 90 days and reflects the actual trading environment. In the legal documents, it is stated that the real account might be different from the demo. As this account is available with the desktop MT4 version, bot EAs and the Trading Central signal service can be tried out.

Countries Accepted

VT Markets legal documents state Japan, United States, and North Korea are not available for their services. We also know that other countries do not allow trading or fall under high-risk jurisdiction according to The Financial Action Task Force (FATF).

Conclusion

TV Markets is an extension brand for adapted for the APAC region and shares the same legal documents with VantageFX, another brand under the Vantage Global Prime company. The structure of this group is distributed to cover all possible clients across the globe and features of a competitive broker. This way, VT Markets has two regulations CIMA and ASIC. Only clients from Australia will be under the ASIC, all other global coverage comes under the CIMA as stated in the legal documents.

Another key point traders should know is that VT Markets is closely working with Hong Kong, the mobile app is available only in Chinese and via the installable APK android package. Traders will probably have conditions with VantageFX as VT Markets feels specialized. Furthermore, this broker has still an unfinished website, packages, tools, and education material that is mentioned. On the other hand, This broker can be a good choice for APAC clients in the future. We also encourage the transparency and efforts to bring additional value to traders, no restrictions on any kind of trading style and EAs support.

Go Capital FX is an unregulated broker brand owned by Lancelot Equity Ltd located in the Commonwealth of Dominica. This company does not have a license to trade with CFD derivatives or other financial instruments and is not under any supervision by the international or local authority. The registration number provided on the web site cannot be confirmed nor it means anything for an investor.

Another domain owned by Lancelot Equity is the gocapital123.com that has almost the same structure. All this aside, the Go Capital FX website has a clean design although does not have any points related to the trading conditions. Published content is very general, redundant, oriented towards people with no experience, with marketing phrases that are generally not allowed in the industry. We will go through each section to find if there is anything of value for traders.

Account Types

Go Capital FX does not have any account types to select, all the information is obscured. The only instance we found is in the Terms and Conditions document stating that the leverage is set according to the account type. Since this document does not provide any more info on the subject we can confirm that no account types are offered. Islamic Account is offered and arranged through the contact form within the Traders Cabinet.

Platforms

The only platform available is the Metatrader 4, desktop versions for PC and Mac only. No smart devices option is offered. The MT4 platform, once installed, will quickly show the Go Capital FX servers with the ping time of 39ms. The client version is the latest with default settings although the welcome message does not point to Go Capital FX but to PBN Capital (pbncapital.com). We are not sure if the feed comes from this company or if it just an error since this company is not mentioned anywhere on the Go Capital FX website. The execution times were always below 100ms and this is even better than the time promoted. As Go Capital FX presents itself as No Dealing Desk ECN broker, order executions are fast enough.

Leverage

Go Capital FX website presents up to 1:300 leverage level but we were unable to confirm this on the MT4 platform, just the 1:100 level. To modify this, traders will have to contact support.

Trade Sizes

The minimum trade size is 0.01 lots or 1 micro-lot. The maximum is 100 lots with the ability of 0.01 lots volume steps. This is a common setting for many brokers as it allows traders to have better precision and Money Management. The same applies to precious metals and Cryptocurrencies.

Trading Costs

Based on the MT4 feed, there are no commissions. The Swaps are very precise, displayed up to 5 digits which may confuse traders as it is not common practice. Starting from the EUR/USD pair, a long position swap is -9.794 points and long +6.112. GBP/CHF pair also has one positive swap for a long position at 2.793 and -7.449 points short position swap. For the Bitcoin/USD, the swap is not negligible sitting on -539.726 points on both sides. Overall, trading costs are under normal ranges but traders should check the specification of the instrument before opening a position.

Assets

Go Capital FX covers all the asset categories, and each is has a good range. Forex has a total of 45 currency pairs. Traders can expect all the majors listed in the MT4 platform, and also a good variety of exotic currencies like CZK, HUF, PLN, CLP, CNH, MXN, and SGD. These are also found under EUR and USD combinations.

Go Capital FX does not stop there and goes wide with the Commodities too. A total of 12 assets including the WTI and Brent Oil. Big attention to metals is given so traders can find Zinc, Aluminium, Nickel, Silver, and Gold. Only Copper, Platinum, and Palladium are missing for the most complete list. Furthermore, Cocoa, Sugar, and more commodities are available.

The indices range is not bad, with a total of 14 across the globe. The majors are there and the less common ones are the Russian RUS50 Index and the Hang Seng index.
Go capital FX has an average Stocks range that covers some popular major companies in the US and a few of worldwide companies. A total of 55 stocks are listed.

Cryptocurrencies follow similar depth as with other categories, making Go Capital FX better than average in the industry. Of course, Bitcoin is unavoidable, with more interesting versions like the Bitcoin SV and Bitcoin ABC, which is rare to see. The description in the MT4 platform was not correct for these and some other coins, as admins did not know their full names. Other, more exotic coins are Zcash, Monero, TRON, IOTA, Neo, EOS and Dashcoin. The total number of cryptocurrencies listed is 14.

Spreads

Again, like with the rest of the key trading information, the spreads are not published. Based on the MT4 platform the spreads are in the industry average. To give an example, the most liquid currency pair – EUR/USD has a 1.6 pips variable spread, AUD/NZD – 3.7 pips, and the biggest spread among the majors is for GBP/NZD at 7.9 pips. For Gold the spread is 43 pips, meaning it is a bit above than usual, and for Bitcoin/USD it is 25pips.

Minimum Deposit

This information is obscured and mentioned in the deposit manual page only. The minimum deposit amount is 10 currency units selected as base account currency during the registration. This is valid for any kind of deposit method. As to what kind of currencies are available is not disclosed.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Go Capital FX states a very unspecified description of deposit channels possible. This broker has a very flexible stance in terms of how clients can deposit. Later on, it is specified that if clients deposit with a Credit/Debit card, the standard fee of 2.5% will be charged for the transaction. This is not true, especially if there is no conversion, implicating that this fee is specific to Go Capital FX. No other fees exist for other deposit methods clients had agreed with the broker. The maximum amount for cards deposit is $10.000.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

According to the information published on the website, Go Capital FX will not charge fees for card transactions. Bank transfers have a fee of $30-50 depending on the bank location. Clients should note paragraph 9.3 under Terms and Conditions that tax fees can be deducted from the withdrawal amount by Go Capital FX. It is not common to see an abroad company deal with the taxes of other country residents.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Bank Transfers are processed in 24 hours by Go Capital FX. The transfers could take up to 10 days to reflect on the client’s bank account. For Credit/Debit cards, this time is 5-8 days, which is unusual.

Bonuses & Promotions

Under the promotions section, Go Capital FX presents an unlimited demo account. In the Terms and Conditions document, bonus conditions are mentioned under section 13 and they may exist. A client must trade a minimum trading volume of the bonus amount divided by 4 to withdraw bonus funds. Profits realized and the bonus amount cannot be withdrawn until the conditions are met.

Educational & Trading Tools

Go Capital FX has a simple News section that is updated monthly on average. The news is global, most popular and not longer than one page. Apart from the MT4 manual, there is also a “Wiki-forex”. This is just a short glossary of terms used in trading and Finance. FAQ section contains a dozen general topics about trading, and this is all educational material published.

Customer Service

Upon registration Go Capital FX uses the phone you have provided to contact you to gather more information about you and the size of your bank accounts. During this sales process, you may be able to ask anything related to trading. No broker phone is published on the website, chat service does not exist.

Demo Account

The Demo is available for MT4 after a sign-up process. Once traders log in they may be surprised that only $1000 of practice funds are deposited. This will not last much even if trading in micro-lots. Go Capital FX stated that it is possible to open an unlimited number of new accounts without time limits.

Countries Accepted

No information about countries anywhere on the web site. It is probably limited to the list of countries upon registration.

Conclusion

This broker has received many negative reports from other regulators and users. Many countries have banned this broker from dealing with its citizens. The biggest concerns are the withdrawals that are not paid out and no communication with the traders after. Other issues mentioned in this review point to a very risky business that is common with unregulated, offshore, obscure brokers that do not have any information to prove their identity or location. If we take these concerns aside, Go Capital FX has great instruments offer, competitive conditions and good executions.

JFD Bank has offices located in Cyprus, Germany, Spain, Bulgaria, and Vanuatu and is regulated by the CySEC, BaFin, and VFSC. This broker offers three different platforms and multiple types of trading instruments and has won multiple awards every single year since 2013. If you like the way this broker’s profile sounds so far, you’ll definitely want to keep reading to find out more.

Account Types

JFD provides the same account type to all of its clients. The company explains that they believe this is the most transparent option, and that each trader deserves the best market access, so there was no need to feature several different accounts. This can certainly provide an advantage to some traders, but we wonder if the lack of specialization could have any negative effects. Rather than offering better spreads or trading costs to some, the company aims to reward higher volume traders through rebates and other types of promotions. The company can get technical when it comes to commission fees and deposit fees, so you’ll need to read through the rest of our review to find more specific information on these sections. Below, you can find a quick overview of this company’s account specifications.

Standard Account
Minimum Deposit: 500 USD/GBP/EUR/CHF
Leverage: Depends on Asset (more on this later)
Commissions: Charged on FX, CFDs, Metals. (more on this later)
Platforms: MT4 & MT5, Guidance

Note that there is a difference between JFD Group LTD and JFD Overseas LTD. The difference only seems to affect transaction fees, and clients in different locations are handled by one certain branch of the company. You’ll be able to pinpoint which branch you’d be dealing with later on in this review. Personal ID and address documents must be submitted and approved before traders can use their account for trading. Once documents have been submitted, it takes 1-2 working days for approval.

Platform

This broker offers the ability to choose from the MetaTrader 4 or MetaTrader 5 platforms, in addition to a platform of their own. We will provide some information on MT4 and MT5, the most popular trading platforms in the world, first. Starting with similarities, both platforms are equally accessible through Webtrader, mobile, or PC, offer add on widgets and tools, technical analysis tools, and 1-click trading, among many other features. MT5 offers access to more markets, supports ten more languages, and provides a few more pending order types, etc.

MT4 is most commonly offered by Forex brokers since it is favored above the newer version. The company’s third-party platform, Guidance, offers many of the same advantages, with some key differences. Webinars are embedded in the platform, as well as built-in social tools. You can compare all of the platforms in more detail by choosing ‘Trading’ > ‘Platform Comparison’. This program is offered through the web or via download on PC.

Leverage

The company’s leverage limits are based on the type of asset that is being traded. Major CFDs have a leverage cap of up to 1:30, while minor CFDs set the limit at 1:20. Commodities and other non-major Equity Indices, such as Crude Oil and Hong Kong 50 Index are capped at 1:10, while individual Equities are capped at 1:5, and Cryptocurrencies offer leveraged trading of up to 1:2. Sadly, this is much lower than the advertised 1:400 leverage ratio. That number is reserved for what the company considers to be ‘professional’ clients. The company runs a program in the background whenever clients are signing up that automatically decides whether they are deserving of the highest leverage offer, based on experience and so forth. It’s possible that you may qualify for the better leverage option if you have experience in the field.

Trade Sizes

The minimum order size in Forex trading is 0.01 lot or 1 micro lot. For CFDs on indices, and commodities is 1 lot (= 1 CFD). The minimum order size for DMA equity CFDs is 1 lot (= 1 stock share). However, there is an exception to some instruments where the mini lot size (0.1 CFD) is enabled. Margin call is set at 100% and stop out levels are set at 50%.

Trading Costs

Trading costs are applicable to all of the following: Commissions, overnight financing, inactivity fees, and for currency conversions. It isn’t surprising to see commission fees and overnight financing charges on this list, but we do wish this broker didn’t charge inactivity fees. These fees are likely charged to help close out abandoned accounts, however, it can be frustrating to find that your account has been charged if you take a break from trading for a few months. Below, we have listed all of the exact fees in detail.

Commissions: CFDs, FX, and metals are all subject to commission fees. These fees differ slightly, although they are very similar, so we will provide the USD fees as examples. The fees are 0.03 on FX, 3.0 USD on precious metals, 0.05% of order volume/minimum charge of 5 EUR on CFDs on stocks from France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Turkey, or the UK. There is a 2cps /5USD minimum charge on CFDs on stocks from the US and a 2.5cps/5USD charge on ETFs. CFDs on indices and commodities are subject to a 0.10 USD charge. Note that zero commission fees are charged when cryptocurrencies and physical stocks of France, the US, Germany, Dutch, and Spanish stocks, however, the company does maintain the right to charge a preset limit at their discretion. If you’d like to view the exact charges in EUR, GBP, or CHF, you can do so under ‘Trading’ > ‘Account Specifications’. The website states that there are different charges for traders of high volume (10 million USD per month).

Overnight Financing: 3.25% +/- Libor, excluding CFDs on Futures Contracts. Swap fees may be subject to fluctuations in the market.

Inactivity Fees: After three calendar months with no activity, accounts will begin to be charged inactivity fees of $20 per month. If there are no funds in the account, these charges will not be applicable, and these fees will not be charged on accounts that have never been funded.

Currency Conversions: 1% fee

Assets

This broker offers 1500 plus instruments over 8 asset classics. The bulk is made up of more than 600 physical stocks, 64 currency pairs, and 400 plus shares. The company also offers 2 precious metals, 15 Index CFDs, 7 Commodities, 21 ETFs, 4 ETNs, and 5 cryptocurrencies. The sheer number and variety of trading instruments set this broker apart from the crowd, and everyone should be satisfied with options that are available here. This certainly makes JFD Bank worth consideration, if you are interested in trading more than just standard options.

Spreads

The website was very vague about what type of spreads one should expect to see, so we reached out to support to gain some clarity. Our support agent assured us that the company uses Inner-Banking Core Spreads from 0 pips for FX. Support also stated that there are no minimum spreads and that the company provides the best possible spreads available from the bank, with no manipulation. Spreads can be monitored from within the trading platform, so you may want to take a look, just to make sure that these options are as low as support makes them out to be.

Minimum Deposit

There is an initial minimum deposit requirement of $500 USD. Once that requirement has been met, there are no further minimums one must meet when making future deposits. If you compare this amount with the competition, you’ll find that several other brokers do offer much lower deposit minimums, more in the range of $100. Some don’t even require minimums at all. On the other hand, the fact that there is only one account type means that the broker is likely offering some better conditions, most likely resulting in the larger deposit with them. Fortunately, this amount is realistic, even if one may have to save up for a moment to afford an account.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Deposits can be made through the following methods: Bank Wire Transfer, SafeCharge (Visa, Maestro, & MasterCard), Skrill, Neteller, and SOFORT (if available in your country). Note that deposits must be made through bank accounts that match the name on the client’s account. Transaction fees and percentage fees are applicable on all deposits and vary based on the currency used. Transaction fees are different for every payment method, currency, and whether it is through JFD Group or the Overseas group. You can view exact transaction costs online, but note that most of them are around .25 cents USD. Below, we have listed all fees associated with depositing.

SafeCharge (Visa, Maestro, & MasterCard)

EUR & GBP: 1.9% Percentage Fee + Transaction Fee

USD & CHF: 2.95% Percentage Fee + Transaction Fee

Skrill & Neteller

2.90% Percentage Fee + Transaction Fee

SOFORT

1.8% Percentage Fee + Transaction Fee

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

All deposit methods are available for withdrawal. The company processes withdrawals back to the original form of deposit, so you may want to consider withdrawal fees when choosing a deposit method. When it comes to SafeCharge withdrawals, note that Standard Credit would be any amount previously deposited, while Credit Extra would refer to any extra profits. We have listed the associated costs below.

• Bank Wire: No fees charged on behalf of JCB. (Fees may be charged on bank’s side)
• SafeCharge (Visa, Maestro, MasterCard): 0.88 units on Standard Credit/7.38 units on Credit Extra
• Skrill: 1% of withdrawal amount, maximum of 10EUR/11USD/8GBP/11CHF
• Neteller: 2% of withdrawal amount, a maximum of 30 USD

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Skrill and Neteller would be the fastest withdrawal methods, due to the fact that both are processed within 24 hours of the time the request was made. SafeCharge can take 2-3 processing days for Standard Credit and 3-10 days for Credit Extra, meaning that it will take longer for the company to process any profit back to the client. SOFORT is returned within 1-3 business days. Bank Wire varies based on the bank’s location. German Banks typically take 2-3 working days to credit funds, European banks can take 3-5 working days, and banks outside of Europe can take 4-7 working days to credit funds.

Bonuses & Promotions

At this time, there do not seem to be any promotional opportunities. It’s always nice to see these offered since it can be a great way to earn a little extra on an initial investment or through some other type of opportunity. This shouldn’t stop one from choosing this broker since this isn’t something that is always offered. Check back in the future to see if anything has changed.

Educational & Trading Tools

This broker focuses more on providing educational tools, rather than offering trading tools, like calculators, an economic calendar, etc. (Although an Economic Calendar is available within the Guidance platform). The company does have a section devoted to Market Analysis, however, where you’ll find some helpful articles that point out trends in the market and relevant news. The most important educational opportunity we found was under the Webinars section, where the company live streams different subjects periodically. Some of the titles of past streams included ‘Pair Trading’ and ‘DAX: Long or Short?’. The company seems to live stream every day and the schedule can be viewed under ‘Research’ > ‘Webinars and Live Events’. Finally, traders will find a Forex Glossary located under this section.

Demo Account

JFD provides the ability to open free demo accounts that mimic the conditions offered on their real accounts. This is a great way to test out the broker before making the decision to sign-up, and demo accounts can be an excellent learning tool for beginner traders. The demo accounts are supported on MT4 and MT5, but you won’t be able to practice on the Guidance platform. In order to open the demo, you’ll need to select a platform and enter details like your name, telephone number, email, and country. You’ll also choose what currency you’d like to use for your practice account and select a deposit that ranges from $500 (The company’s minimum deposit limit), up to a maximum of $5,000,000. You may want to choose more of a realistic deposit minimum to ensure that you’re making realistic trades.

Customer Service

Support is available 24 hours a day, 5 days a week over LiveChat. To be more specific, exact support hours for LiveChat are from 23:00 CET Sunday through 23:00 CET Friday, while all other departments are available from 8:00-17:00 CET Monday thru Friday, aside from banking holidays. In addition to the instant contact option LiveChat, support can be reached through phone or email. This broker is also active on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn. The contact information has been listed below.

• Phone: +49 (0) 69175374271
• Email: [email protected]

Countries Accepted

JFD Group LTD is only authorized to serve clients located in the EEA or in other countries where it is legal to do so, including Belarus, China, Switzerland, Turkey, UAE, and Ukraine. JFD Overseas Ltd serves clients that are located in another third country. Restrictions apply to offering services to clients of the United States of America, Russia, and to any clients located in countries where it would be illegal. Note that you can select the US on the account sign-up page and open account from that location, so there may be no issues trading from there.

Conclusion

JFD Bank offers trading on 8 different asset classes, including crypto options, and provides three different trading platforms to choose from. The company offers one account type with a $500 minimum deposit. Spreads seem to be competitive, based on what we learned from support, but the company does charge fees for deposits and withdrawals. Leverage options are lower than average unless you qualify as a ‘professional’ client. Support seems to be easy to reach, although they are not available on the weekend. Overall, the trader needs to decide whether the larger deposit minimum, low leverage options, and funding fees are made up for by the huge variety of trading instruments and the low trading costs.

Mira Capital Markets is a forex and CFD broker that was established in 2013 and located in Dubai. The company has acquired a growing client base of 117k people since its establishment in 2013. Despite their smaller size, this broker is still able to bring some competitive trading costs and a worthy product portfolio to the table. Since the company doesn’t explain much about themselves, we did some research to find out exactly what this broker brings to the table.

Account Types

Mira Capital Markets offers three different account types with the Classic, Standard, and VIP account being the available options. Traders should choose an account type based on skill level, affordability, and other trading needs, such as the need to have access to trading commodities or to make larger trade sizes. Below, we have provided a more detailed outline of each account type.

Classic Account

This account type is aimed towards those that are just getting started and offers the chance to improve upon skills, while only taking minimal financial risks. This account type offers the lowest deposit requirement but limits tradable instruments to Forex, Gold, and Silver. The maximum balance on this account would be up to $10,000.

-Minimum Deposit: $1,000
-Leverage: Up to 1:100
-Spreads: 2 pips
-Commissions: None

Standard Account

This account type is meant for more experienced traders and holds a balance between $5,000 and $10,000. Additional perks to opening one of these accounts would be access to bonus opportunities, and the ability to trade more metals, indices, stocks, and futures, in addition to currency pairs. Maximum trade sizes and the number of open positions allowed are more lenient with this account type.

-Minimum Deposit: $5,000
-Leverage: From 1:1 Up to 1:200
-Spreads: 2 pips
-Commissions: None

VIP Account

This account type is meant for professionals, with no balance limit, and offers better trading conditions than its counterparts, including unlimited maximum trade sizes, no limit on the maximum number of open positions, and lower spreads. Tradable instruments include currency pairs, metals, indices, stocks, and futures.

-Minimum Deposit: $10,000
-Leverage: From 1:1 Up to 1:1000
-Spreads: 1.6 pips
-Commissions: None

Account verification is also required and must be completed before withdrawals can be processed. MCM requires photo ID and proof of address, alongside some basic information, such as name, birthdate, passport number, etc. If you have any questions, email [email protected].

Platform

If you decide to open an account through this broker, you’ll be trading on the award-winning MetaTrader 4 platform. MT4 offers leading trading and analytical technologies, as well as additional services. Some of these features include interactive charts and more than 65 built-in technical indicators and analytical objects. MT4 truly has everything you could need for forex trading. MT4 can be downloaded on PC, Android, Linux, or iOS.

The MCM website also provides instructions for users that are using a Mac computer. (Mac users typically encounter issues because the software is not supported; however, the broker’s website includes instructions for downloading the software via Wine). An online, browser-based version is available as well, so any Mac users that are having issues with the download, or any trader that would like to opt not to download MT4 will still be able to access the platform conveniently. Download links are available on the website under the ‘Instruments’ category.

Leverage

The Classic account offers a basic leverage option of up to 1:100. Many successful traders will tell you that this amount is ideal and would choose this option even if higher options were available. This would also be a good choice for anyone that hasn’t grown accustomed to trading. If you’re looking for something a little higher, the Standard account offers a higher option of up to 1:200. For the majority of traders, the leverage caps so far will be more than satisfying. On the other hand, if you prefer more of a high-stakes experience, you’ll be happy to know that the VIP account offers a leverage option of up to 1:1000.

Having the ability to trade with leverage this high can be dangerous, so proceed with caution. Note that the leverage on Shares and Bonds is limited to 1:50. Many other brokers place stricter limits on their leverage caps, this broker provides their clients with the ability to decide how high they’d like to go for themselves. If you’re one of the few that can handle this option, then there is a real advantage here.

*We did find a discrepancy on the website when it comes to the leverage cap on the Classic account. On the ‘Comparison of Trading Accounts’ page, the maximum leverage is listed as 1:100 on this account type. However, if you click on ‘Read More’, or go the Classic Account’s direct page, you’ll find that the leverage cap is listed at 1:1000 and this is the amount listed in reviews on other sites. Since the amount differs so significantly, we reached out to support and confirmed that the 1:200 limit is correct.

Trade Sizes

The minimum allowed trade size is one micro lot for all account types. Maximum trade sizes differ more significantly. On the Classic account, the maximum is 10 lots, on the Standard, it is 50 lots, and the VIP account does not set any limit. There is also a limit on the maximum number of open positions, with the limits being 50 on Classic, 100 on Standard, and once again, no limits on the VIP account type. The margin call/stop loss level for all of the accounts is set at 30%/50%.

Trading Costs

The majority of brokers make their profits through commission fees, spreads, and rollover interest. In the case of MCM, there are absolutely no commission fees charged on any of their account types, which provides an immediate advantage. The catch that typically comes with a lack of commission charges would be higher spreads, which seem to balance out the costs. At a glance, this broker does seem to offer spreads that are a bit high, but the trading costs actually turn out to be competitive. We will offer more detail on that later. Keep in mind that rollover interest will be applied to any positions that are left open overnight.

Assets

The Classic account type only allows for trading on forex, Gold, and Silver instruments. Both the Standard and Classic account types offer access to the company’s entire portfolio, including forex, metals, shares, commodities, indices, and bonds. Forex options include 44 currency pairs on all account types. Trading Shares are available with a leverage of up to 1:50 on nearly 100 different shares in companies like Facebook, Walmart, and Pepsi. Several commodities are offered, including metals, energies, and agriculture options. US, European, and Russian indices are offered as well. Trading Bonds also limits maximum leverage to 1:50 and offers three options. In order to view all of the available instruments, you can select ‘Products’ from the top of the website and then choose a category.

Spreads

Earlier, we mentioned that the trading costs with this broker are competitive, although their spreads may seem high at first glance. Keep in mind that the industry average is typically around 1.5 pips, which is usually charged in addition to commission charges. The best spreads with this broker are available on the VIP account and start from 1.6 pips. On the Standard and Classic account types, the spreads are from 2 pips. However, these spreads are actually on the lower end of things, considering that no commission fees are charged.

Minimum Deposit

The deposit requirements with this broker may be high enough to force some of their potential clients to look elsewhere. The lowest deposit amount of $1,000 is exclusively available on the Classic account. Considering that some large brokers don’t even require a minimum deposit, we must say that this is high, especially for a basic account type. Trading on the Standard account requires a larger deposit of $5,000.

Those that don’t have that kind of cash on hand may feel frustrated by this amount, although we will point out that the Classic account offers the same spreads as this account, so there isn’t much to lose if you have to stick with the first account type.

Also, note that the maximum amount of funds these two account types can hold would be $10,000. Ten thousand dollars is also the deposit requirement for the VIP account, so you’ll want to open this account if you’re funding with a large amount. Considering that this account type offers the best spreads and some additional features, we aren’t really surprised to see a higher minimum listed here.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Methods: Bank Transfer (USD), Credit/Debit Card, Prepaid Card, and E-wallets. The latter options include Qiwi, Yandex Money, Azulpay, CorpBanca, PayU, and Perfect Money, all of which are lesser-known options than the popular Bitcoin and others. If you’ve opened a VIP account, you’ll have to deposit via Bank Transfer or with an E-wallet, due to the fact that the other payment methods have a limit of $4,000. (The VIP account requires a deposit of $10,000) Third-party deposits are prohibited, so be sure that you’re using an account under your own name.

Charges: If you are using a Credit/Debit Card or paying through a non-UK bank, there may be instances where a small fee is charged by your provider. MCM is willing to refund this amount to the client’s trading account upon receipt of proof charges, so be sure to let support know if you are charged for making a deposit. If depositing in a method other than USD, conversion charges may apply.

Processing Time: Deposits through credit or debit are credited instantly and International bank deposits are credited once cleared with MCM’s bank, usually within 5 business days. Deposits can only be credited within business hours (8 am to 5 pm UK time, Monday through Friday)

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Withdrawals can be processed back to Bank Transfer, Credit/Debit Cards, E-Wallets, or to the Mira Debit Card. This means that all of the deposit methods are available for withdrawal, aside from Prepaid Cards. If you’re making a withdrawal for more than $2,500, you’ll need to use Bank Transfer or an E-wallet, due to the limits placed on card withdrawals. The company does not charge any fees on withdrawals.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Withdrawals cannot begin to be processed until your account has been fully approved. As long as the client has an approved account, E-Wallet withdrawals or withdrawals to the Mira Debit Card are processed instantly. Withdrawals back to Credit/Debit cards or Bank Wire Transfer can take between 1-5 business days to be processed and posted.

Bonuses & Promotions

We wish that we could provide a detailed review of this section, but this broker’s website barely covers any information about their bonus options. What we do know is that a 100% bonus is available on the first deposit on the Classic and VIP account types. This means that the smallest deposit one could make to qualify for the bonus would be $5,000. However, we couldn’t find any information about the terms and conditions for this bonus. On another note, we noticed that there is a Mira Debit Card option available for withdrawals. How does one acquire this card? What are the fees associated with it? The website doesn’t offer any details. All we know is that one of the advantages of having this card would be instant withdrawals.

Educational & Trading Tools

Education: We wanted to highlight the educational opportunities that this broker has made available due to the fact that seminars, video lessons, and private webinars are all offered free of charge to their traders. There is importance in educating one’s client base, and these options go into much more depth than what is commonly offered by brokers today. Below, you can view all of the available resources.

-Forex Glossary-Free seminars
-More than 25 free video lessons
-Free Private Webinars
-Free Demo Accounts

Trading Tools: A few tools are offered, meaning that this area has less to offer than the previous section. If the company would add some financial calculators to the website, in addition to the tools listed below, then we would consider the options in this category to be more complete.

-Live Trading Conditions
-Important News
-Economic Calendar
-VPS (Virtual Private Server)

Demo Account

Like the vast majority of other online brokers, MCM offers free demo accounts to their clients. These accounts provide traders with the ability to get acquainted with the MT4 platform, test out the market, check trading conditions with the broker, and to gain general practice, all while using a virtual currency. There’s a lot to love about these simple practice accounts. Another plus side to opening a demo with this broker would be that the accounts are more customizable than they are elsewhere. Traders are able to type in any starting amount they’d like, down to the cent. Many other brokers predetermine how much is given in virtual funds, and we often see preset amounts that are much more than realistic.

You can also choose leverage from 1:100 up to 1:500. Note that there is no option to test out the leverage cap that is offered for this broker’s VIP account and that the other account types only offer leverages up to 1:100 and 1:200. Therefore, you’ll want to stick with these two options if you’re looking for a more realistic practice session. In order to open a demo account, you can select ‘Demo’ from the top section of the website. The broker then asks for a few details, including your name, email, country, city, and phone number. If you ever need to top up your demo account, MCM provides the option to replenish your demo with any chosen amount of funds directly from the website, thus eliminating the need to get in touch with support.

Customer Service

24/5 customer support is available through LiveChat, phone, or email. Note that the ‘Live Chat’ button at the top of the website does not seem to be working, but the chat window can still be accessed by clicking the hand to the right of the screen, and then selecting the option from there. Phone support is limited to English only, so you’ll want to use chat or email if you speak another language. There are two email addresses available, so be sure to email support for various inquiries and to email the compliance team if you’re having issues with documentation. The company is active on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Below, you can find the various contact information listed on the website.

-Phone: +44 (20) 80776419
-Email: [email protected]/[email protected]
-Address: 302/02 Boulevard Plaza Tower 2 – Emaar, Business Bay, Dubai, UAE

Countries Accepted

MCM does list any restrictions on its website. We tested the sign-up process out from our US-based offices and were relieved to see that this option is definitely available. If you’re concerned that there may be limitations placed on your country, you can visit the sign-up page and check for your country.

Conclusion

Mira Capital Markets is a forex and CFD broker that offers the ability to trade a variety of assets on three different account types. Leverage options on this broker’s Classic and Standard accounts are about average, but the leverage offer on their VIP account is exceptionally high. There are no commission charges, and trading costs could be considered competitive with all things into consideration. The broker also provides excellent educational opportunities and customizable demo accounts.

When it comes to funding, the broker does not charge fees on deposits or withdrawals, a variety of funding methods are available, including some lesser-known e-wallets, and a few methods provide instant withdrawals. Despite some of these positive qualities, the high deposit requirements may force some of their potential clients away, since the most affordable account requires a $1,000 deposit.

Customer support is available 24 hours a day, but you won’t be able to get in touch with them over the weekend. This broker may be worthy of your loyalty, but you’ll need to weigh the positive and negative qualities for yourself.

ProfitIX is a forex and CFD broker located in St. Vincent & the Grenadines. The company was just established this year, in 2019, but they’ve already generated enough popularity to receive several reviews online. On their website, this broker claims that their strongest commitment is keeping the most demanding of traders satisfied, by offering first-rate market conditions, ultra-fast execution, fund security, price stability, low latency, and exceptional customer service quality. It’s easy to promise all of those things, but what really matters is whether this broker is following through with their promises. Keep reading to find out.

Account Types

This broker offers five different account types, with the options being the Mini, Advanced, Executive, Prime, and VIP accounts. There is no need to compare minimum deposit requirements, leverage caps, or available platforms. It is suggested that trading costs are better on the account types that require larger deposits, but this broker’s website can be very vague when it comes down to explaining the real differences. Below, we have provided a quick overview of each account type.

Mini Account:
This account type is designed to suit novice traders and offers zero commissions with spreads starting from 3 pips. This is the most affordable account type, with a minimum deposit requirement of $250 and it also offers the maximum leverage offered by the company, up to 1:400.

Advanced Account:
This account type is aimed more towards expert traders. It requires a larger deposit of $2,500 USD, offers leverage options up to 1:400, and comes with variable or floating spreads. An account manager is also supplied.

Executive Account:
This account type is also designed for expert traders, with a $25,000 minimum deposit requirement. It offers the ability to trade on all of the available assets. Like with the Advanced account, spreads can be variable or floating.

Prime Account:
You’ll need to deposit at least $100,000 USD to open one of these account types. This account was designed to offer competitive pricing and is the only account type so far to provide fixed spreads. All assets are available for trading on this account type and leverage go up to 1:400.

VIP Account:
The VIP account was made for high net-worth traders and active participants, who often trade larger volumes. The account offers fixed spreads and mentions a “low market price difference” as an advantage. All assets can be traded on this account type. The website does not list the deposit requirement, so you’ll need to ask your account manager.

Platform

This broker offers trading on a platform that we don’t see offered quite enough, the MetaTrader 5 platform. MT5 is the newer version of MT4 and has kept many of the same concepts and qualities that traders loved about the classic version while adding more pending order types, technical indicators, additional trading features, timeframes, and more. The developers kept this platform’s layout similar to the one available on MT4, but programming and other features have been added. The program is accessible through its browser-based version, WebTrader, and also via download on PC, Apple products, and Android devices.

Leverage

Leverage options with this broker range from 1:1, up to 1:400 and the maximum amount is allowed on all four of the account types. This is significant, considering that many brokers limit the maximum leverage for account types that require larger deposits. If you’re not familiar with leverage, you should know that choosing the 1:1 option would mean that you are simply trading with the funds that are already available in your account.

Choosing higher leverage, take the highest option of 1:400, for example, would mean that you are trading with 400 times the funds you have available in your account. This really opens the door to opportunity, but trading with leverage that is too high for your skill level or account balance can be a slippery slope to failure. Overall, we are happy to see such high options available and it is nice to see that this broker is willing to allow clients to make their own decisions. Simply remember to be wary of larger options if you are not ready for the risk.

Trade Sizes

All account types seem to offer micro lots as their minimum trade size, however, we aren’t completely certain if this is available on the VIP account, since that account type is designed for higher-volume trading. The Mini and Advanced account types offer maximum trade sizes of 10.00 lots.

Trading Costs

Where most brokers profit from spreads, commissions, and rollover fees, this broker primarily profits from spreads, in addition to rollover interest when applicable. That means that no commission fees are charged on any of their account types. Rollover charges are only applicable on positions held past a certain time. You can view Market Hours on the website in order to determine the closing time for each market if you wish to avoid these charges.

Assets

ProfitiX gives its clients access to over 10,000 financial markets, including currencies, commodities, stocks, and other derivatives. On their account types page, it is suggested that these opportunities are more limited for those operating Mini and Advanced accounts. Currency pairs offer trading 24 hours a day, but the website does not explain what majors, minors, or exotics are offered. Oil, Gas, Brent Crude, and other commodities are available for trading with zero commission charges. Hundreds of shares are offered, in addition to spot metals, which include Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Pallidum. Several stock indices are also available. If you’re interested in trading cryptocurrencies, you’ll be happy to know that Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum, and Bitcoin Gold are available options.

Spreads

The account type that offers the most specific information on spreads would be the Mini account, which offers variable spreads from 3 pips. At first glance, this spread seems high, considering that the market average would be around 1.5 pips. However, one must remember that no commission fees are charges on accounts with this broker, which essentially lowers the trading costs, despite the higher spreads. You’ll have to decide for yourself whether this account type is offering competitive pricing, based on those qualities.

We know that the spread can be floating or variable on the Advanced and Executive account types, but the website skips over exact numbers. Moving on, the trading costs on the VIP account are described as being low, but no exact numbers are offered there either. We do know that spreads are fixed on this account type, which should ultimately lead to better conditions. What we don’t understand is why this broker fails to be more transparent about exact spreads in this area, especially since it plays such a crucial role in selecting an account type.

Minimum Deposit

The most affordable account offered by this broker would be the Mini account, which requires an average, $250 deposit minimum. We aren’t surprised to see this amount listed, but it would be nice to see the broker lower the amount a tad since this is a Mini account we’re talking about.

Moving up, there is a $2,500 deposit requirement for Advanced accounts. This is still a realistic amount, although it may be too large for some beginners. From there, you’ll need to make more significant deposits of $25,000 on the Executive and $100,000 on the VIP accounts. Obviously, these account types are meant for traders with larger financial means. The VIP account does not list a deposit minimum, but it’s safe to assume that the amount would be more than the Executive account’s $100,000 minimum.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Deposit methods include Visa/MasterCard, Western Union, Diner’s Club International, Neteller, Skrill, and Money Gram. Deposits are advertised as being quickly credited, within five minutes. There are no fees charged on deposits.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

All of the available funding methods are also available for withdrawals. Although the website is vague when it comes to funding, we were happy to find the information listed that mentions no extra fees are charged on withdrawals. Even many bigger brokers charge some type of commission on withdrawals and these fees can really add up in the long run, so there is a slight advantage to choosing this broker when it comes to this. Not having to worry about withdrawal fees mean that you can make smaller, more frequent withdrawals if you’d like to, without worrying about fees eating into your profits.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

This broker advertises fast withdrawals but doesn’t provide any actual timeframes to back up their statements. We found some comments elsewhere that did mention fast withdrawal times, so we’re hopeful that the company is making an accurate statement. Still, we would advise making your withdrawal request ahead of time to avoid any delays. It would also be safe to assume that Western Union and Money Gram may take longer to be processed than the other methods.

Bonuses & Promotions

ProfitiX is not currently offering any bonus opportunities. This is disappointing, but this isn’t something we expect all brokers to offer. The fact that the company has been around for less than a year suggests that they may need more time to become established and to draw in a larger client base before they can afford to make these types of opportunities available. Hopefully, the broker will have added some extra opportunities to profit by the time you read this article, should you decide to sign up.

Educational & Trading Tools

Educational offers are slim and made up exclusively of educational videos. These videos are detailed and provide an immersive learning opportunity, although we do wish that the company offered more in the ways of education. When it comes to trading tools, you’ll find an Economic Calendar and Daily News under the ‘Analysis’ tab of the webpage.

Demo Account

Sadly, this broker does not currently offer demo accounts to their clients. We’re curious whether they simply don’t understand how much of an opportunity these accounts can provide to beginner or novice traders, or if it is on the agenda to add these practice account types in the future. If you have your heart set on practicing frim a demo, you could always open one with a different broker, while trading from a real account with this broker. You’d still benefit from the practice, but trading conditions would differ slightly, which would take away from some of the demo’s advantages.

Customer Service

Multilingual support is available 24 hours a day, 5 days a week via LiveChat, email, phone, or through their website’s contact form. The company is also active on Facebook, Instagram, and Reddit, so be sure to add them to any of these social media outlets you use if you decide to open an account. You’ll find all of their listed contact information below.

Phone: +18007997635
Email: [email protected]
Address: Carenage Bay Canouan Island, VC0450 Kingstown, St. Vincent & the Grenadines
Social Media:
Facebook.com/profitxofficial
instagram.com/profitx_official_
reddit.com/user/profitX

Countries Accepted

The ProfitiX website mentions that clients located in the United States are not allowed to open accounts. However, you’ll often find that these terms are much more lenient, especially with brokers like this one that is located in St. Vincent & the Grenadines. After testing the sign-up page from our US-based offices, we had no problem creating our account. In order to bypass the restriction, you’ll need to select ‘US Minor Outlying Islands’ as your country. Under ‘State’, you’ll choose ‘Other State’ from the bottom of the list. You can then add your real phone number, address, and zip code and you will be allowed to open your account with no issue.

Conclusion

ProfitiX is a newly established broker that hasn’t done quite enough to make their advantages known. The lack of detail on their website makes us wonder how much of an advantage there would actually be in making a deposit of $100,000, over simply opening an account with a $250 requirement. This doesn’t mean that the advantages aren’t there, but the company’s lack of transparency makes us wonder.

On a positive note, the leverage options are very flexible with this broker and their customer support team can be reached easily. They also charge zero commissions and withdrawal fees, both of which can really save money in the long run. This broker is missing some of the extra little things that add to the experience, like bonuses and demo accounts. There could very well be a chance to profit with this broker, although it seems that the best way to do so would be to make a larger deposit.

VideForex is an offshore FX broker that has been in operation since 2017. Based in Seychelles, this broker operates as part of the Vanuatu-based Finance Group Corporation. Offering proprietary trading software and a unique spin on customer support, we set out to complete an exhaustive VideoForex review that would allow all traders to understand exactly what this brokerage has to offer.

Account Types

There are three account types to choose from, including Bronze, Silver, and Gold. Each of the three offers their own set of features, but the shared features of the three include 247 support, 1-hour withdrawals, free demo accounts, and the provision of a copy trading tool. After that, there are some variances between the account types, so we’ve listed all of the features of each below.

Bronze account features:
24/7 Live video chat support
Withdrawals in 1 hour
Demo account
Copy Trading tool
Bonus +20%

Silver account features:
24/7 Live video chat support
Withdrawals in 1 hour
Demo account
Copy Trading tool
Master class (web session)
Bonus +50%
First 3 risk-free trades

Gold account features:
24/7 Live video chat support
Withdrawals in 1 hour
Demo account
Copy Trading tool
Master class (web session)
Personal success manager
Bonus +100%
First 3 risk-free trades

Platforms

As mentioned previously, VideForex is using its own trading platform, but that platform doesn’t seem to have any name or title (ex. MetaTrader). The platform is made available in three versions: Web, Android, and iPhone. While there isn’t much that we can truly say about the platform without extensive testing, we can state that it offers a clean design and user-friendly layout. Traders will easily be able to find setup and execute trades. Although the company has not offered any information regarding the benefits of using the web version of the platform, they had the following with regards to the mobile version on their website:

APPLICATION FEATURES:
CFD and Options trading
Deposit and withdrawal via APP
60 seconds
My account
My portfolio

APPLICATION BENEFITS:
Instant execution of trades
Live charts of every option
Traders can view their entire trade history
Same login as the web-based platform
Download for free

Leverage

VideForex provides no information with regards to the type of leverage that they offer and we were not able to locate this information elsewhere on their site, so we took the opportunity to put their customer service team to the test. During a live chat session, we were told that the maximum leverage ratio was 1:100. We did note in the terms and conditions that it is possible to trade without leverage, but if you do, you may be required to pay a fee. For more on that, please see the ‘Trading Cost’ section below.

Trade Sizes

The site also provided no information regarding the minimum required trade size, so again, we took the opportunity to ask this question via live chat and learned that the smallest allowed position must be equal to 1USD per trade. Most brokers have this requirement set in lots (or micro lots), so the answer was surprising, but not alarming. A requirement of a $1 investment is very reasonable and no cause for concern.

We noted in the VideForex user agreement that the minimum size of a trade may be different for each type of CFD, and they ask that you refer to the platform in order to see both the minimum and maximum position sizes. As such, we highly recommend using a demo account if you are considering trading with this FX brokerage.

Trading Costs

The agent that we spoke with told us there were no commission charges or trading fees, but while waiting for a response to our chat, we found the following information with the VideForex terms and conditions: “The company reserves the right to charge a commission for opening an unleveraged Cryptocurrency CFD trading position which shall vary from 1% to 2.5% of the transaction. For leveraged CFD cryptocurrency positions, the company will charge a commission fee of up to 5% of the transaction.” So, it appears that if you open any unleveraged positions you may incur these fees.

Note also that VideForex does reserve the right to charge $10 per month for each and every month wherein the client has not executed at least one trade. To avoid this charge, be sure that you do enter into a least one position monthly.

Assets

The firm claims to offer over 100 assets in total but does not provide an asset list, so there’s no way to know exactly what these are. Again, we turned to the user agreement for information and found the following list with regards to the different types of CFDs that VideForex offers within its platform:

• Forex: CFDs in currency pairs (FX)
• CFD stocks
• CFDs in Cryptocurrencies

If this information is correct, then we can deduce that the 100+ assets are comprised of currency pairs, stocks, and cryptocurrencies. That would leave out assets such as indices, commodities, and more.

Spreads

Was there any information on the website with regards to spreads? You guessed it! No. We did ask for the spread average during our live chat session and did not receive a direct answer to that question. What we did receive is the following respond: “If you are going to use binary as your main trading tool – there is no spread as you may know. If you would like to use CFD – than of course spread will affect your trading. Please change the view to candles. Trading view will allow you to check actual spread for any particular asset.” So, look to the platform if you’d like information on spreads for each asset.

Minimum Deposit

New clients are asked to submit an initial deposit in the amount of $250. We’re assuming that this will provide one with the lowest account tier, which is Bronze. We noted in this VideForex review that the firm mentions two other deposit amounts, $1,000 and $3,000, in relation to increased deposit bonuses. It very well could be that these two amounts are linked to the Silver and Gold accounts, respectively, but we were not able to confirm this.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Clients of this Forex broker can fund your account using a number of payment methods including:

• VISA/MasterCard
• Bank wire transfer
• Bitcoin
• Ethereum
• Litecoin
• Altcoins
• Neteller
• Skrill
• Perfect Money

There is a 5% transfer fee charged on all credit card deposits, where the is no charge on any other deposit method. A deposit request via credit, debit card or via e-wallet will be processed within 3 hours. It can take Videforex up to 3 business days to process incoming bank wire transfers and to verify that the funds have been received.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

Oddly enough, VideForex does not show bank wire transfer in the list of accepted withdrawal methods, but this could just be an oversight. The costs appear to be the same as above, with a 5% fee on credit card transfers, but we’d advise that you confirm this with a support agent. We did note two items within the user agreement that we felt were worth sharing. The first was that any international wire transfer withdrawal will be charged an upfront $50 transfer fee. Secondly, on funds that were not active, i.e., with which trader has not made 1x turnover, a maintenance fee of 20% on each of the withdrawal amounts do apply, and these will need to be paid by the trader.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

The search for something truly positive to say about this FX broker took a bit of time, but here it is: VideForex offers 1-hour withdrawal processing. That’s right. Within an hour or less you could have your money in hand. Obviously, this would not apply in the case of bank wire transfers but is possible with other payment methods, especially e-payments. Keep in mind that you must have submitted your ID and address (Know Your Customer) documents and had those approved before being able to request a withdrawal. Many choose to complete this step prior to making a deposit to ensure there will be no issues when it comes time to make a withdrawal.

Bonuses & Promotions

VideForex does offer deposit bonuses ranging from 20% up to 100% of the total deposit amount. The following are the deposit amounts which are required in order to claim a bonus:

• $250 = 20% Bonus
• $1,000 = 50% Bonus
• $3,000 = 100% Bonus

As always, there are terms and conditions surrounding bonuses, so please be sure to read through those completely prior to accepting a deposit bonus on your account.

In addition to bonuses, VideForex offers a weekly trading contest that offers a total prize fund of $20,000 which is distributed among 20 total winners. It appears that at least some of the prizes are offered in the form of bonus funds, starting with the participant who comes in 6th place. Positions 1 to 5 are said to have been awarded cash prizes (an iPhone 10 went to the 5th place winner). Here again, we recommend reading the terms and conditions to fully understand the rules.

Lastly, Silver and Gold account holders are provided with the ability to have their first three trades be risk-free. This is what the broker’s user agreement had to say about that: “If the total of the first three transactions is negative, Videforex will compensate the loss in the form of bonus and bonus rules will apply. The compensation of risk-free trades can not exceed the amount of the initial deposit. To use this service, you need to apply for it in advance. Simply contact your account manager and negotiate details.”

Educational & Trading Tools

All three account types are treated with a copy trading tool. There are no additional details regarding this tool on the broker’s website, so we’re going to assume that it is built into the trading platform as standard. Silver and Gold account holders are provided with access to a web session “Master Class” that presumably teaches how to trade Forex. Again, no additional details were provided about how or when to access this class. Aside from these two extras, it would seem the only other tools would be those within the trading platform.

Customer Service

VideForex is said to offer 24/7 live video chat support, which we would have assumed was exactly that – a video chat with an agent. However, having tested it, we can state that this is not how it works. Instead, you’ll have access to live chat, just the same as what most all Forex brokers offer, but be able to see a pre-recorded video of a person (a VideForex employee?) that plays on a loop. The same video seems to be played along with each live chat and to be quite honest, we found it to be quite comical. Technically, it is live video chat support, but do not expect to sit down face-to-face with an agent.

A primary contact number is provided and is as follows: +18499370843. Additional contact numbers are shown below. There is also the option to request a callback or to send an email using the contact form provided on the broker’s website. Due to the fact that we did put the video chat to the test, we can state that the response time was good. Our questions were answered within one minute or less, so no problems to report on that front.

Demo Account

Free demo accounts are available and with this broker, we truly advise that you create one, even if you are an experienced Forex trader. The reason for this recommendation is the fact that far too little trade-related information is provided on the VideForex website. We were able to get some answers from a support agent, but if you want to see what assets are offered, what the spreads are like, and more, you’re going to need to get into the trading platform and do some exploration.

Countries Accepted

It appears that residents of the United States and U.S. territories are not welcome, as the site states the following: “Videforex nor its agents or partners are not registered and do not provide any services on the USA territory.” This is at least somewhat surprising, as most brokers operating from Seychelles do in fact accept U.S. traders. It would seem that all other locations are accepted, but do check with customer support if you encounter any issues with creating a new account.

Conclusion

The lack of information on the VideForex is a bit concerning. For a brokerage that has been in operation for a while now, you’d expect the site to offer a lot more information. Obviously, lack of information doesn’t mean that there is a VideForex scam going on. We’d just prefer to see key details presented front and center. At this time, we’re going to highly recommend that you create a demo account and fully test the platform and as many services as possible before deciding that this company is the right Forex broker for you.

Traders who are looking for low trading costs and access to software will thoroughly enjoy what CWG Markets has to offer. The broker, based out of the United Kingdom, lets you trade through the MetaTrader 4 or MetaTrader 5 platform, whichever you prefer. Most competitors only offer one, with plenty who only provide traders with the less advanced MT4 version. However, not only does CWG give you access to both, but you can choose between paying no commissions or having a 0-pip spread. The 3 accounts types that are available through this broker let you trade a variety of instruments and products. Leverage, however, is limited. So are a few other services. Here is what you need to know about opening an account with CWG Markets.

Account Types

You can choose between a Classic, Advanced, and Institutional Account. All 3 allow traders to have either the US dollar, British pound, or Euro as the default currency.

Classic:
Minimum Deposit: $200
Spreads: From 1 pip
Commission: $0

Advanced:
Minimum Deposit: $200
Spreads: 0 pips
Commission: $3 per open/close ($6 per round trip trade)

Institutional:
Minimum Deposit: $50,000
Spreads: 0 pips
Commission: $1.5 per open/close ($3 per round trip trade)

In certain ways, the Advanced and Institutional accounts may fall under one category. Even though both the Classic and Advanced require the same minimum deposit, there are differences between the two. First, the Advanced account seems to be more suitable for expert traders who value a low spread over higher commissions. Institutional is for seasoned traders who have over $50,000 capital. The Classic allows beginners to generate profits and take their time to grow without incurring commission costs.

The main difference between the Classic and Advanced accounts is that the latter has a $3.00 commission but no spread. Meanwhile, the Classic has 0 commissions but a 1 pip spread. Choosing between the 2 depends on your strategy. If you like to “scalp” or use leverage to profit from small price movements, then the advanced account is appropriate due to its minimal spread. The Classic is recommended for traders who want to avoid commissions.

Platforms

CWG Markets allow you to trade through both MetaTrader 4 (MT4) and, its more advanced version, MetaTrader 5 (MT5). Through these platforms, you can design a custom algorithm that automatically executes trades on your behalf (if conditions that you set are met). The tool is especially valuable to day traders, who, without an automated method, might struggle to compete with the speed of trading computers when opening and closing positions.

MT4 and MT5 are both available on MacBook, Windows, Android, and iOS. In addition, you can passively run your account through profit targeting, stop-loss, and tracking stop-loss orders.

Leverage

Classic, Advanced, and Institutional account holders all have a maximum 1:30 leverage. Experienced and professional clients, such as those trading on the behalf of other businesses or people, can have up to a 1:100 leverage. Again, this is the case regardless of whether a trader is a Classic, Advanced, or Institutional account holder.

Trade Sizes

The minimum trade size is 0.01 and there is no maximum. This applies to all account types.

Margin Call: 100%

CWG’s margin call also acts as the stop-out level. It is designed to prevent your account from having a negative balance, where you would owe the broker money because your trades incurred significant losses. If you get a margin call, CWG will give you 2 business days to either deposit funds in the account (to bring it back to the maintenance requirement) or close some of your trades.

Otherwise, CWG will automatically close some or all of your positions, up until your invested funds meet the required margin level.
Margin requirements are also different from one ForEx pair to another. This is also the case for the different CFDs, commodities, and indexes that are available through CWG. You can check the margin levels for each instrument when you log in to your trading account.

Trading Costs

CWG charges Advanced account holders $3 every time they open or close a position. When you fully enter and exit a trade, the commission is $6. Institutional traders are charged half of what Advanced account holders pay in commission ($1.5 per entry or exit and $3 per fully closed trade).

Classic members pay $0 in commissions, but they do incur fees because of the spread. However, given that a 1 pip difference between the bid and ask prices is not significant, these charges are not hefty in comparison to the commissions. Advanced and Institutional traders only incur commission costs because they have a 0 pip spread. However, there are interest fees on overnight positions, which are different from one FX pair to another. Interest rate decisions, monetary policy, and economic factors impact the overnight swap fees.

Assets

You can trade over 60 currency pairs through CWG Markets, including major ones and exotics. Just as importantly, their website contains valuable and updated information on each FX symbol, such as live spreads, candle charts, and news feeds.

CWG also offers XAG.USD (spot silver) and XAU.USD (spot gold), alongside commodity futures (copper, natural, and oil). You can trade major market indices CFDs. The S&P 500, Dow 30, FTSE 100, Hang Sing, and Nikkei 225 are amongst the available index CFDs.

Spreads

The spread is 0 pips for Advanced and Institutional account holders. Classic traders have a 1 pip spread. Both of which are very low and desirable figures. Not many other brokers offer spreads that compete with any of CWG Markets’s account types. However, it is important for you to keep in mind that these are the minimum spread amounts. Each currency and financial instrument has its own spread, which can vary based on market conditions. In addition, some FX pairs have a floating spread that changes on a regular basis.

Minimum Deposit

To get started with Classic or Advanced, you need to transfer no less than $200. An Institutional account requires a minimum $50,000 deposit. While you can choose between the US dollar, British Pound, and Euro as your account currency, you can’t change that once you start trading.

Deposit Methods & Costs

Deposits can be done through your debit or credit card, Skrill, Neteller, China Union Pay, or as a wire transfer from your bank. CWG Markets don’t charge for deposits, but they warn than an account holder’s bank or financial institution may have fees that apply to international transfers.

The fastest way to fund your account is through a debit or credit card or an e-wallet (such as Skrill and Neteller). It takes only 1 to 2 hours to process the transaction. Deposits through bank wire transfers and credit cards can take 2 to 4 days and 3 to 5 days, respectively. While waiting on a deposit, you can track its status through the Members Area on CWG’s website.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

When you want to withdraw money, go to the Members Area and enter the amount you want to transfer. In addition, to request a withdrawal, you should briefly give them a reason as to why. Some might find this to be intrusive, but CWG does this to make it easy for you to track accounting items. Certain government regulations also require them to do so.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Withdrawals can take anywhere between 24 hours and 4 business days. Generally speaking, requests made before 2 pm GMT are processed that day. Otherwise, they will be taken care of during the next business day.

In most cases, you should expect withdrawals via debit or credit card, an e-wallet, PaySafe, or China Union Pay to take 24 hours. However, if the bank or CWG needs additional information from you, you might have to wait between 2 and 4 days. This is how long it normally takes for bank withdrawals to process, regardless of whether or not you needed to submit documents.

Educational & Trading Tools

CWG provides you with customizable charts, allowing you to choose a timeframe and chart type (such as candlesticks). This is complemented by tools that let you draw graphics and compare various technical indicators. Just as importantly, the broker has a daily economic calendar, which you can change to have it highlight weekly or monthly events. You can also use the calendar to review past data releases for up to one month.

Customer Service

As an account holder, you get trading support from CWG on an individualized, one-on-one basis. Their customer service team is available 24 hours a day during weekdays. You can contact them via phone, email, or through their online live chat tool.

Customer Service: +44(0)2039471777
Technical Support: +44(0)2039471777
Email: [email protected]

Demo Account

CWG’s demo account gives you access to $50,000 in paper money. You will trade live quotes to test your strategy and become more comfortable with the platform’s tools before you risk your actual money. Another advantage of the demo account is that you have access to different charts and graphs for free. With a live account, you have to pay for these tools. This gives you the chance to further look into CWG’s offerings before depositing funds and opening a live account.

Having said that, there are certain disadvantages. While the demo account lets you trade live quotes, it doesn’t charge you interest for overnight positions nor does it expose you to the risks associated with the spread price. Just as importantly, there are no margin calls with the demo account. Keep these factors in mind when you switch from the demo to the live account. Your returns on the former may not entirely match how you will perform when trading actual money.

Countries Accepted

The broker is registered in the UK and their accounts are backed by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). In case CWG becomes illiquid or goes bankrupt, the FSCS compensates every account holder with up to £50,000 (almost $65,000). Outside of the UK, clients from all over the world can open a CWG account and almost every country is listed in the new clients’ application form. Having said that, CWG’s website specifically notes that traders in the US and Belgium need to review their local laws that govern the financial markets. In other words, if you are in the US or Belgium, be sure that your trading strategies and the instruments you trade are in compliance with your country’s regulations.

Conclusion

The flexibility that CWG offers is incredibly helpful. Through choosing between their different account types, you can opt for either a nonexistent spread or no commissions. Many other brokers will charge you both of these fees. Just as importantly, CWG is a safe firm to work with and your funds will be insured by the FSCS in case the broker is unable to pay you back. Technical analysts can access the MT4 and MT5 platforms’ graphics, charting tools, and customizable features. If you prefer to focus on the fundamentals, economic calendars and live news feeds are also available through CWG.

Having said that, by opening an account with this broker, you are limited to their 1:30 leverage. Traders can, however, increase it to 1:100, but they have to provide CWG with a proven track record of profitability and effective risk management. If you are based out of the US or Belgium, you might have to do some extra homework on local regulations that govern the financial markets. CWG is based out of the UK and advises traders in the US and Belgium to bear the responsibility of compliance with their countries’ laws.

CryptoRocket is an FX brokerage offering private cryptocurrency and Forex CFD trading to traders around the globe. The demand for being allowed to trade privately continues to grow, and this broker most definitely meets that need. But what else do they bring to the table? In this CryptoRocket review, you’ll learn exactly what this FX broker is offering and upon reaching the end, should be able to decide whether or not they are a suitable selection for you.

Account Types

You won’t find any tiered accounts or account levels here. There is one main account type, which means that all traders are treated as equals. Each will have access to the same spreads, rates, platform, etc. The signup process for an account will only require that you enter a valid email address and select a password (which needs to be entered twice). In keeping with the offering of private trading, there will be no need to share your name, address, or even country of residence in exchange for an account. If you truly wish to trade Forex anonymously, look no further than CryptoRocket.

Platforms

All who decide to trade with this broker are given access to the MetaTrader 4 platform. This long-standing, intuitive, user-friendly platform has been around for quite some time and continues to be the top choice within the FX marketplace. MetaTrader 5 may at some point claim the top spot, but that doesn’t appear to be happening anytime soon. The platform is available as WebTrader, and of course in application format for a variety of internet-connected mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Note also that this is among a small number of brokerages actually offering an MT4 download for Mac systems.

Leverage

CryptoRocket offers a generous maximum leverage ratio of 1:500. There are, of course, some offshore brokers that offer higher leverage (1:2000 is the highest that we’ve ever seen), but the ability to trade with 500 times your capital should be more than sufficient. The leverage setting can be changed and can be set to as low as 1:1 if you are someone who prefers to trade without leverage. There are actually several increments to choose from and the setting can be changed at any time, provided that you have no open trades.

Trade Sizes

Micro lot trading is available, so the smallest allowed position size is 0.01. This is also the base incremental step-up trade size as well. The largest allowed position is 1,000 lots, which also happens to be the largest allowed by MetaTrader 4, by default. The firm does allow all types of Forex strategies, such as scalping, so the ability to trade in micro-lots will certainly prove advantageous to traders who use these types of methods.

Trading Costs

There are no per-trade commission charges to pay, so expect that the cost of trading will be paid through the spreads. Even so, the spreads that we noted during this CryptoRocket review were quite reasonable. There will be swap fees (rollover costs) on trades that remain open after market hours. These vary by individual asset and can be viewed from within a demo or live account. There were no other costs that we noted in relation to trading.

Assets

FX choice offers six different asset groups, including:

• 55 Currency Pairs
• 11 Indices
• 104 Stocks
• 30 Cryptocurrency Pairs

The number of stocks may seem like the highlight here, but what truly impressed us was the variety of cryptocurrencies. Traders who team up with CryptoRocket will be able to trade with not only the following pairs but also many more.

• BTC/USD
• DASH/USD
• ETH/USD
• LTC/USD
• BCH/USD
• XRP/USD

Spreads

The lowest noted spread was 0.1, which was on the EUR/USD pair. Since that pair tends to be linked to lower spreads naturally, below, we’re providing some additional spreads that we noted within the platform at the time of reviewing this broker.

• GBP/USD: 1.2
• USD/JPY: 0.6
• USD/CAD: 0.8
• EUR/GBP: 0.9
• GBP/JPY: 1.6

As mentioned previously, these spreads are truly not bad at all for a broker that doesn’t charge any commissions.

Minimum Deposit

There is no minimum deposit requirement, so the decision of how much money to start with will be entirely up to you. If you’re struggling with this decision, you may want to start out with a demo account to get a good idea of how much various trades cost. In general, cryptocurrency positions tend to be pricier than other standard assets, so if you plan to trade with that asset group, take note. Of course, the ability to trade in micro-lots will help those who wish to avoid as much financial risk as possible. The average first deposit within the FX industry is $100, which can prove a tad restricting, but should be enough to test the waters.

Deposit Methods & Costs

CryptoRocket primarily accepts Bitcoin for deposits. We say primarily because they have worked out a way for clients to use their credit or debit card to easily purchase Bitcoin which is then instantly deposited into an account with them. By way of a partnership with Bitcoin seller, Instacoins, traders can purchase and transfer Bitcoin into their CryptoRocket account in literally only one step. This is excellent because to put it simply if something is complicated, traders will avoid doing it. Bank wire is also a deposit option for those who are not there for anonymous trading. There are zero deposit fees, which is also excellent.

Withdrawal Methods & Costs

With Bitcoin serving as the primary deposit method, it goes to reason that it will also be the primary withdrawal method. Once again, CryptoRocket has taken the high road and is absorbing banking costs and making withdrawals free. There is no minimum withdrawal amount in place and no limit to the number of monthly withdrawals that one can make. The only thing needed in order to make a withdrawal is an e-wallet address for the funds to be sent to.

Withdrawal Processing & Wait Time

Most withdrawals are reviewed and processed within only a matter of hours. The great thing about Bitcoin is the speed at which digital coins change hands. Once the payments department has transmitted your withdrawal, the funds should arrive immediately. There can be a short wait for incoming funds to clear the blockchain, but even with that, cryptocurrencies are still the fastest way to send and receive money privately, with no need to share any personal or payment information with a Forex broker.

Bonuses & Promotions

There are currently no trading contests or deposit bonuses being offered. There is, however, a ‘Refer-A-Friend’ promotion in place that allows you to earn $5 per trade (round turn) taken by those who sign up for an account via your personal referral link. For more information on this promotion, please visit the broker’s website.

Educational & Trading Tools

There are no educational resources provided, aside from a few guides and articles, which do include Bitcoin Whale Alerts. There is a small FAQ section available as well, and this answers key questions that prospective clients may have. As for trading tools, there are no extras on-site, but MetaTrader 4 is loaded with built-in charts and tools that can be used. Expert Advisors are not provided, but they are allowed. So, feel free to use your own EAs or those which have been purchased from outside parties.

Customer Service

The CryptoRocket customer support team is available 24/7 and can be reached via live chat, phone, and email. It is possible to request a callback, and that call should be received in 24 hours or less. The primary support language is English, but we were told that there are a few multilingual support staff members onboard. To reach out for help via email, use the provided contact form on the broker’s website. This is an area in which the broker scores highly. Their support team proved to be extremely responsive and knowledgeable when tested. Many brokers claim to offer stellar support, but few actually deliver the way this broker does.

Demo Account

Not only does CryptoRocket offer demo accounts, but they offer unlimited demos. This means that you can have more than one practice account for an unlimited amount of time (provided that you are actively using them). An added benefit is the fact that CR demo accounts offer real-life trading conditions and pricing which is the same as what is provided within the live platform. Their demo accounts allow you to choose a leverage ratio and starting balance. A demo account can be created within the actual platform or by using WebTrader.

Countries Accepted

Being headquartered in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, as this FX broker is, means several things. For one, it means that standard regulation is not possible, even if they wanted it, because there is no governing regulatory system in place. Secondly, it means that CryptoRocket is allowed to establish its own rules with regards to who to accept into their platform. The truth is that by permitting truly private trading, no one is barred from the platform. So if you’re in the U.S. or China and have grown tired of being shut out of the world of Forex, a broker such as CR is an available option for you.

Conclusion

The positives of trading with CryptoRocket are crystal clear, as are the drawbacks. If you’re looking to trade FX anonymously, you’re in luck. If you’re looking for a regulated broker to trade with, you’re not. The final result of this CryptoRocket review was that we discovered a broker that offers plenty of assets, a reliable platform, solid trading conditions, high leverage, excellent support, and easy banking. You won’t find a lot of flash and fluff but with this firm, but will find a brokerage that does a bang-up job of providing exactly what FX traders want from a broker.