exness Review

4:45 AM

•

Forex Trading

Exness is an online Forex broker that was established in 2008 in St. Petersburg, Russia. Since then, this broker has grown from strength to strength. This is not surprising as the company is one of the rare breed of online Forex brokers that practices transparency in its business operation. In terms of market innovation, Exness can be still considered an old school broker as it has yet to adopt the social networking concept of Forex trading. Nevertheless, this broker is still highly rated by its clients solely because of the quality of its services as indicated by the $450 billion worth of business done so far in just 2012.

FX Empire’s Awards Received

Exness – Best Educational Broker 2015

Exness – Best International Broker 2014

Trading Platform

As for trading platforms, Exness provides its clients with the reliable MetaTrader based trading platforms. Traders can choose with between MetaTrader 4 or MetaTrader 5. Professional traders with multiple accounts to manage can opt for the MetaTrader 4 Multiterminal platform.

For those who are constantly on the go they also have the option to use their mobiles devices to trade with the MetaTrader platforms for iPhone, iPad, Blackberry, Android devices and Windows Mobile Enabled Devices.

Types of Accounts

Although Exness doesn’t have as many types of trading platforms as some online Forex brokers, the company do take note of the types of clients that they have. This is evidenced by the four different types of trading accounts they provide for traders. The types of trading accounts are classified as:

• “Cent” Trading Account (No minimum deposit)

For those absolutely new to the Forex market and just wishes to get a feel of the trading environment.

• “Mini” Trading Account (No minimum deposit)

For Forex beginners as well but with improved trading conditions

• “Classic” Trading Account (Minimum deposit $2000)

For Professional Traders with full range of tools and trading facilities

• “ECN” Trading Account (Minimum deposit $300)

For Professional traders who want a trading condition where there is no conflict of interest between them and their broker.

Commission & Spreads

Like most online Forex brokers, Exness does not charge any commissions on trades done through them. Instead they earn by adding on a spread on the quote that they give to their clients. Their spreads is probably one of the lowest around in the industry which perhaps accounted for their popularity among so many traders. However for ECN trading accounts, there is a minimum fee of just $25 for each one million dollar trade.

Reliability

To ensure that their clients have no problems depositing their funds, traders have the option to select from the various methods listed below:

• CashU
• MasterCard
• Perfect Money
• QIWI
• RBK Money
• Skrill (Moneybookers)
• Visa
• Webmoney
• Wire Transfer

Withdrawal of funds can be done through:

• CashU
• Internal Transfer
• MasterCard
• Perfect Money
• RBK Money
• Ruble Wire Transfer
• Skrill (Moneybookers)
• Visa
• Web money
• Wire Transfer
• Yandex Money

Since September 2009, Automatic withdrawal of fund is available for Exness’s clients. There is no longer the need to wait for the processing of the withdrawal request. Currently, only Exness has the technological support for this sort of service.

Apart from the various channels for transferring funds, Exness’s reliability is enhanced by their In-house News Section. Through there, they keep their clients updated with the latest going on with their broker. The fact that Exness is regulated by CySec (license no. 178/12) greatly enhanced their reputation as a reliable broker. This indicates that Exness is in full compliance with the European market trading standard.

Customer Support

As for customer support, Exness is top notch. Their website support 17 major languages like:

• Arabic
• Bahasa Indonesia
• Bahasa Malaysia
• Chinese
• English
• Farsi
• German
• Russian
• Hindi
• Thai
• Vietnamese
• Urdu
• Tamil
• Bengali

To ensure that their clients are properly serviced, they also provided several methods of getting in touch with the support. Traders can contact by means of:

• Livechat
• Call Back service
• 24 hrs Telephone support at +357 25 030 959
• E-mails at: support@exness.com, sales@exness.com and complaints@exness.com

• Postal Mail to:

Office 309, Regus Nevsky Plaza Business Centre, Nevsky prospect 55, lit. A, Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation, 191025

Pros

• Tight spreads starting from 0.3 pip
• High Leverage of 1:2,000
• Responsive Customer service
• Reliable Trading platform
• Automatic withdrawals request processing
• CySEC regulated
• Multiple types of trading accounts
• Low deposit requirement
• Can Trade CFDs as well

Cons

• Does not support social networking form of trading

Conclusion

With so many online forex brokers around nowadays, what makes Exness stand out is the fact that they not only show that they care about their clients, they actually prove it by responding to their clients’ complaints and needs. This is clearly evident from some of the feedback that the company have received on some of the Forex brokers review blogs. Their customer support staffs actually take the trouble to read the feedbacks and address the complainant’s concerns. No longer are traders just a faceless account number on a computer screen.

OPEN ACCOUNT

READ MORE

XM Review

4:42 AM

•

xm

Formerly established in 2009 as Trading Point of Financial Instruments Ltd, XM is a regulated Forex broker in the Republic of Cyprus. The company was initially founded by a group of interbank dealers who wanted to improve the level of services in the Forex trading community. With XM, traders now have access to the commodities, CFDs and Forex markets.

One of the main advantages of dealing with XM is the fact that the company is based in Cyprus, a member country of the Eurozone. This mean XM meets the minimum fiduciary standard required of a financial service provider operating in the Eurozone. Incidentally, XM is also registered with the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority of Germany (BaFin) and UK’s Financial Services Authority (FSA) thus giving added protection to traders.

Trading Platforms

Like its predecessor, Trading Point, XM also have a fabulous choice of trading platforms for their clients: 

• XM Metatrader 4

The Metatrader 4 Forex trading platform is one of the world’s most reliable and popular trading platforms. Hence, it is not surprising to see XM making this platform available to their clients. Packed with the tools of the trade, traders can set up the XM Metatrader 4 trading platform for either manual trading or automated trading with Expert Advisors (EAs).

• XM Web Trader

The XM Web Trader provides traders to trade in the financial markets through the internet without having the need to have specialized software downloaded. 

• XM Account Types

There are four types of trading account with XM:

XM ZERO 

XM Zero accounts offer spreads as low as 0 on 56 currency pairs, Gold and Silver and the leverage up to 500:1.

Micro Trading Account

This type of account is suited for those who want to adopt a low risk approach towards investing. This trading account needs an extremely low minimum initial deposit of just $5.

Standard Trading Account

The Standard Trading Account is more suited for the professional and more experienced traders. Although the benefits are the same as Micro Trading accounts, Traders with standard trading accounts can trade with larger contract size.

Other Types of Trading Account

Islamic Accounts

Recognizing that the Forex market is a global market, XM also make allowances for those traders who wish to trade in accordance with their religious belief. The Islamic trading allows traders to conduct trades based on Sharia principles.

Managed Accounts

Clients who don’t have the experiences or time to trade for themselves can also rely on the additional services provided by XM through the form of managed accounts. A professional account manager will help clients’ with their trades and also help to manage their funds for them.

Demo Accounts

With the Demo account provided by XM, traders can test out their trading strategies without having to risk real money. Each demo account is provided with $100,000 in virtual money so traders can try to simulate real trading conditions.

Commission & Spreads

Like most Forex brokers, XM do not charge any commission. Instead, they charge a spread on trades conducted through them. Depending on the instruments and account types, spreads start from as low as 1 pip. There is a choice of fixed spread or variable spread that traders can opt for. To provide their clients with the best possible spreads, XM also offer fractional pip pricing so prices can be quoted to the fifth digit instead of the normal four digit pricing.

Customer Support

To cater for a globalized market, XM website is a multilingual website. Languages supported include:

• Arabic
• Bahasa Indonesia
• Bahasa Malaysia
• Chinese
• English
• French
• German
• Greek
• Hungarian
• Japanese
• Korean
• Polish
• Portuguese
• Russian
• Spanish
• Thai
• Swedish
• Italian
• Turkish
• Vietnamese

Customer support is reachable 24/5 through:

• Live Chat
• Email

–          accounting@XM.com–          backoffice@XM.com–          dealing@XM.com–          hr@XM.com–          IB@XM.COM–          pr@XM.com–          sales@XM.com–          support@XM.com

• Telephone

–          Tel: +357 25029900 (Cyprus)
–          Tel: +64 33353327 (New Zealand)
–          Tel: +357 25029918 (Accounting)
–          Tel: +357 25029900 (Affiliate Program)
–          Tel: +357 25029920 (Back Office)
–          Tel: +357 25029900 (Customer Support)
–          Tel: +357 25029910 (Dealing Room)
–          Tel: +357 25029914 (Public Relation)
–          Tel: +357 25029930 (Sales)

• Facsimile

–          Fax: +357 25820344 (Cyprus)
–          Fax: +64 33353417 (New Zealand)
–          Fax: +357 25820344 (Affiliate Program)
–          Fax: +357 25820344 (Customer Support) 

Reliability

Reliability is reviewed from the aspect of trading efficiency as well as the ease with which the funds can be handled.

• Trading Efficiency

At XM, they recognized that quality execution is essential and hence their trades are executed efficiently with 99.35% of all trades completed in less than a second. They have a Strict NO re-quotes policy and all orders are 100% executed.

• Funds Depositing

Can be done through China UnionPay, Credit Cards, iDEAL, Moneybookers Skrill, MoneyGram, Neteller, SOFORT, WebMoney, Western Union, Local Bank Transfer and Wire Transfer.

• Funds Withdrawal

Supported by China UnionPay, Credit Cards, iDEAL, Moneybookers Skrill, Neteller, SOFORT, WebMoney and Wire Transfer.

Pros

To surmise, XM have several distinct advantages like:

• Deposit bonus up to 5000 USD
• Efficient trade execution (99.35%)
• No rejection of orders (100% execution)
• Strict NO re-quotes
• Unique Leverage up to 888:1

Cons

The cons of XM include:

• Not having any funding option for Paypal
• Doesn’t differentiate much in terms of benefits between the different types of trading account. 

Conclusion

The rebranding exercise is indicative of the fact that XM is trying to adapt to the changing market environment. This is a positive move as it shows that the broker is responsive to their clients’ actual needs. The “No Requote” policy is a good way for them to differentiate themselves from other brokers as this is a major problem faced by many traders in a fast moving market. Taken as a whole, XM seem like an ideal broker for both new and experienced traders. 

OPEN ACCOUNT

READ MORE

FBS REVIEW

4:38 AM

•

Forex Trading

Based in Belize, FBS is an international acclaimed online forex broker that was founded in 2009. They currently serve more than 2,000,000 traders in more than a hundred different countries. Within a span of 3 years after FBS was established, the broker was recognized as the “Best Forex Broker Asia” and “Fastest Growing Broker Asia”. They also achieved recognition as having the “Best platform MetaTrader 4”. As a Belize based broker, FBS is not regulated by any government regulatory agencies in particular. Instead, FBS has opted to be regulated under the industry self regulating body called “Centre for Regulation in OTC Financial Instruments and Technologies” (CRFIN).

Trading Platforms

For trading access, FBS has provided their traders with the widely used MetaTrader 4 (MT4) trading platform. In fact, the MT4 platform is the most popular trading platform within the online forex trading community. No doubt, the features and capability of the MT4 trading platform plays a huge role with its popularity among traders. For example, the MT4 comes with a comprehensive charting package as well as a wide range of technical indicators. It also support automated trading through the use of Expert Advisors (EAs). In addition, the platform is available as a web based platform as well as a mobile platform hence giving traders the freedom to trade from anywhere they want.

Account Types

In order to cater to the trading needs of their international clientele, FBS has made available 5 different types of trading platform. These include the:

• Cents Trading Account
• Minimum deposit $1
• Leverage up to 1:1000
• 100 Maximum open positions
• Floating Spreads
• Micro Trading Account
• Minimum deposit $5
• Leverage up to 1:3000
• 200 Maximum open positions
• Fixed Spreads
• Standard Trading Account
• Minimum deposit $100
• Leverage up to 1:3000
• 200 Maximum open positions
• Floating Spreads
• Zero Spread Trading Account
• Minimum deposit $500
• Leverage up to 1:3000
• 200 Maximum open positions
• Fixed Spreads
• Unlimited Trading Account
• Minimum deposit $500
• Leverage up to 1:500
• No trading limits
• Floating Spreads

Commission & Spreads

With regards to FBS’s spreads and commission rates, the broker offers their traders extremely attractive and competitive rates. As for the spreads at FBS, you can choose between fixed or floating spreads. The fixed spreads starts from as low as zero pips while floating spreads starts from a minimum of 0.2 pips.

Customer Support

The customer support service at FBS is one of the most comprehensive that is ever offered by any online forex broker. Traders can request for assistance from the support team 24/5 through email, live chat or the call back service provided. In addition, the support services are provided in a dozen major Asian languages as well as 4 major European languages.

Pros

• Attractive Bonuses
• Choices of trading account types
• Extremely low minimum deposit requirement
• Free deposit insurance
• High trading leverage of up to 1:3000
• Ultra low spreads

Cons

• Lack of Trading Education
• Localized support limited to email support
• Trading Instruments limited to Forex and 2 metals
• Trading Platform limited to MT4 platform

Unregulated broker

Conclusion

Although FBS is a very new forex broker by the current industry standard, they have managed to prove themselves to be a top notch broker. They have made it extremely easy and affordable to start trading forex with their flexible account opening requirements. In addition, they also offer ultra tight spreads for traders who are looking for a price competitive broker. But what is most impressive about FBS is the extent of the localized support coverage. Despite the fact that they have only being in operation for less than a decade, they have managed to open up localized support centers in more than half a dozen different countries. If you have just started trading forex and is interested to find a broker that can meet all your trading needs, we suggest that you give FBS a try.  

OPEN ACCOUNT

READ MORE

eToro Review

4:34 AM

•

Forex Trading

Since the deregulation of the forex trading industry in 1997, there has been a massive proliferation of internet based spot forex brokers. While this scenario might be a good thing in terms of the availability of choice for traders, too much of a good thing can also be bad. This is because it can be difficult to sift out the “bad” from all the brokers out there, as basically everyone is offering the same kind of service. However, all this started to change when a broker called eToro introduced the concept of social trading to the world in 2010 with the launch of their OpenBook social investment platform. With this innovative social trading platform, traders can now easily copy the trading strategies of their more successful peers without having to have a solid foundation in trading the spot forex market.

FX Empire’s Awards Received

eToro – Best Social Trading 2015

eToro – Best Trading App 2014

Trading Platforms

Since the debut of their OpenBook social trading platform, eToro has gone on to improve the functionality of their platforms. Now, eToro have provided their traders with 3 ways in which they can trade the markets namely with eToro WebTrader, eToro OpenBook and eToro Mobile Trader.

• eToro OpenBook

Regarded as the most popular forex social trading platform in the world, eToro OpenBook platform lets you follow the progress of other traders as well as lets you interact with them in real time and puts the power of networking into the palm of your hand. With the integrated “Copy Trader” feature, you can copy the trades of your more successful peers automatically in real time as well.

• eToro WebTrader

A web based powered trading platform, eToro WebTrader provides you with all the tools that you need to analyze your trades as well as letting you synchronize with OpenBook to copy the trades of others.

• eToro Mobile Trader

With the introduction of eToro Mobile Trader apps, traders can now also access the power of social trading with their smartphones and mobile devices.

Now in addition to forex, traders can also trade a selection of commodities and stocks with eToro’s trading platforms.

Account Types

At eToro, you have a choice of two different types of trading account, standard trading account and Islamic trading account.

• Standard Trading Account

Opening a trading account at eToro is easy as they only require a minimum initial deposit of just $50. You can fund your trading account using the following methods:

• Credit Cards
• MoneyGram
• Neteller
• PayPal
• WebMoney
• Wire Transfer

Withdrawals at eToro can only be done after your have verified your account. Once you have verified your account, you can withdraw using the same method that you used to deposit your money into your trading account. Take note that the minimum amount to be withdrawn is $20.  There is also a small fee payable when you make a withdrawal. The fee is dependent on the amount to be withdrawn and ranges from $5 to $25. The stipulated processing time for a withdrawal request is up to 5 business days.

• Islamic Account

For Muslim traders who want to trade the forex market according to Shariah principles, they can choose to open an Islamic trading account with a minimum initial deposit of $1000. With the Islamic account, no interest is imposed on overnight positions and no commissions are payable as well.

• Demo Account

For those of you who want to try out eToro’s trading platform fist, you can always sign up for their obligation free demo account. The demo account lets you try out all the features on eToro without having to risk any real money. Instead, you will be trading with $10,000 virtual cash supplied with the demo account.

Commission & Spreads

At eToro there are no commissions payable. Instead, traders have to pay a slightly wider spread on all their trades. With the exception of Bitcoin transactions (1 pip spread), the typical spread at eToro starts from a minimum of 2 pips for the USD/JPY currency pair and 3 pips for the EUR/USD, USD/RUB USD/CHF and USD/CAD. For less frequently traded pairs, the spreads can go up to as high as 14 pips.

Customer Support

Customer support services at eToro are provided in several major languages and are available 24/5. Contact with the support team can be done through email, live chat or the telephone.

Pros

• Automated Trading
• Comprehensive Training Academy
• Ground Breaking Social Trading Platform
• Multiple choices of trading platforms
• Regular Attractive Promotional Offers

Cons

• High Spread
• Limited Choices of Forex Pairs
• Their Platforms are Non Customizable
• Trading Charts lack sophisticated tools

Conclusion

There is no doubt that eToro’s social trading platform is the most innovative change that has occurred during the past few years. They have single-handedly transformed a stressful trading endeavour into a fulfilling experience which feels more like game for everyone. The OpenBook platform can be said to be tailored made especially for novices of online trading who are unsure of how to start.

OPEN ACCOUNT

READ MORE