Forex Figures

Following shakeups in the senior staff at some of the biggest Forex brokers including Forex.com and GFT Forex, OANDA has become the next Forex broker to reshuffle its team, replacing CEO Michael Stumm with K Duker, the former Managing Director for the broker’s Asia Pacific division. Mr. Stumm will be remaining on the company’s board of directors, but will no longer fill the role of CEO. Instead, Mr. Duker will now be tasked with helping the brokerage expand from its current market position to hopefully enjoy a larger percentage of the industry pie.

Most Forex brokers saw a decline in trading volumes in the first quarter of 2012, which is likely a reason in which brokerages worldwide have been making major changes to their structures and attempting to publicize new offerings (and, in some cases, gimmicks). On the other hand, it may be a combination of a volatile market, unsettling politics out of Europe and worldwide financial troubles that have decreased trade volume. Whether any of these personnel changes will make a difference is too early to tell, but feelings of optimism for the future are definitely in the air.

Mobile Forex trading is something we’ve been discussing a lot lately, as Forex brokers and market analysts are trying their hand at developing apps that will revolutionize the Forex world…or at the very least, to simplify the process on some level. But while most Forex brokers have come up with an app or two, FXCM is showing its aggressive side by launching multiple Forex trading apps at once and combining them into an FXCM App Store.

The apps range in price from free services such as the “Trade with Friends” app which allows traders to share their moves with others and the “B-Bands Range Trader,” a mobile EA which makes moves based on Bollinger Band indicators, to the “Historical Data Downloader”, a $499 app which offers a dizzying array of data for 50 of the top currency pairs.

Among the other apps offered by FXCM are:

• Linear weighted MA-Cross (Free)
• EMA Cross (Free)
• Breakout2 ($25) – An EA based on theories of when price will break out from a support or resistance level
• Hot off the Press ($99) – Sends traders alerts about their own account activity as things change
• 24-hour trend indicator ($99)

At this point these mobile Forex apps are available to FXCM traders only, and some may be used on demo accounts, though clearly they are designed to enhance live trading. Traders can also contact FXCM to customize apps that will meet their specific trading needs, which is a feature that seems to be entirely new in the world of mobile Forex apps. It is unclear how long it takes to get the requested app customized, and users are encouraged to request a free quote to see how much it will cost to have their app custom built.

Finally, it should be noted that the FXCM app store categorizes their products into 3 categories – MT4 apps, standalone apps and Trading Desk apps. Our biggest complaint about the presentation of the app store is that it did not address openly which types of mobile devices are required for app integration. Still, the breadth of offerings was undeniably impressive and we have every reason to believe that the apps will work for most smartphones.

New to the world of mobile trading? Check out the DailyForex News & Analysis Android app to see how convenient it can be to get market updates directly to your phone!

In only 2 months since its launch, MahiFX has shown a considerable desire to respond directly to the needs of its traders and potential traders. In addition to a full homepage redesign which makes the company’s information significantly easier to access, the Forex brokerage has just launched a collection of charting tools and indicators which is integrated directly into the company’s proprietary trading platform. The new Forex charting tools are fully customizable and enable traders to follow many common indicators including MACD, WMA and others. Traders can also zoom, draw on the charts and trade directly from the charts if they so desire.

From our perspective, the integration of charting tools was a necessary addition, one that could not come soon enough in order to make MahiFX an even more impressive broker. The redesign of the company’s homepage however, came a surprise, as the shock value of the previous incarnation was undeniable, even if the usability was poor. To be sure, our team of expert traders and reviewers is significantly more impressed with the current design than the former version. Not only is the charting feature a central aspect of the new design, but so are the spreads offered by the broker, which are variable, but clearly competitive with other brokers.

Regulated by ASIC and founded by David and Susan Cooney, a husband and wife team with diverse experience in the financial sector, MahiFX is a Forex brokerage worth watching.

Saxo Bank, a leading Forex broker headquartered in Denmark, has recently announced its expansion into the Turkish Forex market. The brokerage itself won’t be regulated in Turkey, but it has acquired nearly 90% of a regulated Turkish broker, Deger Menkul Degerler, which will now be called Saxo Capital Markets Menkul Degerler A.S.

Saxo Bank joins only a handful of brokers that are legally allowed to operate in Turkey, including Integral Securities (formerly Ulukartal Forex), XTB, Gedik Securities and Finans Invest Securities (an offshoot of finansbank). The Turkish Forex industry made headlines recently when the decision was passed in August 2011 by the Turkish regulatory body CMB that Turkish brokers must be regulated, but no regulation was immediately available. Some firms were able to continue serving traders with a temporary license, but most brokers in the region were forced to halt their services and to scramble for regulation application. Since then, brokers have been slowly re-entering the market, and Saxo Bank is the latest to achieve this goal.

Thompson Reuters has long been respected as a leading news provider, a portal to which both financiers and lay people have turned to get the latest updates from across the globe. In addition to the free news and limited analysis that the news agency provides for free, it also offers a range of paid services aimed at providing higher level analyses to investors of all types to enhance the efficiency of their trading and to help sculpt their trading strategies.

To further contribute to their offerings, Reuters has launched FX Buzz, a new service that provides deeper insights and analysis into the Forex market. The service will be available via Reuters’s Eikon and 3000 extra services, both of which are counted among the company’s premium business services. Prices for these services are not available on the agency’s website, though demo accounts are available to allow traders and companies to test out the service before committing.

The specific goal of FX Buzz is to use the company’s top news reporting agency to track developing news stories that will impact the currency markets and to provide concise analyses of how these developments are likely to move the markets. The agency will focus on the major G1 currencies including USD, GBP, CAD, AUD, NZD and more, as well as primary currencies in Asia, EMA and Latin America, such as SGD, INR, HUF, RUB, MXN, CLP and BRL. FX Buzz will combine both fundamental and technical analysis on these currencies and others from Reuters’s respected staff of analysts.

Learn more about FX Buzz here.

ThinkForex may be a relatively new Forex broker, but they seem to be showing that they’ve learned from their predecessors and are ready to offer the latest, most useful services and competitive bonuses that will make almost any trader happy.

Among the offerings now available from ThinkForex:

• Free iPad3 for eligible traders, available through May 31, 2012. To claim your promotion, you must open a live account and email support@thinkforex.com with the promo code iPad Promo 52012. Then you must trade the required amount (which is not specified), in order to earn the iPad. Finally, you must contact the brokerage to claim your prize once you’ve met the eligibility requirements.
• ThinkForex is now also partnered with ZuluTrade, one of the most popular signals providers, which allows traders to choose the providers they want and to follow the trades directly in their MT4 platform.
• Finally, ThinkForex has recently implemented OneClick+, a system that simplifies the trading process and allows traders access to one click trading on their MetaTrader 4 platform, as well as real time tabular market data, both of which are available in easy to install plugins that can be used directly with the ThinkForex MT4 platform. Other OneClick+ features include default order entry, an active spread indicator, net position tracking and a close all order availability, highly useful features that aren’t generally included in the MT4 platform.

ThinkForex is an ECN Forex broker that launched in 2010 and is regulated by the FSC in New Zealand.

One of the most difficult aspects of Forex trading is the fact that there is no real course material used about to teach about the industry, as there are for many other aspects of business world such as accounting, banking and business economics. In fact, if you look at the courses offered by most business schools and universities throughout the world, you’d be hard-pressed to find a single course (let alone a set of courses) that focuses on trading the currency markets as a way to profit as an individual trader or as an advisor. Things may be changing, though, and FXCM, a leading global Forex broker, may be somewhat responsible.

In the spring semester of 2012, FXCM sponsored its first currency trading contest for students of Texas A&M University, West Texas A&M University and Baruch College. Participants in the contest were primarily students of business and economics, though anyone interested in the Forex market was eligible to enter. The contest took place over a 4 week span, during which the new Forex traders were able to study the international currency markets and to apply the technical and fundamental principles that they’d learned in class to the live market.

The contest’s winner, Bryce Moody, won a $10,000 tuition scholarship, courtesy of FXCM. The contest enabled the participants to get a sense of whether they would want to make Forex trading a part of their future trade plans or professional career, and it opened up opportunities that are never offered on the university level.

I think I can speak for the entire DailyForex team and for traders worldwide, when I say that it’s a wonder more universities haven’t yet incorporated classes about Forex trading into their syllabi, and that I hope we will see not only more trading contests in the future, but more accredited courses offered about these fascinating markets.

Do you think that Forex trading should be taught on the university level?

Binary options trading as an industry formed around 2009, and since then, literally hundreds of brokers have been sprouting up worldwide. Thus far, none have been regulated, as no regulatory body in the EU or elsewhere throughout the world has committed to overseeing or providing guidelines for the activities of binary options brokers. In other words, although many binary options brokers do operate quite professionally, there has been nothing stopping unscrupulous companies from swindling unsuspecting traders. This is about to change, however, as CySec, the financial regulatory agency of Cyprus, has just announced its intention to begin regulating binary options brokers.

The announcement comes after approximately two years of advocacy by MAP S. Platis, a consulting and advisory board that works closely with financial institutions in Cyprus, Russia and the European Union. According to MAP S. Platis, as of early May 2012, CySec has acknowledged that binary options trading activities should fall under the umbrella of MiFID, the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive, a directive which came into effect in November 2007 to promote competition and to protect consumer interests relating to financial services in the EU and several other countries. As a result of this ruling, CySec will now be regulating binary options activities.

The announcement coming from CySec regarding this new regulation instructs all binary options brokers to submit their intention to apply for regulation within 15 days. MAP S. Platis has noted that at least 3 binary options brokers have already applied for binary options regulation. It should be expected that more applications will be submitted in the coming days.

Although based and regulated only in Cyprus, Trading Point of Financial Services has been caught recruiting brokers from the United States, despite its lack of NFA regulation.  Known for enticing traders with its unusually high Forex bonuses and promotions, Trading Point has been fined $140,000 by the CFTC and has been commanded to close all accounts of US citizens and to return their money.

In addition, Trading Point was requested to put a noticeable disclaimer on their site announcing that it does not accept US traders, something which many internationally-based regulated Forex brokers already do.  The CFTC claims that Trading Point is violating the 2008 Frank Dodd bill which provides strict rules for retail Forex brokers.  The goal of the bill was to protect US consumer interests in light of the financial crisis.  In recent months the CFTC has been pursuing both Forex brokers and money managers within the US and abroad that have failed to comply with the bill’s demands.

According to a recent article in the Financial Times, however, internationally-based Forex brokers are not the only ones dragging their heels against the implementation of the Frank Dodd bill’s stipulations – EU legislators have requested a gradual compliance to US regulations, rather than an immediate shift in their policies, as the CFTC regulations are still somewhat confusing and complicated for financial institutions based across the pond.

Whether Trading Point will comply with the ruling has yet to be seen, and the issue raises additional questions about how a US governing body can realistically enforce its laws and stipulations on external institutions that are regulated by other governing bodies.  It seems that the haste with which the Frank Dodd bill was past may end up causing problems for the CFTC that will need to be addressed in the very near future.

Operating on 570 servers of Forex brokerages, the MetaTrader 4 platform that is published by MetaQuotes is, hands-down, the most popular and widely-used Forex trading platform in the world.  And, although the company regularly updates its software in what it hopes are the best interests of its traders, few upgrades are as significant as the release of the MetaTrader 4 platform for Android phones which took place this week.  Two months after the release of its iPhone application, MetaQuotes is finally offering the same mobile Fore trading ability to its Android users, allowing traders worldwide to execute trades even while away from their desktops.

According to Gaes Chreis, the COO of the MetaQuotes Software Corporation, mobile MT4 trading is now available to 70% of smartphone users – but the company aims to make their service available to all smartphone users in the coming months.

The MT4 Android app can be downloaded for free in the Google Play marketplace.  And, of course, if you plan to engage in mobile Forex trading on your Android, make sure to download the free DailyForex.com Android app which will provide you with market updates and research to solidify your trades before they’re placed.