FXCM – Broker Review and Trader Feedback

Founded in 1999, FXCM was an early pioneer of online trading. The brokerage firm first began its operation in the USA and later expanded to major cities around the world and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange. However due to the losses suffered by FXCM as a result of the Swiss National Bank (SNB) unpegging the Swiss Franc from the Euro in 2015, FXCM was forced to restructure and shift its operations to the UK. Today, FXCM is based in the UK. Its head office is located at 20 Gresham Street, 4th Floor, London EC2V 7JE, United Kingdom.

In addition to its UK office, FXCM also maintains offices in South Africa, Australia, France, Germany and Italy. As the FXCM brand is managed by different subsidiaries in the FXCM group, the platform comes under the oversight of different regulatory agencies in different jurisdictions with the notable ones being the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority, and the Australian Securities Exchange Commission

Track record: Established broker with high standard of transparency and integrity. Well known broker with good reputation and many awards won.

Highly regulated: Well Regulated Broker under FCA and ASIC to offer high level protection to traders.

Trading features: Wide range of trading tools and multiple trading platforms.

Huge selection of trading technology: FXCM proprietary Trading Station Desktop, Trading Station Web 2.0, Mobile platforms and MT4.

Demo mode: features demo trading for new traders, or those who want to test out FXCM’s suite of platforms.

Market maker, no ECN trading option: FXCM is a market maker and does not offer true ECN or STP trading. This means FXCM takes the other side of the trade to its customers which can pose a conflict of interest.

As for the trading conditions at FXCM, the broker charges a mix of commissions and spreads on the trades that its traders make on its trading platforms. The Forex commission is $30 per million volume traded each way. The commission rate goes down to $25 per million volume once the total monthly volume traded exceeded $150 million. Spreads for forex pairs are equally competitive with the benchmark EUR/USD being as low as 1.4 pips. For commodities and indices CFDs, FXCM does not charge any commissions. The only trading cost which traders have to pay for trading CFDs on FXCM is just the applicable spread.

As for the range of assets which are available at FXCM, they cover several asset classes such as cryptocurrencies, currency pairs, commodities, precious metals, market indices and Treasury bond. In total, there are 39 currency pairs, 2 types of precious metals, 6 types of commodities, 2 cryptocurrencies and 13 market indices. These assets can be traded on the spot markets as well as with CFDs. For UK traders, they also have the option to spread bet on a selected range of assets.

For trading platforms, FXCM offers two main types of trading platforms. They comprise of the industry proven MetaTrader 4 platform as well as the proprietary Trading Station. Both these two trading platforms are available as a desktop client and as a web based trading platform, The MT4 is notably popular among traders as it comes with a wide selection of trading tools and is able to support automated trading with the use of scripts such called “Expert Advisor”. Due to the popularity of the automated trading feature, the proprietary FXCM Trading station was developed also to support automated trading strategies. These two platforms come with a complete charting package which traders can use in order to analyze the markets with more details.

Apart from the two main trading platforms offered by FXCM, the broker has also provided access to third party trading platform such as ZuluTrade and NinjaTrader. For traders with no time to develop their own trading strategies or wish to remove the emotional aspect from trading, the ZuluTrade platform allow its users to receive trading signals from more experienced traders that have already done the all the necessary work. The NinjaTrader platform on the other hand allow its users to trade options and futures together with forex with one trading platform.

For mobile traders, the MT4 and the FXCM Trading Station is available as mobile trading apps on both Google PlayStore and Apple App Store. The mobile apps for both MT4 and FXCM Trading Station are provided free of charge and have all the major features of the full fledged versions of the their desktop and web based versions.

FXCM has provided potential clients and existing clients with a demo account facility. The demo account comes preloaded with £50,000 virtual cash deposit and can be used to test out the services offered by FXCM or to test out new trading strategies developed by experienced traders without having to risk any real money. The demo account uses live prices for trade executions and allows users to trade the financial markets under actual market conditions 24 hours a day 5 days a week.

As for the types of trading account provided by FXCM, they consist of a standard account and an Active trader account. The standard account allows you to access all assets offered for trading on the either the MT4 trading platform or FXCM Trading station. It also lets you earn a 5% interest* on the available balance in your trading account.

*It is only applicable to clients who are onboarded under FXCM Markets.

The Active Trader account on the other hand lets you trade with lower cost. Spreads on forex pairs are competitive but you will be charged a commission of $30 per million volume traded. In addition, you also have access to additional benefits such as API trading and eFXplus derived-data service (DDS) c

To open a trading account at FXCM, you need to undergo a 3 step process. To begin, simply click on the ‘Open Account” button located at the top right hand corner of the home page. You will be directed to the account registration form where you need to select your country of residence as well as the trading platform that you want to use.

After you have chosen your country of residence and preferred trading platform, you can click on the “Begin Application” button. By doing so will bring you to another page that is secured. Complete the registration form by filling in all the required fields and then submit the form by clicking the “Continue” button. Your application will then be processed FXCM. Upon approval, you will be issued a login ID and a password. The final step of the account opening process is when you deposit funds into your trading account. Take note that you also need to verify your account in order to complete the account opening process. The verification of your identity and residential address is due to international anti money laundering legislation. This process require you to furnish FXCM with a copy of your government issued ID and a bank statement what is less than 6 months old.

For withdrawals of funds at FXCM, this can be done through bank wire transfer, electronic fund transfer, credit/debit cards, Neteller, Skrill or UnionPay. There is no withdrawal fee payable for a credit card withdrawal. However all bank wire transfer withdrawal will incur a fee of $40. Incidentally, bank wire transfer is by far the fastest way for you to receive your withdrawn funds. The normal time for the funds to be posted to your bank account is 2 to 3 business days.

One of the most notable features that we noted on the FXCM website is its educational center. The educational center is divided in 5 different sections, the video library, trading guides, live classroom, seminars and Webinar archive.

Video Library. The video library at FXCM is divided into the following categories: Popular Videos; Advanced features; Charts; Deposits/Withdrawals; New to Forex; On Demand; Order Types; Past Recorded Webinars; Trading Station features; Trading Station Mobile.

Trading Guide Section. There are 5 guides in the Trading guide section. The current guides showcased in this section consisted of the following guides: New To Forex; Traits of Successful Traders; From Stocks To FX; Trading Station User Guide; Market Scanner Guide.

Live Classroom section. This section consists of a list of all the upcoming webinars that are scheduled for broadcast.

Webinar archive section. All past webinars that has been recorded can be found here. So even if you miss one of the broadcasted webinar, you can always refer to this section to review the webinar that you missed.

Seminar Section. Seminars are conducted every Wednesday after 6pm at FXCM head office. Seats for the live seminars are limited to 10 seats so reservation is required to secure a place at the seminar. The speakers at the seminars currently are James Taylor, former trader of 3 energy companies and Al Fyvie, a former employee of RBS.

FXCM is a powerhouse of a broker and is worth considering if you are looking for a broker to sign up with. They have a long track history of offering a huge selection of assets across some of the industry’s leading technology.

In our review, we noted that FXCM has remained true to its objective of being a broker that operates with integrity and transparency. If you are a novice, you will not feel lost with this broker as they have provided a very comprehensive trading education package. Even experienced traders will find trading with FXCM a fulfilling experience as the broker has also cater to the trading needs with the active trader account.