FX brokers suitable for UK trading.

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JoeJones

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Hi,

I've searched through many threads and still not found an answer to my questions.


I'm looking for a broker in the UK with which to open an account so I can trade on the FX market.

I've looked at BFL, FXCM and Refco lately and all of which require 6months investment trading experience due to FSA regulations to open an account. In speaking with BFL it looks like I need to set up an account trading Futures but to be honest I know very little about Futures trading and don't know if it's what I'm looking for. (I've signed up for a demo account but waiting for it to come through....examples on the net are rare and don't explain the whole process of trading futures in currency).



So what I'm asking here is if anyone knows of a broker in which I can set up an account trading on the FX market without the requirement for 6months experience. Ideally something which is UK based or has UK offices but more importantly something which is UK friendly (i.e. is cheap) to transfer funds to and from the account.


Thanks for any suggestions/help.
 
JoeJones said:
all of which require 6months investment trading experience due to FSA regulations to open an account.
Click to expand...

Could you spread bet for 6 months first?

The SB companies usually offer Forex as well. Not as good as a forex broker, but surely it would give you the experience they want.

Or open up a basic stock brokerage account and buy a few shares and put them in a Maxi ISA. That way you have the 6 months and if you have made the right choices, you have made a few £ too.
 
JoeJones said:
I'm looking for a broker in the UK with which to open an account so I can trade on the FX market.
Click to expand...
It's not so easy, is it?

I trade FX for a living, and I must say that (apart from for spread-betting, and I don't think that's what you're asking about at all?) a broker in the UK would NOT be my choice.

Might you not want to have a look at Oanda? Not based in the UK, but you can have a £ account with them and you probably won't find a broker that gets fewer complaints or fewer dissatisfied customers wherever they live.

Or failing that, have a look at CMC, perhaps. UK-based and good spreads. Not the very best record in the world for customer service, perhaps, but you did say "UK-based" ...

FXCM have had a lot of very bad publicity, and they have rather substantial spreads and a very bad record for customer service.

Saxo "Bank"? I advise you VERY strongly to read everything you possibly can about them before considering them. Not only here, but at MoneyTec and EliteTrader too. And think about who regulates them and read things written by the many people who've tried to call on the help of their "regulator". (But if you do that, you _certainly_ won't be opening an account with them.) They're not UK-based anyway.

Sorry - didn't start this post intending to be negative, but it's not an easy question! Bear in mind that many "retail forex brokers" are actually bucket-shops that hold the other side of your trade, have a real incentive to trade against you and get many complaints arising from that. I don't mean for a moment to suggest that all the complaints are justified, but these are certainly matters to research and think carefully about before depositing your trading capital somewhere!
 
JoeJones said:
Hi,




So what I'm asking here is if anyone knows of a broker in which I can set up an account trading on the FX market without the requirement for 6months experience. Ideally something which is UK based or has UK offices but more importantly something which is UK friendly (i.e. is cheap) to transfer funds to and from the account.


Thanks for any suggestions/help.
Click to expand...

This might just be my way of thinking, but how do people judge ' 6 months experiance'. ?
Couldn't you just open an account with an SB company, deposit the minimum, or do nothing. Do these people want to see some sort of history? Just a thought, I don't know.
 
I had 12 months expereince of trading FX via SB when I opened an account with FXCM.

I have done no other trading (ie futures/ stocks).

Although their application form hade no option for SB, I asked the question and they said trading SB was acceptable.

I ticked the box that said I had experience of trading fx. There was absolutely no follow up to this so I doubt very much that they check this/ seek further evidence.

BTW, I have had my account with FXCM for about 9 months now and have never had any negative experience with them. Orders filled at the expected price/ quickly etc. Also customer service has been pretty good in my experience. They have offices in London and are registered with the FSA in the UK.
 
PS If you want to trade fx via SB, I used CMC spreadbet (d4f) and would agree, customer service is pretty poor but great spreads and little evidence of the infamous SB bias etc (on fx that is- no experience of other instruments). Capital spreads seems a good alternative but I do not have an account with them so cannot give direct opinions. (see lengthy threads on here though for good reports).

The SB companies will not ask for any previous experience. Hard cash is good enough for them. :D :LOL:
 
JoeJones said:
Hi,

I've searched through many threads and still not found an answer to my questions.


I'm looking for a broker in the UK with which to open an account so I can trade on the FX market.

I've looked at BFL, FXCM and Refco lately and all of which require 6months investment trading experience due to FSA regulations to open an account. In speaking with BFL it looks like I need to set up an account trading Futures but to be honest I know very little about Futures trading and don't know if it's what I'm looking for. (I've signed up for a demo account but waiting for it to come through....examples on the net are rare and don't explain the whole process of trading futures in currency).



So what I'm asking here is if anyone knows of a broker in which I can set up an account trading on the FX market without the requirement for 6months experience. Ideally something which is UK based or has UK offices but more importantly something which is UK friendly (i.e. is cheap) to transfer funds to and from the account.


Thanks for any suggestions/help.
Click to expand...

Why do you need a UK account? You can register through FXCM which does not require 6 months experience, and you can still have a Sterling account. Will there be alot of costs in transferring money to and from UK bank account?
 
Even more interesting about Roberto's answer is this from the site he is using...

OANDA's proprietary FXTrade Platform is a fully automated trading platform in which OANDA plays the role of market-maker. Our platform is not an auctioning system in which a trader must request a price from a pricing source and then make a buy/sell decision based on the quote offered. Nor is it a matching engine where a trade is executed only if both sides of the trade can be filled at the time of the buy/sell request.

which to me seems to be the "bucket shop" he is complaining about.

Try a look at Visual Trading based in New York. I believ e you funds afre held in country. You can check all this on their website.
 
Thanks for all the replies.

Just to clarify, I want to trade spot Forex and whilst Spread Betting 'is' an option it doesn't appeal to me due to the large spreads and the poor stories I've heard with SBing.


Although FXCM allow accounts to be set up in GBP base currency, the last time I conferred with them they forwarded me onto BFL claiming that they were they're UK branch so to speak. Setting up an account with FXCM.co.uk carries the same FSA regulation of 6months trading experience (and in talking with BFL they DO check you have relevant experience). Maybe if I set up an account with FXCM.com I can bypass the UK side of things.

With regards to wanting a UK account it is purely down to limiting costs acquired with transfering funds to and from the account and in a timely manner. Upon investigation pretty much everyone charges to withdraw funds from an account.



I've now been looking at Oanda and Visual Trading. I've heard nothing but good reviews of Oanda with the only concern being the increase in spread due to market volatility and on the weekend...something which I can cope with and am not put off by. The only gripe with Oanda I have is with withdrawing funds....I'm sure they are completely overcharging for such a service but it's one of those trade offs associated with a small spread and good customer service (or so I've heard).

Out of the two I prefer the simpler interface of Oanda...but maybe I need more time with Visual Trader to get over the gripe I have with multiple window'd applications.




Again, thanks for all the input.

If any UKer have set up an account trading spot Forex without having 6months trading experience and are trading for a living, mention of which trading broker you went with and why would be most grateful.
 
If you go for FXCM, you can transfer money from your account to you free, (through cheque)
 
redrocket said:
Even more interesting about Roberto's answer is this from the site he is using... OANDA's proprietary FXTrade Platform is a fully automated trading platform in which OANDA plays the role of market-maker. Our platform is not an auctioning system in which a trader must request a price from a pricing source and then make a buy/sell decision based on the quote offered. Nor is it a matching engine where a trade is executed only if both sides of the trade can be filled at the time of the buy/sell request. which to me seems to be the "bucket shop" he is complaining about.
Click to expand...
Exactly so. I don't understand why you seem to think I use Oanda, Redrocket, but in view of your comments I think I should probably apologise for any ambiguity or confusion my post might have caused. I don't use Oanda. But I have noticed from internet forums that are absolutely riddled with sad and bitter tales about FXCM, in particular (whom I also don't use nowadays, although I have) that Oanda seem from the customers' perspective to have a particularly clean bill of health and a most remarkable lack of complaints.

I use spread-betting, because I don't like paying tax on my profits.

Contrary to some people's opinions, the spreads these days are _not_ necessarily any higher than those of the retail forex brokers.

Anyone who thinks they are should simply take a look at deal4free and Capital Spreads.
 
TheWolf said:
Why does spread betting means no need to pay tax?
Click to expand...
At the moment it's legally classified as "gambling", and as such is officially untaxed.

The spread-betting firms have to pay tax, of course, but the winning customers don't. Similar position to betting on the horses with a bookie: you don't pay tax on your winnings unless you do it full-time for a living and it's your SOLE income.

But this will not be relevant to you until your capital gains exceed £8,200 in any one tax year anyway, because everything below that will be within your CGT-allowance (unless you also have other capital gains apart from trading).
 
If any UKer have set up an account trading spot Forex without having 6months trading experience and are trading for a living, mention of which trading broker you went with and why would be most grateful.
Click to expand...

Hi Joe,

The "6 months experience" clause is an example of meaningless regulation. The just have to ask the question. As long as you check the box, all brokers will be gagging to get you on board. This is because they are working on the assumption that you will lose heavily - and you almost certainly will. This is not a negative comment, it's the reality for a beginner who is entering into a game against professionals. You wouldn't fork out £10,000 to play in a golf tournament against Tiger Woods, etc., unless you were a very, very good golfer, would you?

You need to develop winning strategies first and get a lot of experience. To do this I would recommend an FXCM demo account, which is unlimited. I would also recommend that you try fxengines.com and back-test some simple strategies.

I trade forex using IG Markets at the moment. The software is not as good as FXCM's, but they offer 3pip spreads on their 100k lots. Most brokers are a "much of a much-ness" - try them all and find a platform that you like and are comfortable with.

Have fun
Steve
 
Apparently they dont care about the 6 months experience thing. You can just tick it even if you havent had 6months experience
 
Hi

Do FXCM offer spread betting? Thought with them you actually buy the currency. If this is the case wouldn't you have to pay tax and stamp duty?

John


darrenf said:
I had 12 months expereince of trading FX via SB when I opened an account with FXCM.

I have done no other trading (ie futures/ stocks).

Although their application form hade no option for SB, I asked the question and they said trading SB was acceptable.

I ticked the box that said I had experience of trading fx. There was absolutely no follow up to this so I doubt very much that they check this/ seek further evidence.

BTW, I have had my account with FXCM for about 9 months now and have never had any negative experience with them. Orders filled at the expected price/ quickly etc. Also customer service has been pretty good in my experience. They have offices in London and are registered with the FSA in the UK.
Click to expand...
 
I tried both Oanda and FXCM. Onada is much better. You can also have Sterling account with Oanda and you can withdraw money for free by cheque
 
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