1. Safety of  Your Funds

Financial Regulation – When the Forex Broker Expert reviews a new Forex or CFD broker, the best way to know if they are a legitimate broker is by checking for a valid license and the quality of the license. Many legal Forex brokers, are licensed by a local regulator like ASIC in Australia, CySEC in Europe, FCA in the United Kingdom or by FSB South Africa.

AVA Trade EU Ltd is regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland (No.C53877). AVA Trade Ltd is regulated by the B.V.I Financial Services Commission. Ava Capital Markets Australia Pty Ltd is regulated by the ASIC (No.406684). Ava Capital Markets Pty is regulated by the South African Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA No.45984). Ava Trade Japan K.K. is regulated in Japan by the FSA (No.1662) and the FFAJ (No.1574), read more.

Forex brokers that are regulated in a major hub are always more trustworthy. Brokers in emerging hubs can also be trustworthy, but caution is warranted. Based on our annual study of regulatory trustworthiness, here is a list of the regulatory bodies we track and how trustworthy each one is:

• FCA Regulated – Financial Conduct Authority – United Kingdom – (Great)
• CySEC Regulated – Cyprus Securities & Exchange Commission – Cyprus (OK)
• ASIC Regulated – Australian Securities & Investment Commission – Australia (Good)
• SFC Authorized – Securities Futures Commission – Hong Kong (Good)
• MAS Authorized – Monetary Authority of Singapore – Singapore (Good)
• FSA Authorized – Financial Services Agency – Japan (Good)
• IIROC Authorized – Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada – Canada (Good)
• FINMA Authorized – Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority – Switzerland (Good)
• FMA Authorized – Financial Markets Authority – New Zealand (OK)

United States 

The two organizations tasked with licensing and regulating Forex entities are NFA and CFTC. These two bodies, the National Futures Association and Commodities Futures Trading Commission, are the governing bodies. Capital requirement for any broker doing business with United Stated clients must have a starting capital of $20 million. Regulated entities are not allowed to offer more then 50:1 leverage on major currency pairs. 20:1 is the maximum leverage set for minor currency pairs.

Brokers in the United States region are not allowed to trade with popular trading derivatives. These include CFDs or Contract for Difference, which is popular in most European countries. Any U.S based trader can only trade in exchange-traded derivatives in their accounts. And this is why most brokers prefer trading in Asia and European regions. The U.S has strict guidelines whose sole purpose is to protect the interest of the investor.

Corporate Information – We look for credible information regarding ownership. Who are the actual owners of this website? Is it possible to know the names of the founding members? Who are the people running this website and why haven’t they posted their actual names? Now you know why you should stay away from this and any other online anonymous platform.

We go further to compare registered companies, addresses and servers to see whether they are linked to any notorious network.

Data Security – Your 3rd consideration in safety of your deposit should be data security. To join any Forex platform, you must submit a vast amount of financial and personal information. Some of these documents include copies of your identification, such as passport, bank account details, and so on. A utility bill is also a huge consideration to prove your place of residence. If you get a Forex broker who fails to have reliable internet security, your data could be at risk. Account hacking has been a hotspot for identity theft. Make sure to conduct a thorough review of a broker’s data and firewall security. The best brokers have DDoS protection and SSL Encryption. These brokers also ensure their websites have basic security features to protect against third party attacks. To avoid personal information falling into the wrong hands, go for a broker with two-factor authentication. By doing so, you will get a random security code for every entry.

Double check the authority of the governing body that regulates the broker you are looking at. You can go to the website of the governing body to search for the registration number and verify its legitimacy.

2. Minimum Deposit

Forex Broker Expert recommends average minimum deposit amount of $100-$250 for basic account in the Forex brokerage industry. Most of the brokers require a minimum deposit at this level. Some even go as low as $10 or none at all.  FCA regulated FXTM requires $10 and ASIC regulated EasyMarkets requires a minimum of $100 to open a standard account. Trading with small amounts helps you hone your skills and prevent you from blowing up your account in the future. Experience is an important factor to consider when trading forex. Trading with small amounts allows you to gain experience while minimizing your losses. Once you have acquired enough experience, you can then proceed to use larger amounts to trade

3. Forex Trading Platform

After checking their licensing and background information, the next step is to check how their platform works. Some Forex brokers offer web based platform, lacking some basic functionalities, readily available with professional trading platforms like the MetaTrader4.

MetaTrader4 on the other hand is equipped with nearly a hundred integrated market indicators and trading robots with the help which you can easily run algorithmic trading sessions. On top of that MT4 comes with an excellent set of advanced charting tools, see metatrader here. This software is considered the most preferred and reliable trading platform, which is why nearly all Forex and CFDs brokers are supporting it at the moment. The reason why MetaTrader4 is loved is that it comes with a solid charting tool, compatibility with many indicators including in built indicators that traders don’t have to pay for, extensive back testing environment and compatibility with all kinds of expert advisors for trading.

Look at the many options available to investors using the Vantagefx Platform.

4. Spreads

For comparing spreads, we use the benchmark EURUSD spread, because the Forex pair is the most popular. Here at Forex Broker Expert, the acceptable typical spreads is below 1.5pips. VantageFX offers variable spreads with a very tight spreads on the Raw ECN account, averaged just 0.1 pips on EURUSD. Low cost ECN broker FXTM offers tight spreads starting from 0 pips on EURUSD

Conclusion: Trading with a broker shouldn’t be a costly affair. Wide spreads means you are paying more, and it is affecting your profitability in one way or the other.

5. Leverages

Another possible benefit of the best Forex broker is the leverage of up to 1:200 these Forex brokers provide. Such ratios will be sufficient for most traders and are yet not dangerously high. Keep in mind that the leverage available to retail traders is capped in a lot of jurisdictions due to investor protection concerns – in the USA, Japan and throughout the EU. Furthermore, these brokers product portfolio is quite rich and diversified. Clients of these brokers are able to trade in many forex pairs and various CFDs, including wide range of cryptocurrencies. 

Conclusion: Maximum leverage ratios up to 1:500 is considered high and can only been seen legitimately in Australia. Some jurisdictions set limitations on leverage, which are significantly lower than this, i.e. 1:50 in the US and 1;25 in Japan. Most brokers usually offer leverage of up to 1:200 or 1:400, for instance global broker easyMarkets, also holding an ASIC license, provides leverage up to 1:500.

6. Payment Options

Most professional Forex brokers have a wide range of choices for their customers. They accept bank wire in addition to master card, visa, e-wallets such as skrill, neteller and many more. This is to ensure that there is always a variety for traders who want to deposit in one form or the other. Not every trader is comfortable with bank wire. So this may be one reason why many traders will want to use one of the best brokers because the provide alternatives to wire deposits. ASIC licensed broker TradeFred accepts credit cards (Visa, Mastercard, Maestro, Visa electron), bank transfer and e-wallet systems, such as, Skrill, Neteller, WebMoney, SoFortüberweisung, American Express, Giropay, Ideal and UnionPay.

Conclusion: One of the reasons while a broker will withhold your withdrawal request is because you accepted a bonus without knowing what is the terms and condition.  The broker might invariably require a minimum trade volume level, which quite too often traders do not read before applying a withdraw request.

7. Market Maker Model

8. Customer Service

Client portal – You should also consider the communication process with the broker. Do they reply to emails fast? Is there a live chat where users can pour out their grievances? 

The FCA registered Pepperstone has an outstanding average connection time and excellent Average Net Promoter score in the United Kingdom