FX GLOBAL Review

fxglobal.com briefly

G.C. FX GLOBAL CUSTOM CARE PERFORMANCE is a registered brand name of Goldenburg Group Limited. It provides global investment services and is supervised and regulated by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC). Customers can trade currency pairs, indices, commodities, and shares through one of the world’s most popular trading terminals – MetaTrader 5 (MT5) with floating spreads. You can open a live account with as low as USD250.

Regulation

We recommend that you trade only through regulated brokerage companies, so it is exceptionally important whether and where the company is regulated. FX GLOBAL is a registered brand name of Goldenburg Group Limited, which is licensed and regulated by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) under license number 242/14. The company says it is committed to protect clients’ funds at the highest level in accordance with the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID) and the strictest regulatory standards issued by the CySEC. Goldenburg Group Limited is a member of the Investor Compensation Fund (ICF) for clients of Cypriot Investment Firms (CIFs), which guarantees compensation to clients for losses of accumulated funds in the event that a company is not able to meet its obligations.

Account Types

A demo account is available, and it is preferable to open this type of account before you start trading for real money. Trading here is risk free because the money is virtual. The demo account offers access to all the same features as the real one but is funded with virtual money. It lasts 30 day and after that period you can upgrade it to a real account.

There is only one type of real account, so trading conditions are equal for all categories of traders. Spreads are floating, and the average one is 3 pips for the EUR/USD pair. The minimum deposit is USD250 and the leverage can be up to 1:100 for professional clients. You can also hold physical shares, but this involves a management fee.

What Type of Broker the Company Is

We have found in the Order Execution Policy document of Goldenburg Group Limited that the company does not execute the client order as a principal to principal against the client and the company is not the execution venue for the execution of the client’s order. The company transmits client orders or arranges for their execution with third parties. This means that it uses the Straight Through Processing (STP) model to execute client’s orders and there is no conflict of interest as there is if the company is a market maker. Currently the financial institutions functioning as company’s execution venues are JFD Group Ltd, London Prime Ltd, and NAGA Markets Ltd.

The same document reveals that under certain trading conditions, it may be impossible to execute orders (including stop loss orders) at the requested price. In this case, the company executes the order at the first available market price. This may occur at times of rapid price fluctuations. This means that stop loss orders are not guaranteed and will be executed at the first available market price.

It is also written that all types of orders are subject to slippage and the company informs it is a normal phenomenon during the period of low liquidity or high volatility. The orders will be executed at the next available market price.

In addition, all the retail clients are covered by “Negative Balance Protection“. This means that FX GLOBAL ensures that losses will never exceed the client account balance.

Fees

If there is no trading activity in your account for more than six months (there is no trading, withdrawals, or deposits), it has become inactive and may be charged a monthly maintenance fee. The maintenance fee will be equal to the lesser of the remaining balance in your account or EUR40, levied monthly. In addition, all transactions on Italian CFDs and ITA40 are subject to FTT (Financial Transaction Tax). Tax is charged as a fixed fee related to notional transaction value and up to EUR2,500 it is EUR0.25 but over EUR1,000,000 it is EUR200. Of course, there are common fees such as spread, swap and rollover.

Deposits and Withdrawals

Deposits can be made by bank transfer, credit/debit cards or through the TrustPay online payment system. The minimum deposit is USD250 and the maximum deposit is USD10,000 per transaction.

Withdrawals can be made via the bank transfer only.

FX GLOBAL does not charge any commission on customer deposits or withdrawals.

Trading Platforms

You can trade via the popular – MetaTrader 5 (MT5) terminal. MT5 is a modern and powerful trading platform that has an intuitive interface and a wide range of advanced features. You can use built-in plug-ins created to accelerate the ways of trading. The terminal is available as a desktop version and as mobile app for iOS and Android tablets and smartphones.

Assets

FX GLOBAL offers four asset groups for trading:

Forex – More than 60 popular major, minor, and exotic currency pairs can be traded. The typical spread for the EUR/USD pair is 3 pips.

Indices – You can trade 14 of the most popular major and minor indices globally, such as DJIA, US500, FTSE100, CAC40 etc. The typical spread for DAX30 is 20 points.

Commodities – 23 of the most traded commodities are available such as Gold, Silver, Platinum, Oil, Wheat, sugar, etc. The typical spread for the Gold is USD1.6.

Shares – FX GLOBAL offers CFD trading of major companies such as Apple, Bank of America, eBay, Google, etc. They include 650 US, over 100 German, 60 French, 15 Dutch, 8 Spanish, 8 British, 9 Hong Kong, 2 Italian, 6 Czech, 1 Hungarian, and 18 Swiss shares. The minimum commission is EUR20.

Education

There is a special educational section called the Academy, where you can find some e-books, an economic calendar and subscribe to regular seminars.

Summary

FX GLOBAL has a CySEC regulation, which allows it to provide financial services across European Union. It uses the STP model to execute orders transmitting them to its liquidity providers, so the main conflict of interest does not exist here. The company provides a wide range of trading instruments via the most popular trading terminal MT5. There is only one type of real account, which requires USD250 to open, but the spreads are not so attractive. Deposits and withdrawals are processed free of fees. You can hold physical shares as well, but this involves a management fee.