Finexo Review

I had heard some really good things about Saxo Bank and had been looking at opening an account when i came across Finexo. Finexo is a white-label partner of Saxo, and as such I didn't really expect to get anything from them that I couldn't already get at Saxo. To my surprise though, I found that Finexo offers up tighter spreads on EUR/USD (because they give up a bit of their commission, as I found out later). They offer a few other advantages over Saxo, most of which translate into better trading conditions for many retail traders. For those of you who have traded Saxo, you know that there is a learning curve to the platform. It is powerful, but difficult - with great power come great headaches. Finexo gives you a much easier-to-use platform, and it's browser based so even you Mac guys out there can play. The downside is that it doesn't offer all the reliability of SaxoTrader.

Along with all that they also accept more payment methods for those of you who use PayPal instead of a private bank in the Cayman Islands. I found the trading conditions to be quite good since they tap Saxo's liquidity. Overall, it feels like a small brokerage but with the backing of a large institution when it comes to liquidity and financial stability.

NOTE: Although I had some doubts in my mind about their connection to the British Virgin Islands, the fact that they are backed by a well-known broker alleviated most of my concerns. My hunch was correct, and all my deposits and withdrawals went without a hitch.

PROS:
Wide variety of deposit/withdrawal methods;
Decent spreads;
Scalping is allowed;
Easy to use platform;
Mac-compatible platform;
Deep liquidity (Goldman Sachs, Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, Deutsche Bank, Marex Financial);
and UBS.;
Orders are processed through an automated dealing desk according to the "Best Execution Policy";
Server-side trailing stops;
OCO and if/then orders available;

CONS:
Platform reliability is questionable;
No automated trading;
Registered in the British Virgin Islands - a bit shady;
No Islamic swap-free accounts;
No oil, gold, or exotic currencies;

Quick Facts:
Finexo is a white-label partner for Saxo Bank;
Registered in British Virgin Islands and Germany;
Regulated by BaFin (Germany) with ID 108861;
In business since 2003;

For more detailed information, you can visit this Finexo Review, or visit their website here.

InterbankFX (IBFX) Review

To begin with, I would like to review a few brokers that I have used in the past. IBFX is a very well known and trusted broker, and is one of the first brokers I trusted with my money. I don't have many complaints. Here is a summary of some of my more interesting experiences with IBFX:

A few months ago (September 2008 to be exact) they introduced a number of new currency pairs to trade and were offering extremely high overnight interest rates on those pairs (namely USD/ZAR $140/lot/day, EUR/DKK $21/lot/day). After taking into account each pair's daily ATR (Average True Range) and pip value, I determined that trading EUR/DKK would be the way to go if I am only going after the swap. DKK is a part of ERM2, and is required to stay within a 2.25% band of a pre-determined rate against EUR. The Danish central bank will defend those levels. Moreover, we have never come even close to the edges of the band since it was imposed. This gave me the extra assurance that this pair was not going to move much and that it would yield some profits as a result, since I could open large positions without worrying about the pair running off with my money. I still couldn't figure out why IBFX was offering such ridiculous swap rates though so I spoke to their customer support and they assured me that these rates were real, although they couldn't explain exactly how the rates were determined. So I traded huge positions, particularly on Wednesdays when they triple the swap. Even one day's worth of interest would make up for the spread paid so it was easy to open a position a few minutes before swap time and then close it soon after. This was free money.

A month later though, they announced a "Significant Change to the Swap Rates" and the window was closed, but they never reversed any of my trades and I got to keep all that free money. To this day I don't know what they were thinking, but they left a huge gaping hole in their risk profile for an entire month. Still, they were fair enough to suck it up and take the losses in stride (I'm sure I'm not the only one that took advantage of this opportunity).

Another point for them is the fact that they fill resting orders at the desired price, if the price trades, or even if we gap over the price. This happened to me only once, so I can't say it is their policy per se, but I had an open position over the weekend a few months ago, and price was getting near my stop loss on Friday close. Sure enough, when trading opened the following week, price gapped over my stop loss by quite a margin. I don't remember the exact number, but it was more than 20 pips. Despite that, IBFX closed my trade at the exact stop out price I wanted, even though, technically, that price never traded. I was obviously not happy about my trade getting stopped out, but I gained an extra layer of trust for IBFX that day, because 99% of other brokers would have filled my order at the "next best price" and I would have sustained a much larger loss.

Quick Facts:
Headquarters in Utah, USA;
NFA member (0326091);
In business since 2001;
$40,892,161 in capital as of November 30, 2008, as reported to the CFTC;
Deposits by Check, Discover, Visa, MasterCard, Wire Transfer;
All orders passed straight through to liquidity providers BofA, JP Morgan, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs;
Metatrader 4 (MT4) platform;
Target spread on EUR/USD: 0.0002 (2 pips) variable;
Credit/Debit cards available to US-based clients;

More details about IBFX available here.