Forex has been an extremely fast-growing market for more than the last 20 years. Trading Forex offers great flexibility to both: people that want to use it as a part-time source of income and those who seek to be self-employed full-time traders. Due to the absence of market opening or market closing hours Forex traders all around the world have the opportunity to trade 24 hours a day, Monday to Friday. Forex trading in Africa is no different in this regard. The scope of trading naturally may vary substantially with regards the number simultaneous overlapping sessions, and, as such, is often subject to fluctuations during bank holidays tied to major market players such as Wall Street. 2016 Triennial Central Bank Survey of FX and over-the-counter (OTC) Derivatives Markets research has revealed that Forex markets had an average turnover of $5.1 trillion a day as of April 2016. And it has been increasing since then. Such high volume of trading naturally increases the liquidity of the market, which in turn makes it easy and quick for a potential trader to enter the market as well as lowers the risks involved, particularly the risk of price manipulation by the third parties. Forex market also has a notion of leverage which has a potential to multiply your profits (but do bear in mind that it can multiply your losses as well) in an incredibly short span of time. Leverage lets you “operate” more money than you possess in your trading account at the moment giving you a chance of getting higher profits. One of the most important decisions you will have to make at the start is choosing a broker. In order to help you out we’ve put together a list of the best forex brokers in Africa.
1. JustForex.com
Accepts MY residents – Yes
Average Spread EUR/USD Standard – 0.3
Minimum Deposit – $1
Overall rating – 9.7/10
JustForex has been around since the early 2000-s. It is licensed with and authorized by the FSA of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. JustForex is an international broker and as such it realizes the importance of approach while dealing with clients from all around the world and understands the necessity of various tools and services needed for those people to achieve success on the trading market. JustForex has a number of trading account types to offer with a considerable variety of trading instruments among which anyone can find something that suits their personal needs and preferences. Multiple servers support unfailing work of the system and low latency around the globe. Data backup protocols eliminate the possibility of the clients’ information, such as personal data or history of commercial transactions.
JustForex hosts a team of professionals with a relevant financial background and lots of experience in trading various assets. The support team available to help customers and provide the best working experience possible. Data transfer through an SSL security connection with encryption of information ensures prevention of the user data interception by unauthorized entities.
JustForex works with the biggest banks in the world. All of the clients’ personal and financial data is safe from the third parties. The broker also has a negative account balance protection system in place. JustForex offers various bonuses and compensations in case the losses exceed the funds on their trading account. In practical terms this means that when an account reaches a negative balance due to a sharp and unforeseen movement of the market, the balance will be set to zero to protect the client from possible losses.
2. TD Markets
Accepts MY residents – Yes
Average Spread EUR/USD Standard – 0.00004
Minimum Deposit – $50
Overall rating – 9.5/10
One of the most trusted Forex brokers in Africa, TD Markets’ approach is to offer its clients custom-made solutions catering to traders not only in Africa but also all around the world. They work with small retail and large corporate businesses and put great emphasis on smooth execution and experience. The site also offers dedicated customer support around the clock. The company prides itself on constant innovation and rapid adapting to the ever changing circumstances of the Forex market often resulting into life long partnerships with clients deciding to side with the broker.
TD Markets work with the Metatrader 4, an industry standard platform. It is accessible from mobile devices and PCs and offers a variety of tools, such as different indicators, experts’ advice alongside with custom algorithmic trading scripts.
This trusted Forex broker is licensed through Authorised Financial Services Provider with the Financial Sector Conduct Authority FSP49128. Clients’ funds are kept separately from the company funds in order to assure transparency and safety. TD Markets also protects their clients from the market volatility by providing a negative balance safety for trading accounts. Because of it, in the event of the market’s rapid volatile movement the customer’s negative balance will not be required to be paid back in full immediately. Also this broker employs an anti money laundering programme through working with major reputable banks. TD Markets offers great spreads for all instruments, fast command execution, a large number of trading types, supports a great number of locations you can trade from and devices you can use to do so,generally low server latency and white label functionality.
3. SaxoBank
Accepts MY residents – Yes
Minimum Deposit – $10,000.00
Average Spread EUR/USD Standard – 0.6
Overall rating – 9.3/10
All you might need for conducting trade on the global markets is at your disposal with the Saxo platforms. This licensed forex broker in Africa offers a wide variety of financial products and numerous ways of trading and investing.
SaxoBank sources only the best products currently present on the market. Being an independent provider of said services the platform offers constant support with issues you might encounter during your trading experience. SaxoBank understands that you require the right and timely information in order to make the right choice when it matters. Specifically for this it offers curated investment themes, market commentary from the experts, smart alerts, different charting tools, and, last but not least, in-depth webinars.
If you choose SaxoBank you can be sure that you are trusting your money to a company that takes safety seriously.Saxo Bank is a licensed European bank under the supervision of the Danish FSA working in numerous locations including various African countries. It complies with strict requirements on reporting and EU client management regulations so you can be assured that you are working with a secure broker. Saxo Bank’s company registration number is 15731249 and is and also runs a bank and is regulated by the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority (FSA) – Finanstilsynet, Århusgade 110, 2100, København Ø.
The broker sports a proprietary platform – SaxoTraderGO. It has such features as enhanced trade tickets, charting package, fundamental and technical analysis tools, performance analysis tools and a comprehensive account overview option. Saxo Bank works with stocks, ETFs, bonds, mutual funds, options, futures and many other trading options. The platform is accessible from both mobile devices and desktop and supports one-screen setup with the option to drag charts to a second screen.
4. Interactive Brokers
Accepts MY residents – Yes
Minimum Deposit – $0
Average Spread EUR/USD Standard – N/A
Overall rating – 9.2/10
Interactive Brokers was founded in 1977 and it has been providing its services to traders and investors for more than 40 years. In all those years it has proven to be one of the most reliable brokers in the field. Interactive Brokers is considered to be a low-risk broker. Company’s assets are publicly traded and it is authorised by six tier-1 regulators: , Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC), Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), Securities Futures Commission (SFC), Japanese Financial Services Authority (JFSA).
Despite Interactive Brokers’ long history in the business it is no stranger to innovation. The company provides a proprietary Trader Workstation (TWS) desktop platform. This platform offers a number of tools that can and will make your trading experience easier. However, the aforementioned utility may pose difficulties for beginners and is clearly targeted at somewhat experienced traders that are sure to appreciate due to its numerous quality of life improvements and tools. The company also provides the IBKR Mobile application that comes with lots of useful features. We have to mention the fact that it is also somewhat complex and is not really beginner friendly. This broker does not support MetaTrader that is widely regarded as an industry standard at the moment. Interactive Brokers also has a rather unusual monthly minimum activity fee so keep in mind that you will be charged if you are not trading constantly, even though the intervals for its activation are rather generous. If you believe you know what you are doing be sure to check this Forex broker in Africa.
5. eToro
Accepts MY residents – Yes
Average Spread EUR/USD Standard – 1.0
Minimum Deposit – $50
Overall rating – 9/10
eToro concludes our list of the best trading platforms in Africa. The company, just like our previous entry, is considered to be a low-risk broker. However, it is not traded publicly and doesn’t operate its own bank if that might concern you. eToro is authorised by the Australian Securities & Exchange Commission (ASIC) alongside the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). It offers services in more than 2000 tradable articles. Due to such a wide range of tradable items, the platform creators make sure to provide its clients with the best possible experience. To give an example of this attention to detail: CFDs and underlying asset trading can be toggled directly in the trade-ticket window. Such quality of life improvements are barely noticeable after getting used to them. However they are invaluable in a while and you wish more brokers adopted them. Cryptocurrency trading is only allowed via CFDs and underlying assets. eToro, being a major player in the field, offers a spread of 1 pip on the EUR/USD. The company provides a proprietary social copy-trading platform as well combining self-directed trading and copy trading. There are various account types available on the platform, including VIP accounts. These accounts fall in brackets of $5000 – $250000. Higher tier accounts bring such benefits as a dedicated account manager and discounts on deposits and withdrawal.
The decision whether to trade or not on the Forex market is yours to make alone, but it is worth knowing that even being in the category of the smallest players on the market, you still can make significant profit. It is wise to take your time deciding why and how you want to trade. If you put your heart and mind into it you are more than likely to succeed. Another thing you might want to consider is that if you want to dip your toe into Forex trading, it might be a worthwhile idea to start a demo account before you put your real money savings on the line. And also remember that there is a slim chance of you making a lot of money if you don’t stick with a reliable broker to see your deals through.
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