IG Markets Review

IG Markets offer a range of tools to educate novice traders and enhance the skills of experienced ones, which include:

In Person Seminars – Held regularly, these seminars are presented live by experts and cover a range of topics, almost all aimed at the novice trader. Titles include; Stock Index Trading and Risk Management; Building Portfolios and Managing Risk and Think Like a Trader. Other seminars are designed for specific groups such as active traders or beginners where you can share tips, tricks, indicators and successful trades.

Live Webinars – These allow traders to join a forum where the speaker will introduce topics and the attendees can interact. These can also allow active traders or beginners to share tips, tricks, indicators and successful trades.

Trading Guides – These are a comprehensive set of guides covering most questions traders would have. They have an easy to access structure and are quick to read and simple to understand.

Guides Available by Email –Just the one here which tries to cover all bases but is good as an introduction to trading. Covers only shares in practice but the principles on which they trade shares or Forex are similar.

They have a help-desk which is open 24 hours a day during weekdays and has the added bonus of being open 9 to 5 at weekends, If you have questions about trading or technical questions the help-desk can answer them but they don’t give trading advice. Novice traders can have ‘hand-holding’ through the first weeks and months of their account.

Despite some bad press in some quarters, IG Markets has its fair share of awards which include:
UK Forex Award 2013 Best Forex Trading Platform,
Shares Awards 2012 Best Online Trading Platform
Investment Awards 2012 Best Spread Betting App

The company is registered in the UK with the Financial Conduct Authority and also conforms with financial regulation in the US, Japan and Australia. Capitalized as one of the top 250 companies on the UK stock exchange it seems to have plenty of financial strength behind it as well as a successful track record in making profits.

IG Markets developed their own platform in 2007 called PureDeal which was browser based. Since then it has modified and transformed it into a Direct Market Access brilliant platform called L2 Dealer downloadable from the site and similar to MetaTrader. They now also offer mobile and tablet platforms as well as systems that are integrable to professional dealing systems.

The company says that their records show that the platform handles over 99% of deals in a tenth of a second and is up and running for 99.97% of the time. They spend £17m a year on IT and employ 300 UT professionals to make sure their systems deliver as well as refining the products to meet the challenges of the Forex and other financial evolving markets. Now if this was true, these conditions will force them into the best trading practices available in the FX industry, which might make them the best trading conditions a trader can find, of course if that statement above holds true.

IG Markets trading conditions were not competitive in our point of view. For example Last, Islamic accounts are not catered at IG Markets and Expert advisors are compatible with their MetaTrader based platforms only. Their leverage ranges from 1:40 and up to 1:400 depending on the account type. Margin requirements are set on platforms other than mt4 at 0.5%,

One point we noticed while reading IG Markets’ trading conditions is that they are not clear when they reach a point in their trading conditions that is not in their favor. However they gave the client a few definitions, which were unusual in our experience. One of those was the Funding Fee, which was also unclear if it was a fee charged on deposits of the client, or simply a Swap Fee. Their charges included one that is posed if the account is not active, or not being traded.

Moreover, they state on their website that they guarantee the client’s Stop Loss points, however they note in their terms and conditions that spreads may widen in times of rapidly changing prices or large trading volumes, which is much worse because prices they offer can just widen to trigger a Stop Loss order, and they will guarantee execution on such orders.

IG Markets earn their profits on a mix of fees, commission, spreads, Hedging options, funding or other deals that should be offered to clients’ to reduce risks on them. Commissions depend on the instruments being traded and the size of the transaction.
The company offers tiered margins and says theirs are amongst the lowest for CFDs available. Margins are small for low volumes because markets are easier to make in them and rise through the tier for larger trades. Typically on Forex you will be quoted a spread of 0.5% for the major pairs.

All Forex and security trading companies are keen for business, but IG Markets trade on their reputation, so basically they don’t offer bonuses or trading contests.

IG Markets website is very big and detailed except when they come to a point that doesn’t work in their favor. They have a wide range of securities are traded and through their sister company, you can also take part in spread betting. A big name, so you have the reassurance of a FTSE 250 company that’s award winning and registered with regulator. There’s a range of platforms to suit all levels of traders and their trading activity. Some can be combined so you can trade at home then follow trades on the move. The company offers the industry standard MetaTrader4. Getting started is quick and easy. Spreads might be low but with commissions and funding you’ll need a bigger move in the markets to cover your cost. Funding means that if you keep a trade open overnight you’ll be charged 2.5% on top of the interbank rate. Inactivity fees of £12 a month. Charges for live prices, refunded against a minimum trade. £30 a month charge for real time charts. Extra charge for guaranteed stops of 0.3%. Big minimum amounts to be traded on some instruments, often around $10,000, although new traders can trade on 50% of minimum.