What Is IC Markets？
IC Markets is an online forex and Contract for Difference (CFD) broker headquartered in Australia. The company was founded in 2007 and is regulated by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). The official website of this broker is: https://www.icmarkets.com/global/en/. IC Markets offers a variety of trading instruments, including forex, stock indices, commodities, and cryptocurrencies. Additionally, IC Markets provides a range of advanced trading platforms such as MetaTrader 4, MetaTrader 5, and cTrader, which offer powerful features and flexibility. Whether you are a beginner or an experienced trader, IC Markets also offers round-the-clock customer support and rich educational resources to help you improve your trading skills and knowledge.
Is IC Markets Safe? Is IC Markets Trustworthy?
IC Markets is regulated by two primary regulatory authorities, ASIC and CySEC, and also has an offshore entity regulated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) of Seychelles, demonstrating its position in the financial markets.
IC Markets places a strong emphasis on the safety of client funds. They fully segregate client funds from company funds and keep them in highly-rated international banks. This practice underscores IC Markets' high level of transparency and credibility, providing traders with ample security and assurance.
We have rated the regulatory authorities on a scale where 1 represents the highest level of trust. Below is the regulatory status of IC Markets' different entities, ranked by level:
- International Capital Markets Pty Ltd is regulated by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), with registration number 123 289 109 and license number 335692. ASIC enjoys a strong reputation in the Australian financial markets, providing IC Markets with a solid legal foundation.
- IC Markets (EU) Ltd is authorized and regulated by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) with license number 362/18. This allows IC Markets to offer its services in the European market, earning recognition under CySEC regulation and providing clients with broader trading opportunities.
- Raw Trading Ltd is regulated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) of Seychelles, with a Securities Dealer License number SD018. While this is an offshore entity, it is subject to strict regulation, offering IC Markets diversified business jurisdiction.
Through the authorization of these regulatory bodies, IC Markets not only provides a safer trading environment but also extends regulatory protection to traders on a global scale. This further enhances IC Markets' reputation and reliability in the financial markets.
Products Provided by IC Markets：
Here is information about the trading products offered by IC Markets:
Access to the Forex Market: IC Markets provides its clients with a wide range of forex trading opportunities, allowing for spot trading and leveraged trading through Contracts for Difference (CFDs) on efficient platforms. Traders can access various currency pairs, offering flexibility and diversification in the global forex market.
Diverse Trading Products: Clients can access over 3500 trading products through IC Markets' platforms. This includes currency pairs, indices, commodities, and various asset classes, enabling investors to build diversified portfolios based on their risk preferences and market perspectives.
Currency Pair Selection: For forex enthusiasts, IC Markets offers trading in 61 currency pairs. This covers major, minor, and some less common forex pairs, catering to different trading strategies and analysis methods.
Stock Trading Options: While IC Markets doesn't directly offer non-CFD forms of US and international stock trading, it allows investors to indirectly participate in the stock market through CFDs. This provides convenience for investors looking to capitalize on stock market volatility.
Social and Copy Trading Platforms: IC Markets recognizes the value of community and knowledge sharing, offering social trading and copy trading services. This service allows novice and less experienced traders to replicate the trades of more experienced traders, potentially gaining profits while learning.
Flexibility in Cryptocurrency Trading: While IC Markets doesn't offer services for purchasing physical cryptocurrencies, it does provide opportunities to trade cryptocurrencies through CFDs. This means investors can speculate on the price fluctuations of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin without directly holding these assets. However, this service is subject to geographical restrictions, particularly in the UK, due to regulatory reasons, where retail investors cannot trade cryptocurrency CFDs through IC Markets' UK entity.
In summary, IC Markets' range of trading products and services aims to cater to the needs of various traders, from forex to cryptocurrencies and CFD-based stock trading. Its offered platforms and tools provide global investors with avenues to access and participate in international markets. However, each prospective client should carefully consider regional regulatory limitations and select products based on their trading goals and risk tolerance.
Minimum Deposit of IC Markets:
IC Markets has set a minimum deposit requirement of $200 USD for account opening. Compared to some other well-established brokers in the industry that often require minimum deposits of $500 USD or even $1000 USD, IC Markets' threshold appears relatively moderate. On the other end of the spectrum, competitors like Avatrade and Axitrader offer lower entry requirements, with minimum deposits of only $100 USD and $0 USD, respectively. Therefore, IC Markets falls within a mid-range position in terms of initial deposit requirements.
Here is a comparison of minimum deposit requirements with some other brokers:
Commission and Fees charged by IC Markets.
IC Markets boasts highly competitive trading costs, particularly appealing to those traders seeking low spreads and low minimum deposit requirements for commission accounts. Its trading costs are on par with industry low-cost leaders such as IG and CMC Markets.
Clients have the option to register with different IC Markets regulatory entities in Europe (Cyprus), Australia, or the Seychelles, each offering variations in spreads and services. IC Markets provides a diverse range of account types, including a commission-free Standard account, as well as two commission-based accounts: the Raw Spread account and the cTrader Raw Spread account.
Choosing either the cTrader Raw Spread account on the cTrader platform or the Raw Spread account on the MetaTrader (MT4/MT5) platforms, users will enjoy a nearly identical commission structure. However, commissions are slightly lower with the cTrader account, costing $3 per 100,000 currency units traded (per standard lot), equating to $6 per round turn. In contrast, the MetaTrader platform's Raw Spread account charges $3.50 per standard lot, amounting to $7 per round turn.
The average spread for EUR/USD at IC Markets is extremely low, at just 0.02 pips (as of August 2021 data). When adding the commission for the cTrader account, the total cost comes to about 0.62 pips, and on the MetaTrader platform, it's around 0.72 pips. For those traders who prefer not to pay commissions, the Standard account offers an average spread of 0.62 pips with no additional commission.
For active traders, those trading over 100 standard lots per month, IC Markets also offers volume discounts. It's important to note that IC Markets executes orders on an agency basis, which can result in positive or negative slippage, without re-quotes or instant execution. Although it routes orders to numerous liquidity providers, IC Markets does not hedge every trade as a counterparty and thus manages certain risks to some extent.
Mobile Trading App of IC Markets：
IC Markets offers mobile app versions of three major trading platforms - MetaTrader 4 (MT4), MetaTrader 5 (MT5), and cTrader. These apps are compatible with iOS and Android operating systems and come with full functionality. Although IC Markets' mobile app lineup is quite robust, some industry leaders like Saxo Bank, CMC Markets, and TD Ameritrade also offer their proprietary trading applications.
On mobile devices, the MetaTrader series and cTrader apps demonstrate high consistency in functionality and chart plotting. Therefore, traders may choose their preferred platform based on personal trading habits (manual trading or automated trading systems).
As for algorithmic trading, the mobile apps of cTrader and MetaTrader currently do not support automated trading features. This indicates that these apps are mainly suitable for monitoring existing trading positions or manually initiating new trades. However, users can still execute copy trading functions on mobile devices through third-party platforms like ZuluTrade and Myfxbook.
Other Trading Platforms：
IC Markets offers the MetaTrader 4 (MT4) and MetaTrader 5 (MT5) platforms, as well as the cTrader platform. For MetaTrader clients, additional add-ons are also available, including an advanced toolkit for the desktop version and plugins from AutoChartist and Trading Central. While these third-party plugins require separate installation, they enhance the functionality and experience of MetaTrader.
VPS Services: IC Markets offers a special perk for clients who complete at least 15 standard lot trades - a variety of free third-party Virtual Private Server (VPS) services, designed to provide stable and efficient hosting for their algorithmic trading strategies. As a broker, IC Markets understands the needs of algorithmic traders for fast execution and uninterrupted connections. By using VPS services, traders can deploy their trading strategies on remote servers, ensuring a high-speed and stable trading environment at all times. This means that even if the trader's computer is shut down or disconnected from the internet, the trading strategies will still be executed reliably. IC Markets' VPS service offers additional convenience and competitive advantage to traders, allowing them to focus more on strategy improvement and market analysis without worrying about technical issues. In summary, IC Markets' free VPS service is a commitment to its high attention to trader needs, aiming to create the optimal trading environment for algorithmic traders.
Charting Capabilities: Both MetaTrader and cTrader offer excellent charting capabilities, with a variety of default indicators pre-installed, and more options available from third-party providers. IC Markets' cTrader platform includes both web-based and desktop versions.
MetaTrader Tools: IC Markets provides access to an advanced trading toolkit developed by FX Blue LLP, a set of platform add-ons. Additionally, IC Markets also offers installable third-party plugins from Trading Central and AutoChartist.
Algorithmic Trading: The MetaTrader desktop edition supports this feature, and the cTrader suite includes applications for automated trading such as cAlgo and cTrader Copy for social copy trading. IC Markets is popular among serious algorithmic traders for its low costs, execution methods, and support for Virtual Private Servers (VPS).
In terms of social copy trading, apart from cTrader Copy and MetaTrader's native signal market, IC Markets also offers platforms such as Myfxbook (AutoTrade) and ZuluTrade to implement its global brand's copy trading. The recently launched IC Social is a mobile application powered by Pelican Exchange and offers an additional social copy trading platform in specific regions for IC Markets' Seychelles entity.
Educational Resources of IC Markets:
IC Markets provides traders with a wealth of educational resources covering the needs of beginners to advanced traders. These resources include practical economic calendars, in-depth market analysis reports, various video tutorials, a comprehensive glossary of professional terms, insightful blog articles, and multifunctional risk and trade calculators. These resources are regularly updated to ensure they provide the latest market information and knowledge. The professional glossary helps traders better grasp the fundamental terms and concepts of forex trading, while the extensive video tutorials cover a wide range of topics from basic introduction to complex trading strategies. The market analysis in the blogs offers valuable insights for traders in making wiser trading decisions. Additionally, the trade calculator is an important tool for calculating trade risks, margin requirements, and position sizing.
However, the abundance of these resources may be overwhelming for beginners, and some content may require a certain level of foundational knowledge in forex trading to understand. Furthermore, compared to educational resources provided by some other brokers in the market, IC Markets' content may have limitations in terms of comprehensiveness or interactivity.
IC Markets also offers educational videos on its official YouTube channel, with some videos such as "7 Common Mistakes Made by Novice Traders" being particularly useful for newcomers to the market.
Taking into consideration the information provided in your table, here is a summary of the advantages and disadvantages.
Pros and Cons of IC Markets:
Below is a table summarizing the Pros and Cons of IC Markets.
IC Markets' Online Reputation：
The images contain customer reviews of IC Markets, which include both positive evaluations and negative feedback about IC Markets.
Positive Comments:
- Some customers have stated that they have traded with IC Markets for over 5 years, praising its tight spreads, fast deposit and withdrawal services, swift order execution without requotes, and excellent customer support. They consider IC Markets to be one of the best brokers on the market and express satisfaction with their 12 years of trading experience.
- Several users appreciate the customer service at IC Markets, noting its quick and professional response.
- Users highlight the trustworthiness of IC Markets, providing consistent quality support, and favorable trading conditions for customers.
- Clients also mention the variety of deposit methods and the straightforward withdrawal process offered by IC Markets, regarding it as one of the best brokers currently available.
Negative Comments:
- A VIP customer from Taiwan claimed that IC Markets deducted $436,668 from their account without notification. The customer alleges that they have filed a complaint with ASIC and has requested a prompt return of their funds.
- Other users have reported a poor experience with IC Markets' Chinese customer service and some difficulties in communication, especially outside of working hours.
Please note that these comments are unilaterally from users and may not fully represent the service quality of IC Markets. When choosing a broker, it is also necessary to consider other various pieces of information and personal needs.
Frequently Asked Questions about IC Markets:
Q1. What is the minimum deposit required to open an IC Markets account?
A1. The minimum deposit required to open an IC Markets account is $200.
Q2. What deposit and withdrawal methods are available with IC Markets?
A2. IC Markets offers multiple deposit and withdrawal methods, including Neteller, Skrill, bank transfers, VISA, Mastercard, PayPal, credit cards, debit cards, UnionPay, POLi, telegraphic transfers, RapidPay, and Klarna.
Q3. Which trading platforms are available with IC Markets?
A3. IC Markets provides three trading platforms: MetaTrader 4, MetaTrader 5, and cTrader.
Q4. What is the maximum leverage offered by IC Markets?
A4. IC Markets offers a maximum leverage of up to 1:500.
Q5. Does IC Markets charge any additional fees for deposits and withdrawals?
A5. IC Markets does not charge any additional fees for deposits and withdrawals. However, some banking institutions may impose additional charges.
Conclusion:
IC Markets is renowned for its reliable trading services, offering traders a range of trading tools, account types, and platform choices. The broker is known for its low spreads, competitive commissions, and comprehensive educational resources. Overall, IC Markets is considered a trustworthy broker that both beginners and experienced traders can rely on for their trading needs. Currently, IC Markets is marked as "Active" on Traderknows.
