The Central Bank of Ireland (CBI) also permanently banned the sale of binary options to retail customers.
The move follows similar steps taken by Denmark the UK and Austria in line with the guidance of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA).
“The Central Bank is banning the sale of binary options to retail investors as we consider them a fundamentally flawed product, which have no place in the investment plans of retail investors. They are no more an investment than betting on a horse.” said Derville Rowland, director general of financial conduct at the Central Bank of Ireland. ”
Along that ban on binary options CBI also adopted a series of restrictions on the marketing and sale of CFDs, such as a ban on all welcome bonuses.
“Based on our ongoing work on CFDs at a domestic and EU level, we have concluded that retail investors must be protected from excessive levels of leverage, which can result in unexpectedly high levels of losses and from the risk of losing more money than they put into their CFD account. We also want to stop firms using incentives to entice retail investors to trade in these short term, speculative products,” Rowland also said.
