RECOMMENDED FOREX BROKERS
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Open trading accounts with at least two brokers.
VFX Financial is a UK-licensed broker that has been on the market for more than 20 years – since 2001. This seems to be a small, legitimate broker specializing in corporate foreign exchange. However, we would not say that we were impressed by VFX Financial – they only allow you to trade currencies on a quite simple trading platform. They do not provide any educational resources and it is very hard to find any information or customer reviews on them. The only reviews we found criticized the lacking customer support.
VFX Financial is not a bad trading option per se – however, we believe that most other UK brokers have a lot more to offer in terms of trading conditions, support, software, and efficiency.
VFX Financial REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
VFX Financial is based in the UK and licensed by the local financial regulator – the strict FCA.
The broker has one more office – in Toronto, Canada.
The fact that a company is licensed by a respected regulator like the FCA is not to be neglected. This authority sternly monitors the activities of brokers under its supervision and makes sure that they conduct business in a fair and transparent manner. UK-licensed brokers have to meet a number of requirements in order to be allowed to offer services. They have to maintain a minimum capital of €730 000 (and potentially more) in order to prove their financial stability. They also have to provide negative balance protection – so your losses can never exceed the amount of money you currently have in your account – and keep client money in segregated bank accounts. This not only speeds up withdrawals and proves that the broker is not using your money for their own financial activities but also protects your investment in case of broker bankruptcy. UK brokers are also obligated to participate in the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). In case such a broker goes bankrupt, each of their clients would be entitled to a compensation of up to £85 000.
For all of these reasons, choosing a UK-licensed broker is generally an excellent choice.
Check out some great alternatives for UK-regulated brokers:
VFX Financial TRADING SOFTWARE
VFX Financial offers access to its own custom-developed software. The platform had a web version as well as a mobile version (available both for Android and iOS). However, a desktop version did not exist.
The software looked quite intuitive and easy to navigate. However, it offered a very limited number of features – you would be allowed to buy and sell various currencies 24/7 but that is about it. You could also set trading alerts for price movements. You would not be able to perform any sort of charting and analysis. Social trading and algo trading are not available either.
We would recommend trading on MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 instead – these popular platforms are offered by a number of great brokers. They offer access to many trading tools and features including a wide range of indicators, timeframes, and graphical objects. You would also be able to use preprogrammed bots to track markets and trade automatically, create custom scripts, set signals or subscribe to those set by others, purchase additional trading apps or VPSs, and much more.
VFX Financial TRADING CONDITIONS
VFX Financial only allows you to trade currencies – hardly the most impressive range of markets. In contrast to that, most legitimate brokers would usually allow you to trade thousands of trading instruments across various markets – forex, commodities, metals, stocks, ETFs, bonds, options, cryptocurrencies, etc.
In order to start trading, you would have to invest at least £500. That might not sound too bad but is actually a lot. Most brokers these days would not ask for more than $250 to open a basic account. There are those, however, that are much more affordable. Check out some such brokers below:
VFX Financial DEPOSIT AND WITHDRAWAL METHODS AND FEES
VFX Financial accepts deposits made with a credit/debit card, or via wire transfer. Your bank payment could also pass through payment solutions such as FasterPayments, CHAPS, and BACS.
Keep in mind that the broker does charge payment fees that can go quite high – up to £15 per payment. If you are depositing in GBP, you might be able to avoid all the extra fees. However, no additional information on the question was provided. We could not discover what the size of the fee depends on and would not say the broker’s fee schedule is exactly transparent.
BOTTOM LINE
VFX Financial does not seem like the best trading option. This seems to be a small brokerage that is trying to offer decent conditions but falls somewhat short. The fact that you would only be allowed to trade currencies – and not on the best, most functional of platforms – will surely turn some traders off. Even though this is a broker with a solid license from a respected financial institution, we would still urge you to consider some alternatives before investing with VFX Financial.
