Beware! CTRL FX is an offshore broker! Your investment may be at risk.
RECOMMENDED FOREX BROKERS
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Open trading accounts with at least two brokers.
CTRL FX is a textbook scam broker – from the ugly-looking website to the annonymity, lack of license, and the rudimentary trading platform. We would not deposit money with such an enterprise in a million years – and you should not either. We can hardly imagine someone actually considering investing with such a shady broker since they really are that bad. However, if you were, read the following review – we hope that, by the end of it, you would have changed your mind.
CTRL FX Regulation and safety of funds
Guaranteed Funds | Segregated Accounts | Negative balance protection | |
CTRL FX | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
UK regulated brokers | £85 000 | Yes | Yes |
EU regulated brokers | €20 000 | Yes | Yes |
AU regulated brokers | No | Yes | Yes |
US regulted brokers | Yes | Yes | No |
CTRL FX claimed to be regulad by the FCA, the financial regulator of the UK. We could not, however, establish if the broker was actually based in this country – they have not provided any actually useful contact information. The only way to get in touch with them is via e-mail since no address or phone number were provided. This makes CTRL FX a fully anonymous company which is far from the best place for a broker to be at. Moreover, a quick check of the FCA register proved that the broker is, unsurprisingly, not regulated.
This shady company is not under anybody’s supervision – and they are certainly not obligated to treat you fairly. They are also hardly subject to any laws or specific requirments.
The situation is much different for brokers regulated by authorities like the FCA (the UK), CySEC (Cyprus) and ASIC (Australia). If they want to offer financial services, such brokers have to meet countless requirements, treat clients fairly and do everything in accordance with the law – otherwise they would get fined or straight up lose a very hard-earned license. Client deposits must be kept in segregated accounts – this means faster withdrawals and no chance for the broker to use your money for their own purposes without your knowledge. There are also minimum capital requirements in both Australia and Europe- A$1 million for Australia and €730 000 for the EU and the UK – but in case the broker has a lot of clients, the digit could be much higher. This way, you can be sure that the broker is financially stable and has sufficient capital to navigate the volatile markets. Negative balance protection is a must – you could never lose more money than you have in your trading account. If you are working with a European broker, you could also get a compensation in case they go bankrupt – up to £85 000 in the UK and €20 000 in the EU. This is because all UK and EU brokers are obligated to participate in compensation schemes.
CTRL FX Trading Software
Analytical tools | Auto trading | Custom indicators | Mobile apps | |
CTRL FX platform | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
MT4 | 30+ indicators | ✅ | ✅ | Android |
MT5 | 50+ indicators | ✅ | ✅ | Android |
cTrader | 40+ indicators | ✅ | ✅ | Android and iOS |
CTRL FX offered a quite generic web-based platform. Such software cannot be called impressive though it is functional. The number of features and tools it offers is, unfortunately, very limited.
Our advise is to try trading on popular, highly functional platforms such as MetaTrader 4, MetaTrader 5, or cTrader instead. All of these platforms offer impressive charting and analysis packages – but that is far from the only thing they have to offer. All of them allow algorithmic trading – which means you would be able to track markets and trade automatically with the help of trading bots. Developing custom bots and indicators is also possible – with MQL4/MQL5 on MT4 and MT5, and C# on cTrader.
CTRL FX Trading instruments
Currency | Stocks | Indices | Crypto | Commodities | |
CTRL FX | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
XM | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
FBS | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
FXTM | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
CTRL FX offered access to a failry decent range of trading instruments – forex, commodities, indices, and cryptocurrencies. We could not help but notice, however, the notable abscense of stocks.
At any rate, CTRL FX is hardly impressive – plenty of brokers actually offer thousands of different instruments.
CTRL FX Spreads and cost of trading
CTRL FX | XM | FBS | FXTM | |
Spread EURUSD | 2 | 1.7 | 1 | 1.1 |
Spread GBPUSD | 2.7 | 1.3 | 1.2 | 1.4 |
Spread USDJPY | 2.7 | 1.3 | 1.2 | 1.4 |
CTRL FX definetly did not manage to impress us with its spreads. The broker offered 2 pips on EURUSD and as wide as spread as 2.7 pips on both GBPUSD and USDJPY. Such wide spreads would probably not result in great profits. Consider the fact that most big brokers try to keep their spreads around 1.5 pips on EURUSD – and that enough of them can actually offer even lower rates.
CTRL FX Maximum leverage
Forex | Stocks | Crypto | Gold | Indices | |
CTRL FX broker | 200:1 | ❌ | 200:1 | 200:1 | 200:1 |
UK regulated brokers | 30:1 | 5:1 | ❌ | 10:1 | 10:1 |
EU regulated brokers | 30:1 | 5:1 | 2:1 | 10:1 | 10:1 |
AU regulated brokers | 30:1 | 5:1 | 2:1 | 10:1 | 10:1 |
US regulated brokers | 50:1 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
CTRL FX offers a mazimum leverage of 1:200 on all trading instruments. This is actually extrmelly high, especially since this broker claims to be based in the UK. UK brokers are banned from offering leverage higher than 1:30 on forex majors to retail traders. The rates are even lower on more volatile asset such as crypto and indices.
The reason for that is that trading with such high leverage is risky – it could result in both bigger profits, and bigger losses. However, in volatile market conditions and for inexperienced new traders, bigger losses are a much more likely outcome.
That is why we always urge traders to be careful with their settings and only trade with the kind of leverage they are sure they can handle.
CTRL FX Deposit and withdrawal methods
Deposit time | Withdrawal time | Fee | |
Crypto | 24 hours | 24 hours | Fee depends on crypto |
CTRL FX only accepts crypto deposits which is a huge red flag. There is a reason why you will see so many scam brokers urging you to deposit in crypto – such transactions are completelly irreversible. They are also anonymous and can only be traced to a wallet address and not to a specific person or organization.
Only use this payment solution if you are completelly sure you can trust whoever you are depositing with.
CTRL FX Minimum deposit
CTRL FX | XM | FBS | FXTM | |
Minimum deposit | No information | $5 | $10 | $5 |
CTRL FX did not provide information about the minimum deposit required for opening an account. Whatever the case, however, we can guarantee that there are plenty of legitimate brokers that would be more than willing to open a trading account with excellent conditions for $10 or even less.
CTRL FX Withdrawal requirements
CTRL FX did not inform us about particular minimum deposit requirments. However, such brokers often have many such requiments. They might, for example, ask you to reach an enormous turnover threshold before allowing any withdrawals. This is definetly not the norm with legitimate brokers – always stay vigilant, and try no to deal with shady brokers in thr first place.
Trading volume | Fee/Tax on withdrawal | Minimum withdrawal | |
CTRL FX / offshore brokers | No information | No information | No information |
UK regulated brokers | No | No | No |
EU regulated brokers | No | No | No |
AU regulated brokers | No | No | No |
US regulated brokers | No | No | No |