There are a large number of Forex brokers in the retail and Institutional spaces these days, each touting their services as the best in the market. Due to the vast diversity of options, it is not possible to speak of a broker who is perfect for all kinds of traders. Instead, you should carefully consider your own expectations from trading, and compare that with what is offered by the broker, and choose the one that is best suited to your needs.

Here I will examine the criteria in order of importance:

Reputation

The first necessity for choosing the right broker must be the safe and reliable track record of the firm. Here at Tripeak we have a sound history of over 7 years in the marketplace and a full MFSA license under FXDD. Fortunately, the regulatory authorities in this country and in other financial centers around the world are very diligent in screening out the few unreliable ones among the many decent firms. Your best course is to ensure that the broker you choose is a member of a regulatory body, such as the MFSA in Malta, or with other relevant authorities in other parts of the world.

What is the point of opening a forex account if the funds you deposit will be unsafe with the broker, or worse yet, will be stolen and misappropriated? What is the logic of studying analysis and currency fundamentals if the profits that you make are then squandered by irresponsible individuals?

Deposits and Withdrawals

The broker must facilitate your termination of the account in case you’re not entirely satisfied with the services offered, regardless of the reasons. This should be non-negotiable: since the broker is the custodian of your funds, there’s no justification for any unreasonable delays or excuses when you make the request to withdraw your funds.

Similarly, you, as the client, should have no headaches at all when depositing funds with the broker. At Tripeak, we have some of the most efficient and fastest turnaround times in the business when it comes to both depositing and withdrawing of funds. If the broker is not even capable of ensuring that your deposit process is smooth, how likely are they to guarantee a painless and satisfactory trading experience for you? It is not a good idea to trade Forex if you cannot withdraw your earnings with ease.

Spreads

Spreads are important but NOT necessarily the most important factor for seasoned or novice forex traders. Factors such as execution quality and even the traders experience are in fact more important factors than the spread itself. The broker usually receives the compensation for its services by widening the bid-ask spread beyond the quoted values in the interbank market. You pay this fee regardless of the profit or loss you make with your trade: so there’s always good sense in ensuring that you choose a broker which offers one of the more competitive spreads in the market. We at Tripeak can offer extremely tight spreads due to our varied liquidity pool, which is made up from some of the most reputable and largest Tier 1 banks in the world.

Margin Requirement

Margin requirements and leverage are probably the second most important aspect that must be considered in the choice of the broker. Higher leverage is only advisable for traders with a proven track record of profits and success.

Tripeak typically offers a maximum of 100:1 leverage, with an option to increase this to 200:1 once we have seen your trading style and know that you are comfortable with applying risk. Instead, the minimum leverage available is far more useful as a criterion, as this is how traders are able to compound their profits on an exponential and continual basis.

Trading Platform

In online forex trading, almost all activity is conducted through the trading software. Indeed, for a safe trading experience, and to ensure that the broker doesn’t tamper with your trades, and misrepresent currency prices to you, you should always seek those offers which allow the greatest automation, and reduce human interference to the lowest level possible. This is only possible with a successfully implemented trading platform.

What should you look for when choosing the trading platform?

We offer the most versatile and easy to use trading platform in the marketplace today, MT4. It offers all of the FX Majors and Cross Currency pairs, and is extremely easy to navigate. You can trade through any one of our global data centers in London (LD4), New York (NY4), Tokyo (TY3) and Hong Kong. We have a 99.97% successful execution rate with low slippage. We can also help you customize your platform to suit your own specific trading needs and requirements.

Currencies Offered

In evaluating the currency pairs offered, you should try to make sure that different currency pairs of different classifications are available, instead of concentrating on just the number of the total pairs offered. For example, if a broker offers pairs of major economic powers, pairs of emerging nations, and a mix of emerging market pairs as we do in, for example, Thai Baht, Hungarian Forint or Mexican Peso, the offer is much better than that of a firm which offers 15 pairs all of which belong to major, developed economies.

Value vs Price

Because we are using a prime broker we are able to offer our traders much more versatile and generous trading conditions. This means that you, the trader, not only have access to better pricing, but also the execution and , minimizing factors such as slippage. We deal with higher end more sophisticated traders, so you will be in good hands when speaking with our support teams which run through the week 24/6. If you are a trader who executes larger orders, you are more likely to be filled at price through a Prime Brokerage rather than a retail broker as we can offer you guaranteed fills of up to 100 lots in one click for FX and 20 lots for Metals.

Conclusion

I have tried to be as transparent as possible when it comes to evaluating and assessing the requirements in order to choose your broker. With our varied and cost effective offerings, Tripeak allows you, the Trader, to have access to one of the deepest liquidity pools with the most competitive spreads in the marketplace today. Should you need any further information regarding our products, pricing and service, I would be more than happy to talk with you personally.