Forex broker cheat

Forex Chart Patterns Cheat Sheet.

Like we promised, here’s a neat little cheat sheet to help you remember all those forex chart patterns and what they are signaling.

We’ve listed the basic forex chart patterns, when they are formed, what type of signal they give, and what the next likely price move may be. Check it out!

You never know when you’re gonna need to cheat, hah! Bookmark this thing yo!

And as you probably noticed, we didn’t include the triangle formations (symmetrical, ascending, and descending) in this cheat sheet.

Confusing I know, but that’s where practice and experience comes in!

Like we mentioned, it’s tough to tell where the forex market will breakout or reverse.

So what’s important is that you prepare well and have your entry/exit orders ready so that you can be part of the action either way!

Your Progress.

The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person's determination. Tommy Lasorda.

BabyPips helps individual traders learn how to trade the forex market.

We introduce people to the world of currency trading, and provide educational content to help them learn how to become profitable traders. We're also a community of traders that support each other on our daily trading journey.

Forex Cheat: dos and don'ts.

Those who are already in this business, forex cheat is not an unknown phrase for them. For them who have ventured into it for the first time, they should be wary of this. Fraudulent brokers used to be very common in past but now, the picture is changing. With identification documents, licenses, certificates and registration being compulsory, brokers rarely take any chance to cheat people. Yet, it is recommended to check the background of a broker before you hire. Consumer Protection Bureau and Better Business Bureau provide this provision of background check of brokers for the investors.

Common Tricks of Forex Cheat.

For smooth dealing, a broker has to be honest because you will be going to rely on the quotes set by him. But unfortunately, these brokers often take good advantage of this reliance. There are several ways they can cheat you. A fraud broker can rip you apart by using some dirty innovative tricks. Some of the mostly used tricks are - they stop hunting, they disconnect the software, give fraudulent quotes of price, will not fulfill orders, or ban the account. If you are consistently making profit, they can even ask you to leave the business too. Sometimes, they ask you politely and sometimes they don't.

Guard Yourself against Forex Cheat.

There is no way that you can know beforehand if the broker you have hired would lead you to a Forex cheat or not. When known, why would you hire him or her at the first place. So, the best way to avoid a fraud is to register with a reputed dealer. Before hiring one, research a little. Know about the dealers of good repute and their rates. No point paying a hefty fee for an unknown broker and at the same time, you should not think twice if you need to pay a little more for a reputed a broker because you are going to put a heavier sum of money at stake with him.

A Forex cheat will definitely have software to flag larger accounts. Never open an account with huge amount at the first chance. They can use software to erode your balance from the account and before you notice, you will already lose a substantial amount.

Some Dos and Don'ts.

Don't start any new venture immediately after any important news release. Usually, under such circumstances the Forex cheats become more active as transaction increases owing to a special incident.

Make full use of Internet. Investors who have already been scammed by some Forex cheat would definitely discuss it in some forum. Go through those threads that concern Forex cheat. You will find discussions on how have been they cheated and you can even find out some names. If you have already considered someone, use the company's or his or her name as the search keyword and keep your fingers crossed. Though there are very thin chances to get reports on the individual, yet you can gather lots of other information on them from these forums. Also there are particular websites especially meant for the scammers. Visit them to know more about the tricks used for Forex cheat .

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How Can Forex Brokers Cheat You Legally?

There are many reports of scam brokers in the Forex industry. “ Bucket-shop ” companies attract customers’ funds and then simply run with them or they create unjust trading conditions, under which every trader loses money constantly. Those can be classified as true scams and are plain illegal. They deserve their own subject and are discussed throughout the Internet widely. But, unfortunately, legit (registered and regulated) Forex brokers have a developed arsenal of methods to get more from their traders in quite unethical way. Here I’ll try to list some of them.

“No fees, no commission, no hidden costs” – those are good words for the commercials but in reality every broker has a legal right to cut some extra pips or dollars in its favor from your position. I know at least 4 such methods:

Spread widening – all-time favorite of all Forex brokers. Spread widening usually happens during the periods of very high volatility. Broker may fail to allocate your position at a price it quotes (even if it’s completely up-to-date ) and protects himself by imposing a wider than usual spread on the trader. There’s nothing wrong with that if, of course, the broker does it honestly. In reality nothing stops brokers from applying wider than needed spread to earn several pips from the traders. What can you do to avoid spread widening? Choose a broker that’s not known for excessive widening or simply try not to trade during the periods of high volatility (important news releases). Slippage – isn’t dishonest itself, as the broker’s liquidity providers may change prices pretty fast and broker may simply have no choice than to execute your order at a slightly worse price. But some brokers use slippage for their own advantage and offer you to buy a currency pair at a slightly higher (or sell at a slightly lower) price than they could. The difference is their instant profit. It’s impossible to find a broker without slippages but you can try joining one with as little of them as possible. You can also try to avoid trading with market orders and switch to stop/limit orders; if you use EAs, apply reduced slippage parameter in orders. Disproportionate swaps (overnight interest rates) . Brokers charge and pay overnight swaps depending on the difference between the short-term interest rates associated with the currencies of the currency pair and set by the central banks. Unfortunately, the difference isn’t always strict – if the broker should charge the swap from trader, it will charge more than required, but if the broker should pay the swap, it will pay less than required. When the difference is quite low (for example, currently EUR/GBP has 1.0% and 0.5% interest rates; USD/JPY has 0–0.25% and 0.1%), the trader will have to pay swaps both ways – no matter if one is long or short on the pair. This trick can be avoided by trading strictly intraday, going for no-swap account, choosing a broker by studying their trading conditions for better swaps. Overleveraging isn’t really a dishonest method of brokers – it’s usually traders who just fall for the bigger volumes. And the brokers are glad to offer those bigger volumes, as it will increase their earnings per pip of spread. Remember that and don’t overleverage yourself. If you can afford it – trade without leverage at all (1:1).

If you want to add something on the topic of the legally cheating brokers the traders or have some questions, please, use the commentary form below.

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9 Responses to “How Can Forex Brokers Cheat You Legally?”

Nathalie Bowen.

Very good article. Very straight to the point. Clear and concise. Hope to read more articles from you regarding the basics of Forex.

sometimes when we take a position, it is beyond ask line and bid line. It is not spread widening, it is spread stealing.

January 27th, 2012 at 10:02 am.

That’s called slippage.

I was cheated by a forex broker yesterday. When I placed 2 identical trades on 2 separate brokerage accounts. The price on one account went on to take profit, while the price on my second account froze until it eventually turned against me and stopped out. Which makes market manipulation just another method brokers use to cheat traders.

June 12th, 2014 at 10:09 pm.

First, there is nothing legal in price manipulation.

Second, why do you think it was manipulation by the broker? Brokers use different data feeds, so their price quotes are not necessarily identical.

Some get your stop loss by walking down to the location where you have your stops set up. The market is 10 pips above on all of the other websites. I have three MT4 ECN Brokers accounts and all are getting traded by me some with EA’s and some manually and some on demo trade with an EA that I develop. You can see the extension of the tick on the tick chart or the One Minute Chart.

March 21st, 2015 at 6:31 pm.

I would not call stop-hunting a legal practice. Manipulating the Forex rates inside the trading platform to put traders into loss is a criminal activity.

Hi, if the spread is increased from 21 to 199, in GBPUSD, with no market all, no volatility, and they say it’s due to “lack of liquidity”, is it a scam, or not? Many times, from the late hours of Friday, and the early hours of Sunday.. Is it legal? I don’t think so.. some people say it’s legal..

September 12th, 2016 at 1:13 pm.

Not only this is legal, it is also quite normal. I would worry if a broker did not widen spreads during those periods and not result in huge slippage / execution failures instead.

6 Ways Forex Brokers Cheat You.

Making money through forex trading needs 3 requirements to be met at the same time:

Techniques Proper mental situation Proper brokerage service.

We have to talk about all of these 3 requirements on a regular basis. Focusing only on the techniques, or giving you the forex signals whenever there is a trade setup doesn’t make you a trader. You have to learn the techniques and master your trading system, and at the same time you have to build a proper and stable mental and psychological status for yourself. Additionally, you also have to know about the brokers, the way they work and make money, and the way they can cheat their clients to make more money.

As a retail trader, you need to have an account with a broker, otherwise you will not be able to trade. Many professional traders, hedge funds, money managers, proprietary trading firms, and institutional traders who have large trading capitals, trade through the banks. Some of them have their own custom made platforms connected to the liquidity providers. However, novice retail traders who want to start with a small account, have to sign up for an account with a broker, because they cannot afford to trade through the banks, or have their own platform.

If you are a retail trader who wants to open a live account in future, or you have already opened a live account, you should know how the brokers make money and how they can cheat you to make more money.

Before I go to details, I have to clarify something:

There are so many traders who open a live account before they learn to trade properly, and so they lose. Instead of finding the problem and trying to fix it, many of them are used to accuse the broker. It is true that many brokers cheat their clients, but most retail traders lose because of their own mistakes, not because the brokers make them lose. A cheating broker can cause the losing traders to lose more and wipe out their accounts faster, but a professional trader can easily find out that the broker is cheating, so that he will withdraw his money and close his accounts as soon as possible. So, if you lose money in a trade after reading this article, don’t immediately think that the broker has made you lose.

I will have a separate article about the ways that broker can make money legally. In this article, I am talking about the ways that brokers cheat their clients to make money illegally.

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Regulation.

Nowadays, traders talk about regulation all the time. A brokerage company is regulated when it is registered with a governmental organization that monitors the brokerage companies activities. Usually there are also something like insurance that covers the traders capital if the registered broker gets bankrupt.

When traders find out that a brokerage company is regulated with a well-known and powerful organizations/authorities, they think that they are safe and they can not be cheated anymore, but this is not true. I have seen some highly regulated brokers that cheat their clients the most. How?

There are always some special cheating ways, that can not be tracked by the regulatory authorities. Brokers can easily bribe the regulatory authorities and ask them to be kinder to them and close their eyes on some events. Many of the people who work in the regulatory authorities are the brokerage companies owners, and so they know how to bypass the rules.

The “regulation market” started to become hot since a few years ago, and poor traders thought that the governors have finally decided to support them against the cheating brokers, but they were wrong. There are proofs that those regulations are done by the governors who directly or indirectly own brokerage companies and make millions through them. They made the regulation rules to prevent the traders to open accounts with the offshore brokerages, so that the money stays in their own countries, and the traders become obliged to open accounts with those brokerages owned by the governors. I am sure you can guess the rest of the story…

Someone Who Has GOLD Makes the Rules!

The conclusion is that “regulation” doesn’t necessarily mean that the broker can not cheat. Also not being regulated doesn’t mean that the broker cheats definitely. For some cheating brokers, “regulation” is just a tool to attract more traders to open accounts. They get regulated and registered because they have to, not because they are honest. I am not saying that all registered/regulated brokers cheat their clients. What I am saying is that don’t trust a broker just because it is regulated and registered.

There are dirty hands behind these kinds of apparently good actions (regulation). When they found out that they could make a lot of money through the traders losses, they took actions to (1) prevent the traders’ funds to leave the country, and (2) make it too difficult for the small brokerages to become registered and regulated, because (1) they wanted to keep the traders’ money in their own country, and (2) only their own brokerages become regulated, and traders can not open accounts with the other brokerages. Indeed, they created a funnel to drain the funds to their own pockets. However, people just see the surface and are not aware of what is going on behind the scene.

Let me ask you a question. More than 95% of the traders lose money. Many of them wipe out their accounts at least a few times, before they give up on forex trading. Many of them lose a lot of money. What these so called regulations have done for these people?

Nothing. Still more than 95% of the trader lose. What the governors have done is not about supporting the traders. It is about driving the funds toward the direction they want. They could easily make a rule that doesn’t allow those who have not passed some training courses and stages to open live accounts. You can not drive a car when you don’t have a drivers license. They could do the same with having a live account too. Why don’t they do it?

You know the answer. They want you to open a live account before you learn to trade properly, and lose your money. Before the regulations, they were worried about you to lose your money to the overseas brokerages, but now it is OK if you lose, because your money goes to their own pockets now.

Now, let’s talk about the ways that brokers can cheat to make more money out of your trades. Before reading the rest of this post, I recommend you to read a small article already published on LuckScout, to learn about the two different kinds of brokers, market maker and ECN/STP.

When you learn about the market maker and ECN/STP brokers, you may think that it is only the market maker brokers that cheat the traders. This is not true. ECN/STP brokers can cheat to make more money.

1. Stop Loss Hunting:

Stop loss hunting is a very effective way that market maker brokers use to make the traders lose money. To learn about this method, please read this article: Stop Loss Hunting by Forex Brokers – What to Do?

ECN/STP brokers should only transfer the orders to the liquidity providers (banks). They can only charge a fixed fee (commission) for each order, and this fee is the only way for the ECN/STP brokers to make money. However, many of them who are greedy, want to make more money through some other ways. “Markup” is a way used by these brokers to make more money through each position that traders take.

Markup is an extra pip the broker adds to the liquidity provider’s base spread. For example, the liquidity provider spread for EUR/USD is 0.5 pips, but the broker adds 1 pip to it, and so the total spread becomes 1.5 pips. In this case, the broker makes 1 pip, in addition to the commission it is legally allowed to charge.

How can you find out that your broker adds markups?

You can ask the broker first. Sometimes they tell you that they are doing it. Many of them believe/claim that it is their right to add markups while they charge commissions also. Many of them deny it, and claim that the spread they offer is the normal forex market spread. You can easily compare their spread with the market’s normal spread. If it is 1-3 pips above the regular spread, then they are adding markups to the spread. Nowadays, the liquidity providers offer a very low spread, as low as 3 pips for GBP/JPY that was used to have a relatively high spread in the past. If an ECN/STP broker doesn’t add any markups, then its spread must be very low.

When you found out that your broker charges markups too, it will be your choice to withdraw your money and close your account, and find another broker. However, you should note that sometimes the broker adds markups, but it is a real ECN/STP broker and you don’t have any problems in opening and closing your positions. If just a few markup pips doesn’t make a big difference, you’d better to hold your account.

It doesn’t make sense for a market maker broker to add markup. The spread they offer is completely in their own control, and they don’t get the spread from a liquidity provider. Therefore, they can increase the spread directly and they don’t have to add markups.

3. Slippage.

A high spread because of adding markups can be easily seen on the platform, by checking the difference of the bid and ask prices. However, slippage is hidden to the traders. You don’t find out that the broker slips the price as long as you have not opened and closed any positions.

What Is Slippage?

Slippage is a trick made by the market maker brokers. As your profit is their loss, then they have to do their best not to let you win. One of the ways is that they slip the price when you want to take or close a position. When you want to buy and click on the buy button, they suddenly take the price higher, so that you will enter with a higher price than what you see on the chart. For example you want to buy EUR/USD while the buy price is 1.31216 on the platform. You click on the buy button and you enter, but when you check your entry price you will see that it is much higher than what you saw on the platform. For examples it is 1.31320.

They don’t make you enter with a lower price when you want to go short (sell), because it doesn’t make sense to enter with a lower price when the actual sell price is higher on the platform. However, when you want to close a short position (you buy) they slip the price and you get out with a higher price.

Slippage causes you not to make the profit you could make with your winning positions, and lose more with your losing positions, because it worsen your entry/exit prices.

Market maker brokers don’t do this manually. It is all done automatically and through some special settings of the platform.

If you ask them why this happened, they will answer that it is because of the market situation, volatility and… .

With the real ECN/STP brokers sometimes you see that your entry is not what you saw on the chart. You may think that they also slip the price when you enter, but this doesn’t make sense to do if the broker is a real ECN/STP broker. They don’t make money from your losses, so they don’t have to make you lose. In contrast, they want you to win, grow your account and keep on trading with them, so that they will also make more money in long term.

Slippage is normal with the real ECN/STP brokers, specially when the market is volatile and during the news release time, because ECN/STP brokers have to route your orders to the liquidity providers. Although this is done automatically and electronically, but it takes some time and it is possible that the price changes during this time, specially when the market is moving strongly. So you will enter with a different price than what you saw on your platform. With the market maker brokers, this difference is always against you, but with the ECN/STP brokers it is sometimes against you, but sometimes in your favour.

4. Re-quoting.

Re-quoting is another trick made by market maker brokers. When the price is going up strongly, and you choose the right direction to enter (you click on the buy button), the broker delays for few seconds, and then instead of taking the position for you, gives a new price which is higher than the price you want to enter (because the price is going up strongly).

They do it when you choose the right direction. When the price is going up strongly and you buy, then you will make profit, and this is what a market maker broker doesn’t want. So it doesn’t let you enter with the buy price that was being offered when you clicked on the buy button, waits for few seconds for the price to go higher, and then offers you a new price, which is called re-quoting. Then you will have to click on the buy button again to enter. It is possible that they re-quote again, and repeat this process for a few times, to either stop you from entering the market, or make you enter with a much higher price. They just want to sabotage your trading.

Similarly, when the price is going down strongly, and you choose to go short, they don’t let you enter and wait for the price to go lower, and then they re-quote. They cause you to enter with a lower price to prevent you from making a good profit from your short position.

If you find out and complain, they will say they have no idea, and re-quoting is just the result of the markets volatility, and they have no control on it, and… . Whereas this is absolutely a big lie. They do the re-quoting through some special software and settings they apply to the platforms. They do it 100% intentionally.

Real ECN/STP brokers don’t re-quote, because it doesn’t make sense for them to do it. It will have no advantage for them. However, if a broker claims that it is a real ECN/STP broker, and it re-quotes at the same time, then it is not a real ECN/STP. It is a market maker broker.

Swap is the interest you have to pay when you hold your position overnight.

Swap has to be calculated through a special formula, and as each currency interest rate is clearly stated by the related central bank, the swap has to be a constant amount with all of the brokers, banks and liquidity providers. However, the swap you actually pay is different from broker to broker. It is OK if it is not too much, but if you see your broker charges a lot as the swap, then you have to ask them about the reason, and you have to close your account if they don’t fix it. Swap can cause you to lose a lot specially if you hold your positions for a long time.

6. Leverage.

Leverage is a good facility that helps us trade large amounts of money with a smaller account, and make bigger profits compared to the time that there is no leverage. However, it is a two-edge sword that can cut our own throat, if not used properly. Most of the novice and inexperienced traders misuse the leverage and take huge positions that their account balance is not high enough to handle. So that when the position goes against them, they get margin call and stopped out very easily and the whole account will be wiped out.

Real ECN/STP brokers that are connected to real liquidity providers cannot offer a leverage higher than 100:1, because the liquidity providers do not support a leverage higher than this. If a real ECN/STP broker offers a higher leverage, and the client’s position goes to loss, then it is the broker who has to pay the extra loss. So a real ECN/STP broker never supports a leverage higher than 100:1.

However, market maker brokers can offer any leverage they want. I see that nowadays some of them offer 2000:1 which is crazy. Why do they do it?

They know that over 95% of the traders don’t know how to trade and they wipe out their accounts sooner or later. A higher leverage makes them take bigger positions, lose more and wipe out their accounts faster and easier.

When you see a broker offers such a high leverage, don’t think that they do it for your favour. They think about making more money within a shorter time.

This is it about the ways that brokers can cheat you. Please don’t ask me to recommend you a broker to open a live account with. I will never do it. I have good reasons for that.

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Thanks Chris another v useful article. And the USDCAD setup you mentioned 2 days ago has moved powerfully today!

I observed that GBPCHF really took a hit after news about the Swiss GDP (both YOY and QOQ) came out much worse than forecast. But if the Swiss economy is doing badly, then why does the GBP go down so hard and fast against the CHF? Should it not be the other way around? the GBPCHF lost like 80 pips in a few hours. Could this just be a false move created by the big players to be able to enter at much lower levels when the true move starts? Doesn’t really make a lot of sense this move. Thanks.

It is not the first time I see that the price moves against the news. Is it a false move or not, is what we have to wait and see. But who cares? We trade only when a strong setup is formed on the chart. The rest is none of our business.

Thanks Chris, i mention this because i saw what i thought to be quite a strong continuation signal on the weekly chart for GBPCHF – strong up trend, pullback to BB mid band, and strong candle close last week. But it seems that in the end it is not that strong.

Hi Chris, thanks for the article, interesting. Are you SURE that true ECN brokers only give leverage up to 100:1. Because I’m with two brokers, Pepperstone and Axitrader, they both claim to be ECN, and they both give leverage above 100:1. One is 200:1 and the other is 400:1.

Any way, I went long on the USDCAD trade, and I’m in profit now 50 pips. I’m trading without a stop loss, because I’m only trading 0.05 of a lot. How long should I hold the trade for? another 50 pips or so until I hit the resistance?

Keep it up Chris, and thank you very much!

Yes I am sure. Those brokers are not real ECN then. There are some apparently ECN brokers, but they don’t route the orders to the real liquidity providers. They route the orders to another broker which market maker and usually belongs to the same company. So they are ECN electronically, but are market maker in reality.

My first target is 155 pips because my stop loss is 31 pips.

Hi Chris, does it look like a potential short setup forming on GBP/JPY ? if the bar closes as a Doji with quite long shadow and breakout from upper BB? or will it be not strong enough? .. thanks.

It is relatively strong, but it needs confirmation.

First of all thanks for your articles, wonderful website. Its daily feed for me. One question I am struggling and its big one. How to know if your broker is reliable.

Would it be possible to generate a list that which brokers are ECN or which one are STP or DD ?

That would be really helpful for novice trader like me.

Hi Singh, I can not list any broker here, nor I can recommend any broker. There are too many brokers coming and going every day. You can google and find good ECN/STP brokers. It is not too hard.

I am also in doubt that true ECN only offer leverage up to 1:100. To my understanding, it maybe true in the past as interbank network only accepted large lot size orders but in nowdays they start to accept smaller lot size like 1000 units. I don’t know if it is true. Like CM-US new pricing model, it looks like they are a mixture of MM and STP and I think it shouldn’t be an issue trading with this type of brokers as long as they are honest. Moreover, those dirty tricks played on old days are easily being caught by experienced traders and cause their operation license revoked. The thing is someone else has to be your opposite site to make the deal anyway, I wouldn’t mind who takes as long as they don’t play dirty tricks.

Hi Tim. I demo trade with Pepperston but plan on opening a live account with a local broker in my own country. They say it’s easier and cheaper to do so. For example, I don’t have to pay any bank charges when my profits are transfered to my bank account from a foreign broker. Anyway thanks for the heads up. You too Chris.

This was a really useful article, thank you!

I know a broker, who has 100:1 leverage, but at weekends lower (30 only). They say that they are true ECN. Their spreads are also quite tight: EUR/USD 0.2-0.4 pip, USD/JPY similar. And there is a volume commission. They provide Market depth data.

These facts confirm that they are really ECN, am I right?

And why is the weekend leverage lower, do you know? Is this typical for true ECN brokers?

Do they lower the leverage during the weekends even when you have open positions?

Yes, they clearly state this on their website. They reference to possible weekend price gaps, which would seriously threaten invested funds.

Then there is no doubt that they are market maker. They lower the spread to make all the accounts with negative open positions to reach the stop out level and get wiped out. For example, you have a $1000 account and you have a 0.2 lots EUR/USD position which is -$300. About $262.96 goes for the 0.2 lots EUR/USD position as the margin. So (-$300)+(-$262.96)=(-$562.96)

A $1000 account still can handle a -$562.96 negative balance with the leverage of 100:1. But if they lower the leverage to 30:1, then $876.53 is needed as the margin of a 0.2 lots EUR/USD position. As your position was $300 in loss, then (-$300)+(-$876.53)=(-$1,176.53)

You don’t have $1,176.53 in your account, so your 0.2 lots position will be closed as soon as the broker lowers the leverage to 30:1, so that you will lose $300.

Only a market maker broker do this, because your loss is their profit. For an ECN/STP broker doesn’t make any difference whether you win or lose.

Be careful. You are not in good hands.

Thanks for your explanation, I will ask them about leverage.

I have found another broker whose weekend margin requirement is higher.

It looks quite a reputable broker.

It’s different from usual “bucket shops”, it says: “we operate a minimum trade size of $US 10,000”, and “minimum deposit of $US 20,000 is required”

Can it really be a market maker because of the lower weekend leverage?

Lower weekend leverage is nothing but a dirty trick by market maker brokers to make the accounts with big losing positions reach the stop out level.

Off topic……What do you think of the pin bar that is forming on the GBP/JPY daily chart? Is this a good to go short trade? or was the previous candle not strong enough? perhaps we should wait for confirmation…………

Thanks a lot for your time!

It is a good shooting star with a strong Bollinger Upper Band breakout. However, it is recommended to wait for the confirmation.

I always wondered why an entry buy was always higher than the actual market price and why a sell was always at market. Now I know. Maybe I should become more of a short trader…LOL.

It doesn’t make any difference. When you are short, you will have to pay the spread when you exit. So the price has to go below the level you set your target, to cover the spread. Otherwise you can not get out.

Hi Chris. Thank you very much for your daily feeds I just love ur topics. M currently demo trading on etoro but planning to open a live account with cm when m ready. I have a question regarding aud/usd candles that formed on september 1 and 2. Could they be considered as a sell setup at the end of september 2 candle? I sold at the close of this candle n my stop loss is about to be triggered since I set it to half the bearish strong candle. Thank you.

It was too late to go short. I wrote an article about this last night which is just published on the site:

thanks Chris.. all posts of this site are very useful..thanks again you…

Chris what’s your recommended brokers to trade?

Hi Asiri, Thank you too. Unfortunately I can not recommend any broker here. I am sorry.

Chris… After I see your reply I feel, If we know the and trade properly It’s may be more risky that trade with brokers.. so they can wipe out us not our bad trades…LOL…

Hi Asiri, It is not too hard to find a good broker. You can easily google and find it. Keep in your mind that more than 95% of the traders lose, because of their own mistakes, not the brokers.

Thanks Chris I got it…I follow your posts continuously……

I have found an article that helps how to identify a real ECN broker:

Chris, do you think the article shows a right approach?

Hi Otto, I read the article. Thank you.

Anything it says is true. Of course it has not covered a few important things like leverage and swap.

Is it possible to have a broker who offer both market maker and ECN/STP accounts?

Sutivserv, There are some brokers who offer both. However, I am not sure if their ECN service is a real ECN or is just another dealing desk.

All I can say Chris is thanks a lot for your very important inputs, may your tribe increase as the saying goes…….

Thank you Alejandro.

hi Chris, thank you very much for your honest help to traders.

i’m an cm customer and traded with mixed fortune for 2 years.

my last strategy is giving me great satisfaction but the problem is cm spreads are too high and it’s hard to keep my gains.

i should cut spread cost to 50% in order to be regularly profitable.

cm active trader account (requires 25,000 usd deposit) allows an average cost cut of 25% on main crosses which for me is not enough.

i searched another regulated broker and made a database of bad reviews (not interested in marvelous fake reviews) from various websites (excluding those of last minute.

traders who typically complain about huge spreads during key news)

well, i’ve to say that i’m really discouraged as slippage, requotes, platform freezing, bad customer service, difficulty in fund withdrawals and manipulations of all sort occur in most cases.

i’m really wondering if the entire business should exist if it’s managed in this terms… shouldn’t be a surprise though given the number of new brokers opening their doors nearly every day… they are attracted to this shady business like bees on their honey… why not? casinos do not fit everybody.

please share your thoughts if some traders here are more hopeful than i’m.

Thanks bro. your discussions are serious eye opener. Is it ok to set a very high stop loss order?

You are welcome. What do you mean by very high stop loss order?

Hi Chris, Eye opener! Thank you very much! Where do I find your trade discussions? i. e. “And the USDCAD setup you mentioned 2 days ago has moved powerfully today! “

You are welcome. You can follow our market analysis and signals here:

Thank you very much for the article. Very useful.

My question is can a real ECN/STP do markups but not charge commissions?

They claimed they only make their profit through markup and 0 commissions. What do you think?

Yes, they can do that. Markups are not clear for traders. They don’t know how much they are paying for marketups. But commission is a constant fee. It is a red flag if a broker charges markeups.

Thanks for the info. I oppened an account with a broker in the UK (regulated by the FCA). When I was about to wire money to fund the account, I noticed their bank account where they requested me to transfer money to is in Latvia. I thought it would be in the UK, as well as my account. I wanted a UK broker. Is this legal or is there a red flag.

You say they are regulated with FCA.

The best thing is that you ask them why you have to send your money to Latvia. Their answer is important.

True ECN/STP, do they guarantee no negative account balance?

No, they cannot do that. You lose to the liquidity providers not the broker.

Thanks god i read this article. I’ve been trading in a demo acc for 6 months, with good results and im planning to open a real acc in the next couples of months. This article came in good time.

All the article is true and all the things are true. This is also my experience. Now a days , it is hardly to find true ECN broker but i can say Octa is good for tradings. I do the trades with them for 6 months. I got 12000 dollars from them but then they excuse me from giving more services but i recommend every one to test it.

Thank you again for an insighful article.

please can briefly explain how slippage affects pending order. Its giving me some nighmare. Thanks.

Exactly the same as it affects the market orders. It makes you enter the market with a much different price than what the pending order was set to.

Could you make advice for real ECN broker, which use MetaTrade 5 – name.

First of all, thank you for a very detailed and enlightening article. (and website over all)

I am not new to , but I would say that I´m new to a serious approach to this market and profession. Lately I read many of the articles / videos at LuckScout and most of the content is relevant to me. It made me look in the rear mirror to see my many mistakes from a new perspective. I intend to follow the instructions published on this website thoroughly, including demo-trading for at least three months.

This leads me to my actual question. A couple of weeks ago I opened a new demo account with a broker that appeared more serious than the ones I tried (lost money with) before.

So far everything is ok, I´m improving my hit rate and profitability. My spread sheet tells me that I might be able to x10 the initial 1000 NOK balance within 5-6 calendar weeks. (I broke it down to a daily average goal of 5% balance growth per market day.)

However, after reading this article I concluded that my current broker isn´t ECN/STP. For obvious reasons I would like to continue the simulation period with as realistic conditions as possible. I understand and respect the reason why specific traders must not be mentioned here at LuckScout so I started to google only to find that many claim they are true ECN´s, but they´re obviously not. (a few control questions in the customer chat room is all it takes to reveal the scam)

Is there any authority, or independent organisation that can be trusted when it comes to listing true ECN/STP brokerage houses?

Once again, thank you for providing us “newbies” with this educational site. Who knows, maybe one day I can contribute too.

Re scam brokers cheating on clients.

My problem is as follows and wander if other clients have experience the same and need advice me to prove my point.

My account with different brokers have been traded by others NOT ME and wiped out my deposits.

My accounts have also been wiped out of funds prior to having my account verified.

Brokers insists that i did all the trading in my account and loss all my funds (this is a lie)

Advice needed, Brokers must know who traded in my accounts.

through IP addresses or other methods etc.

So i want to know, which one is better STP or ECN broker? Can you explain about Tier-1, Liquidity Provider? Thanks.

Our broker is refusing to pay us our deposits and profits claiming that the Liquidity Provider is refusing to allow them to do that. Could this be possible? there is well over 200 clients involved.

It depends who their liquidity provider is. If it is a market maker broker, then it can be a scam like all the other market maker brokers. First you have to find out whether they really have a liquidity provider or not which is almost impossible for you unless an insider tells you the truth.

By the way, whether they have a liquidity provider that doesn’t release the funds or they don’t have a liquidity provider…, or whatever the problem is, the broker is responsible.

Even I am also cheated by 2 local forex trader in mumbai india.. Name of those 2 cheater are [removed] age 32 told me that he was driving his car got accident. Cant do any thing..Now his mobile is switch off.. and 2nd [removed] age 22 Mumbai along with his partner [removed] 42.. not refunding my amount.

Thank you for your comment and sorry that we can’t publish their names on our site, so that they were removed.

Hi Chris, Very educating article with intelligent comments. I trade with two brokers. Both claim to be ECN. One offers 1:100 and the other 1:500 leverage. the spreads from the 1:100 broker is higher but I’ve never experienced slippage or any trading malfunction. With the other with 1:500, I get dangerous slippage once in a while but they offer better withdrawal and deposit speed and reliable customer service. My withdrawals takes less than 24 hours. But the 1:100 have less reliable customer service and withdrawals run into days. Would you say the 1:500 broker is fake? Thanks.

The 1:500 is a market maker. They can have the ECN system at the same time but you never know what behind the scene is.

If you are making profit consistently with a broker and you never experience any problems, both in taking and closing the positions and also in withdrawal, then it is a good broker. They usually make no problems for you as long as you don’t make profit consistently.

is it hard to believe when you are saying that with the 1:100 broker you have never faced slippage. usually, one have less slippage with a market maker, because your trade does not go to the market, and the market marker does not have to wait for a rate from their liquidity provider, therefore, when you say you have no slippage with the 1:100 broker, I just think….do you know in which circumstances slippage occurs?

I really appreciate your good work keep on opening anus. I think I am interested on DT but don’t know how to go about it.

You can sign up for the course:

I’m really confused. I attend forex seminars and expos. I also trade and I’ve been consistent for a while making a few thousand of dollars from forex retail brokers monthly. So if the ones with leverage above 1:100 are paying me profits consistently, do you mean they’re still scams. I have checked online for real ecn brokers and most Google search brings out still over leverage above 1:100. I think if you can recommend for us, it will be very helpful. Thanks.

As long as they let you make profit consistently and withdraw your money, you can keep working with them.

Yeah. I using forex for side cash. So a month target if $2000 to $5000 has been working for me.

Could you please share your trading statement?

Maybe I can forward it to an address. I can’t attach here.

Thank you. Please it to admin at luckscout.

you said that a broker is regulated when it is registered with a specific regulator body. i am a big fan of yours, but that is totally wrong. being registered does not mean that the broker is regulated. is only the first process, where the broker pays a fee in order to be registered meanwhile is making ready his documents in order to be regulated. this does not mean that all the registered brokers, want the regulation. so they just pay the registration fee again and again, and they create misdealing among the traders. they believe the broker is regulated but is not. is only registered. good day.

My name is Louis Malubana from South Africa. First I thank your publications about Forex brokers scams alert.

It is true that you will never make make money through forex trading. I am one of the forex scam victim. I lost thousands of dollars to these forex scams and would like others to follow this advise not to trade forex. I allow this publication to use my address as a reference as one of the victim cheated by forex brokers.

What was the name of that broker who cheated you? Was it a Binary Options broker or Vanilla Options broker? I was once scammed by a Cyprus-based Binary Options broker.

I was scammed by BNR Options and Noble Capital House just cannot get them to answer any s… lost 7000$…