Hi Infinit,

Let's address your questions:

1) Alpari UK (since 2004, FSA UK) **** newly introduced ECN trading - Alpari Direct Pro - Russian owned, no prejudice, but I am of Russian origin myself and there great chances that they might play very dirty games.

You've got some point here. Russian brokers in general haven't earned much of a positive reputation among traders yet, rather there have been some negative incidents... But Alpari UK so far proves to be an exception: good services, few complains, fair dealing. Their ECN services, however, are very new, basically introduced somewhere in August, so we can't fully evaluate them yet.

2) Dukascopy (since 1998, ARIF, KPMG +) **** ECN min deposit $50 000 - are you sure they service retail brokers? they told me that provide service only to institutional accounts.

Dukascopy used to close their doors for retail clients in the past, but not anymore. With a minimum of $10 000 (not $50 000 - my mistake) retail clients can now open trading accounts with this broker.

3) GFT (since 1997, NFA, CFTC ++) **** ECN for Prime accounts $10 000 - had chat conversation with them and the staff member clearly wrote me that they are MM. Could you please double check on that?

GFT is primarily a market maker, but have recently introduced GFT Prime, which is an ECN type of dealing, at least that's what I was told.

4) HotSpot FX (since 2000, FSA UK) **** ECN min deposit $7,500 - are you sure they service retail brokers? they told me that provide service only to institutional accounts.

You're right, HotSpot FX, Fxi to be accurate, doesn't work with retail clients. Instead they have opened HotSpot Euro FX for retail clients. Min deposit: $7500.

5) Interactive brokers (since 2004, NFA, CFTC +) **** ECN min deposit $10 000 - yes, this is one of the best.

Good broker, good conditions, good feedback form traders.

6) MB Trading (since 2001, NFA, CFTC +) **** ECN min deposit $400 - not available for Canada

Another good broker. Too bad Canadian traders are not accepted.

7) PFGBEST (since 1980, NFA, CFTC) **** ECN min deposit $10 000 - has quite a few complaints registered with NFA, no trust.

PFGBEST got controversial reviews from Forex traders, but overall still a good one, plus they are registered; however, as you said, they are still missing some trust somewhere, I'm not sure what the real reason there is. Futures trading is their strongest side, while Forex is probably the weakest.

BiGi!

Greatly appreciate your investigation for me. You host the most interesting and informative website!

I will keep digging and trying myself with brokers and will certainly visit you again to provide my valuable information as well.

Respect,
Infinit

Hi Egudu,

I haven't really dug into this area of brokers with multi-terminal platforms. Might be a task for later.
Also, same thing with traders from different countries: it is different with every broker, so you have to ask all of them one by one to make a list. I'm not ready for this challenge :) It is too time consuming and very specific, means few traders will ever use it, but for me it'll take days, may be weeks to prepare the stats. Sorry, but I can't do that...

The minimum deposit for an ECN account with FXCBS is $1000.
I haven't traded with this broker. Here are some FXCBS reviews.

Hey dudes,

Read the previous comments before you ask questions, please !!!

*) BG, many thanks and keep up the good work ;)

I just wanted to comment on some of Broker Guru's post on Sept. 5:

1) Alpari UK (since 2004, FSA UK) **** newly introduced ECN trading - Alpari Direct Pro - Russian owned, no prejudice, but I am of Russian origin myself and there great chances that they might play very dirty games.

You've got some point here. Russian brokers in general haven't earned much of a positive reputation among traders yet, rather there have been some negative incidents... But Alpari UK so far proves to be an exception: good services, few complains, fair dealing. Their ECN services, however, are very new, basically introduced somewhere in August, so we can't fully evaluate them yet.

** I have not been able to find any information on the Alpari's ECN services - "Direct Pro"?? I am quite interested if it's there.

6) MB Trading (since 2001, NFA, CFTC +) **** ECN min deposit $400 - not available for Canada

Another good broker. Too bad Canadian traders are not accepted.

** First of all, I would like to say that MB Trading has been very helpful - their customer service is top notch. I downloaded their MT4 platform and was quite impressed with the trade action, and spreads dropping to almost zero in some cases. One problem I ran into was with an Expert Advisor I own. It appears that MB, has eliminated some sort of data signal normally available to EA programmers, to create their "MT4 ECN bridge". MB couldn't tell me what it was, and the developer I bought the EA from couldn't figure it out either. This was a dissapointment, but other than that, this platform is absolutely the best I've ever seen with MT4!

7) PFGBEST (since 1980, NFA, CFTC) **** ECN min deposit $10 000 - has quite a few complaints registered with NFA, no trust.

PFGBEST got controversial reviews from Forex traders, but overall still a good one, plus they are registered; however, as you said, they are still missing some trust somewhere, I'm not sure what the real reason there is. Futures trading is their strongest side, while Forex is probably the weakest.

** I have serious reservations about the ECN claim from PFG Best. I downloaded their demo, and have made numerous trades while watching the spreads in the MT4 tick view (my ECN acid test). From what I can tell, they have fixed spreads that vary sometimes. It's not much different than IBFX or FXDD in my opinion. On top of that PFG charges commissions - exactly the same price as MB Trading.

On another note with PFG, the sales rep I spoke to made 2 claims in our conversation that simply turned out to be not true (i.e. he lied to me). He told me emphatically that Gain Capital had purchased TradeStation - which was completely false. I called TradeStation up and they had a good laugh on that one. He told me that MB Trading was trying to copy their MT4 ECN technology, but would be in legal trouble if they tried... He also said several other things negative about MB Trading (note MB didn't have anything bad to say about anyone else).