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Brokers for Canadians? 325 replies

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Recommended Brokers for Canadians

Quoting 4xNewGuy
{quote} Not anymore man. I was with them for about half a year, fooling around with a micro account. Then I checked the members area yesterday, and they blanket banned all Canadian traders. Originally it was just BC and Alberta, now it's all Canadian traders. Each province regulates things like forex, securities, etc. That's why the regulations vary throughout the nation. Alberta is the worst. You have to have something like $250k in cash and assets, and be an accredited investor to be allowed to do forex. So in other words, only the wealthy can...
That is right. All Canadians must have their xm.com account closed by the end of May. I got all my funds and moved back to ICmarkets.

It is not good to be a forex trader in Canada due to TAX duty alone. In this country income tax, sale tax and living cost are too high. Since trading is location independent, the best option is to reside overseas. Once u become a non-resident, u will be able to open account with a broker of your choice and of course cut the tax and the living cost to half or lower. Recently I have been searching for the best countries for trading forex.

In south east asian, I found Thailand, Malaysia, and Philippines. Thailand is cheap but dangerous place so I would avoid. The percentage of english speaker in Philippines is higher than the percentage in Canada so there is no language problem. The only thing is heavy population and tropical weather. Someone who has lived in Canada may not like it. Kula lumpar in Malaysia is less crowded than Malina so it worth consideration. Malaysia offers a second home program.

2 other places in that region has better quality of life and lower tax, Hongkong and singapore. Unless u have a few million USD, it is impossible to buy permanent residence in these 2 cities. Brunei might be an alternative but it is a boring place.

There are many islands in Caribbean that have 0 or low income tax. But I have heard that the living cost is high because everything is imported. Living on a small island is also boring. Panama has a friendly nation visa program and Canada is a friendly nation. I would skip it for now because of living cost and language etc. I think living there is also very boring.

I not an expert and recommend everyone read internationalman.com
Quoting demark1
{quote} That is right. All Canadians must have their xm.com account closed by the end of May. I got all my funds and moved back to ICmarkets. It is not good to be a forex trader in Canada due to TAX duty alone. In this country income tax, sale tax and living cost are too high. Since trading is location independent, the best option is to reside overseas. Once u become a non-resident, u will be able to open account with a broker of your choice and of course cut the tax and the living cost to half or lower. Recently I have been searching for the best...
Thanks for mentioning IC Markets. I think I'm going to open up an account with them. And yeah, taxes, especially in a province like Ontario is just ridiculous. 13% on most purchases, 40% on income tax if you're a top earner. Thankfully I still have some losses I can claim future gains against, so I won't get crushed come tax season. But yeah, considering how costly it is to live where I live these days, the taxes don't justify it.
Quoting DarrenLehma
Without using practically thats really difficult to recommend at any brokers because lots of brokers are available in retail market place and most of them are found to be scams.
Yeah, I can't agree with you more!
Hi Stefan,

For your con of IC Markets, keep in mind that you can now deposit with credit card and PayPal free of charge! Fees are being waived so you do not incur any additional fees.
Quoting 4xNewGuy
{quote} Thanks for mentioning IC Markets. I think I'm going to open up an account with them. And yeah, taxes, especially in a province like Ontario is just ridiculous. 13% on most purchases, 40% on income tax if you're a top earner. Thankfully I still have some losses I can claim future gains against, so I won't get crushed come tax season. But yeah, considering how costly it is to live where I live these days, the taxes don't justify it.
what part do you live in? im vancity,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Quoting stefan416
Hi everyone, I was wondering what broker fellow traders living in Canada (Ontario) use or anyone with some experience trading live would recommend. I have looked into; Oanda: Pros - CAD based account Cons - Huge spreads, MM, only one withdrawal a month before incurring extra fees IC Makets: Pros: good spreads, regulated, CAD based account, decent commissions Cons: Only wire withdrawals $20 each Pepperstone: pretty much identical to IC. FXOpen similar to...
Great. Thanks for taking time writing such a long post to share with us.
Quoting forexvert
{quote} what part do you live in? im vancity,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Sorry for the late reply, was on a well-earned vacation. I live just outside of Toronto. My city's nice, but the taxes are ridiculous.
I'm a forex newbie and live in Canada. I'm planning to use IB for forex trading. I think their spreads and customer service are good.
However, they don't seem to offer MT4 but provided the message below:

IB offers an open source interface - the TWS API - which third party developers can use to create trading applications that connect to IB accounts. As this has not specifically been done by MetaTrader, it would be necessary to use one of the third party bridging software packages mentioned in the article above to place orders to an IB account from MetaTrader.

Not sure what they mean. Anyone using MT4 with IB account?
Quoting groobi
I'm a forex newbie and live in Canada. I'm planning to use IB for forex trading. I think their spreads and customer service are good. However, they don't seem to offer MT4 but provided the message below: IB offers an open source interface - the TWS API - which third party developers can use to create trading applications that connect to IB accounts. As this has not specifically been done by MetaTrader, it would be necessary to use one of the third party bridging software packages mentioned in the article above to place orders to an IB account from...

Hey,

IMO unless you require indicators or expert advisors that are only available for MT4 you are better off using other platforms (Ninjatrader, Sierra Chart, Multi charts) as they are more robust and feature rich. Once you move to one of those kind of platforms you will come see how mediocre MT4 really is. The only thing good about MT4 is its indicator base that people create for it. Other than that order management is appalling and charting is only mediocre. You'll only find MT4 with forex, once you dabble in futures, stocks etc the other platforms are much more powerful.

As for using IB as a broker for forex, they're require higher main deposits and higher main trading volume (25k USD per order). They also don't automatically settle profits or losses into your account currency. I'd say they'd only be worth it if your trading in the magnitude of five figure accounts and whole lots as constant conversions to account currency can rack up if done on the daily. Other wise you have to start looking into hedging your currency risk and juggle currencies in your account. Spreads and commissions are the best in the business tho and routine withdrawals are cheap and quick in Canada!!

I'm not at the trading volume level yet to make IB worth it for me for forex so I'm currently using IC Markets.
Quoting stefan416
{quote} Hey, IMO unless you require indicators or expert advisors that are only available for MT4 you are better off using other platforms (Ninjatrader, Sierra Chart, Multi charts) as they are more robust and feature rich. Once you move to one of those kind of platforms you will come see how mediocre MT4 really is. The only thing good about MT4 is its indicator base that people create for it. Other than that order management is appalling and charting is only mediocre. You'll only find MT4 with forex, once you dabble in futures, stocks etc the other...
Thank you stefan. I do need one indicator so I will stick to MT4 for now. IB requires $10,000 minimum. I will probably open an account with $15,000 USD and trade 1 standard lot each time. What do you mean by "~don't settle into account currency"? Does that mean I have to pay conversion fee each day I finish trading? I will check out IC Markets. Thank you!
And now Pepperstone doesn't accept Canadian clients anymore. IC Markets still does, with the exception of Ontario. Which sucks for me, because that's where I am. I liked them too. Very tight spreads, commissions were fair, and they even had a paypal deposit/withdraw option, so I could avoid costly wire transfer fees. Now that option is gone. Now it's looking like Tickmill via the FSA of Seychelles, FXTM (ForexTime), or FXOpen as my options. I am getting so sick of the IIROC trying to salvage FXCM and Oanda. I don't have 10x the money I have now to trade with them, just to make the same money I'd be making with an offshore broker. But the government doesn't care about its people, just placating failing businesses.

I think Avatrade could also be added to the list. Their spreads are noticeably higher, but there's no up-front commission charges, so I guess that's factored into the spread. They along with FXOpen have a prepaid mastercard, which is what I'm looking at. It's nice to skip wire fees, especially when you have a small account.
I should also add that Global Prime is a highly recommended broker. Their leverage is lower at 100:1. Although they say they will go to 200:1 on a case by case basis, which likely means if you have a small account, they'll give you that leverage. They mostly do wire transfers, which is a pain for smaller traders, but again, I've seen nothing but positive reviews about them. So they're another Australian broker worthy of considering. They also haven't banned any Canadian traders from any province. Just pray you don't live in Alberta. Because in Alberta, brokers don't ban you, your provincial laws make it illegal unless you make $200k per year, or have $5mil in assets.
Quoting 4xNewGuy
I should also add that Global Prime is a highly recommended broker. Their leverage is lower at 100:1. Although they say they will go to 200:1 on a case by case basis, which likely means if you have a small account, they'll give you that leverage. They mostly do wire transfers, which is a pain for smaller traders, but again, I've seen nothing but positive reviews about them. So they're another Australian broker worthy of considering. They also haven't banned any Canadian traders from any province. Just pray you don't live in Alberta. Because in Alberta,...
I've discussed this with Global Prime, they have not banned any Canadians like other brokers have done.

They have great reviews and as far as I can tell, they're not MM's.

Tough these days with lots of places cracking down.

Cheers,
Piplife
Quoting thepiplife
{quote} I've discussed this with Global Prime, they have not banned any Canadians like other brokers have done. They have great reviews and as far as I can tell, they're not MM's. Tough these days with lots of places cracking down. Cheers, Piplife
It's tough alright. It's also worth looking into brokers that are members of the financial commission. Some are regulated, some are not (by that I mean regulated by a national government agency/body). At the very least, if you get screwed over by a non-nationally-regulated broker, your account is covered up to $20k by the commission. I'm signing up with FXPIG. They too have plenty of positive reviews, as well as being very upfront about any and all costs.

Unregulated brokers are a crap shoot sometimes. My previous broker Finfx was great. Tight spreads, fair commissions, diligent in screening clients to avoid fraudsters. I had zero problems with them. Yet you have regulated ones in nations like Belize where they'll offer 3000:1 leverage. Some in other nations don't even provide a physical address on their website, yet they're regulated (or claim to be). It's tough all around trying to find a legitimate broker that isn't a bucket shop.

At any rate, once my credit card gets whitelisted (I'm not doing a wire transfer, especially with all the christmas holidays coming up for banks), and I've taken out at least half of my initial deposit without any problems, I'll follow up with a review of FXPIG.
Hi,

Is there any conclusion to this thread ? Can someone please suggest a good broker for traders from Ontario ?

Thanks in advance !
IC MARKETS
Quoting msiva
Hi, Is there any conclusion to this thread ? Can someone please suggest a good broker for traders from Ontario ? Thanks in advance !

I use Vantage, they are based in Australia, no problem accepting Canadians. Their ECN spreads are very good.
Thanks "symona" and "kminler". Much appreciate your response.
I have just been informed by IC markets that they do not accept application from the US and Ontario, Canada.

Hope Vantage would accept.
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