What do traders look for in a broker?

What do you look for in a broker? whats the most important thing to you? Spreads? customer service? dedicated account manager? fast deposits and withdrawals? Brokers are every where and many all seem the same... what would make you choose one over the other?

Broker should be Registered with a financial authority.

Broker should NOT be registered with NFA /USA

Broker should be an NFA member.

withdrawals....Pays Client profits

Your so right Maxey!

Execution!!! - Spreads!! - Withdrawal - Non-NFA (I wont even consider NFA shops anymore)

All of the above! I want instant execussion, correct/accurate pricing, fast deposit, faster withdrawals, reasonable spreads/commission rates, robust platform, customer service (that includes a dealing desk), and most important of all ... a funded broker. Write it up, those are requirements.

In addition, I prefer a broker to NOT be registered with the NFA, but as an American resident, I have no choice.

Ah all you anti-NFA'ers, let's hope something like this doesn't happen to you, you'll wish you had NFA behind you 'cos the FSA sure won't help!

I'm with ATC (in USA) - They're NFA but I can still Hedge, LIFO and my cash is held by FXCM (one of best capitalized brokers in the world!) - Plenty of nice Non-NFA USA options out there where you can still trade like YOU want to - CollectiveFX, IamFX, JadeFX, Gallant, BeamFX. - The NFA isnt gonna help you more than a fair trading field will - They're a pro-broker organization - Dont get it twisted.

The true interbank doesnt care if you Buy AND Sell a currency (Why would they? - Its YOUR money) - It just another Wall Street move against traders - The Futures biz was feeling threatened by all the traders moving to Forex and started their typical lobbyist moves to stop the outflow. Also you had bucketshops that trade against their clients losing money to smart martingales and grid traders so you get 2 rules to stop them. - FIFO stops martingale since now they cant close out the profitable last order first and No-Hedging kills the grid traders. Its big biz running the country AGAIN!! - Thats why these regulations only effect the USA. - Sometimes seeing the control that big biz has over this country is sickening!! - The small guy got served AGAIN!! - But its no biggie you'll always be able to hedge somewhere (No other country is adopting these idiotic rules - NOBODY!!). - These regulations are stupid because it just drives traders overseas. This gang that cant shoot straight is ignorant. Wall Street outsourced our manufacturing to China because it increased profits in the short term without even realizing that they were destroying the middle class thats 70% of the economy - IDIOTS!! - Now the NFA is making the USA the worst place to trade Forex in the world just to make scam brokers happy!! - SUPER IDIOTS!!

Ok, so NFA Compliance Rule 2-43(a) regarding price adjustments doesn't help the trader? I think you'll find it does!

2-43(b) FIFO has been discussed on these forums at length and has also been proved beneficial, the problem there is that most US NFA member brokers seem incapable of applying it correctly or adapting their trading platforms effectively, heck just a few short months ago they were saying that NFA had banned stops!!

There was a lot of opposition from US brokers about both parts of the rule so it doesn't really look like NFA exist "just to make scam brokers happy" does it!

Firstly, it shouldn't let people 'cheat' the system.

Secondly' it should openly tell you its hedging strategy if it is a market maker.

Thirdly, regulation/registration of some sort at some authority other than panama or the british virgin islands.

Not NFA regulated (fifo and anti hedging is bullshit).

Net capital over 20 mio

More than 50 000 clients

Have restrictions on the amount of under market volume it handles. I.E account size caps on micro accounts or mini lots. (get real people, you cant get 10k into the real market, 100k is the minimum on a liquidity network and 1 mio on interbank).

lol, it's the way every other market works, why should forex be any different

Because FX is used directly to hedge other markets. For instance, if you go long gold, and long oil, you are essential short USD.

If you hedge that by buying usd/chf and usd/jpy but not at the same time, and the market moves on your oil trade in a manner that makes it slower than the gold movement, and your gold TP is hit, and you want to close your hedge, but can't because you hedged oil first. ITs BS.

The USE of spot FX means that FIFO doesn't work, it makes it far more speculative than it currently is. And without hedging people are over exposed (isn't this the reason the GFC happened in the first place! over exposure?)

Ok ignoring the fact that the gold/USD correlation has broken down somewhat in recent months, the (new) FIFO 2-43(b) rule only applies to the same instrument.

The benefits of holding long and short positions on the same currency pair, or rather lack of benefit, has been discussed at length in other threads, even brokers themselves admitted in survey that 'hedging' in that way has absolutely no financial advantage.

First of all, the broker should be a registered one. Have a good customers relation. Offer a lot of financial instruments to trade, not just the majors pairs and just a few crosses. And of course the spread/commission as low as possible(and the willingness to negotiate commission).

NFA registered. Been in business longer than 5 years. Have at least 100,000 active traders. Be well capitalized (NFA gives lists on their website). Excellent customer service. Allowing you to pull money out and to do it quickly. It shouldn't take any longer than the following business day for them to send money you request. Their feed must be reliable and they must have a backup server in case something goes wrong with the main. If there is any down time more than once every few months than they aren't worth trading with.

Having a hard time finding a new forex trading company to use....Been with ibfx for 2 years and just started using an EA that works for me....that is until the nfa stepped in and took my leverage away. I've contacted Nordmarkets and downloaded there mt4 demo account ....three days into using it i find out that they dont allow U.S. customers to use this platform with a live account...So i check into Alpari UK and download there mt4 demo...do my strategy testing...and start Questioning them thru email...only to find out that due to U.S. regulations they can not provide accounts to U.S. residents....guess i need to become a Canadian citizen.

I look for proper regulation. Spread is not really a concern with me as i'm not a scalper. Customer service is important to me as well.

thanks for your all comments and thoughts..... I ended up going with forex.com.au an AUD broker.....