no regulations stopping US residents from opening offshore accounts

I'm sorry, did you find a broker that would let you trade at 1000 to 1? Otherwise, any broker restricts your margin at some level. Just because they took it DOWN doesn't mean that you had freedom at 100:1 and now lost a freedom at 50:1. Please turn down the drama.

well, better get trading then. but the thing is if they stop institutions from entering into forex on the spot market, then they are restricting what institutions can and can't do. i dunno about that one. db has U.S. offices, but they have the same regulations as banks and not all the NFA crap.

that's basically telling someone they can't bank with who they want to bank with because that bank is foreign. if that's the case, then they should restrict ALL U.S. citizens from even opening foreign bank accounts. that's not gonna happen

So since you can't trade successfully at a higher leverage than 50:1 it's okay to take that away from those that do? I wonder how passive you will be when they get around to taking away a freedom you enjoy. In the 1930's everyone in world wasn't really concerned about the Nazi Party and their agenda in Germany either. Big mistake...

Just an observation, nothing personal.

Hi fxcellent,

To answer your question, yes, you can still hold an account with FXCM Micro if you are a US resident. It's just that your account will be held with FXCM US.

Hi Kush,

When your account is moved to FXCM US, you will still have access to the same trading platform and trading functionality you had with FXCM UK in terms of being able to close positions individually through the open positions window and add stops/limits to trades individually through the open positions window. So you can still manage positions non-FIFO if you want to. Where FIFO will come into play is if you use market orders to close positions whereby you don't specify which position to close, then trades will be closed via FIFO.

Hope that helps. Feel free to post any questions on the FXCM Discussion thread.

-Jason

U.S. retail clients can continue to trade with offshore banks until July 2011 without regard to the CFTC's leverage and hedging restrictions. This was confirmed by the CFTC.

See this article: http://www.investmentlawgroup.com/content/view/237/61/

http://ezsmiley.com/gallery/oversize...banana-big.gif

I just read this article, I am still unclear from the article about offshore brokers--are we allowed to trade with offshore non-bank brokers like GoMarkets until July 2011?

Thank you - finally someone with some brains - great point. That's what people aren't understanding. It's not just that fact that Big Brother has forced this on forex, and 50:1 isn't the real issue - even though that by itself is a big issue and it sucks for people who know how to handle leverage - most people don't even have a clue as to how leverage works anyway - and it sucks for people who are making a living from trading only to see their weekly earnings cut by 3/4ths. The real issue behind all this is this is just the beginning on 2 fronts. This is just the beginning in forex in the US. Do you really think this is as far as it will go? Dream on. This was just a test. They got away with it with absolutely no opposition from any senator or rep or anyone with any kind of authority. Next it will be 10:1 or 1:1 then on to just plain shutting down retail forex in the US. Or perhaps just straight to shutting it down.

You made an excellent point with Nazi Germany. Their total oppression didn't happen overnight. It started with small changes in freedoms - just like what is happening in the US. Everyday we lose a little more freedom. Remember how it happened with stock trading? A few years ago you could day trade all you wanted - can't do that now unless you have big bucks.

The idiots that say 50:1 doesn't affect them or actually welcome it are just the morons the powers that be want out there. They are morons because they can't see the big picture. It will only dawn on them when their grandkids ask them what it was like back when there was freedom.

Why do you think we're on the verge of economic collapse and we have insanely high unemployment? It's because the US government has regulated out small business(including individual retail forex traders - especially now). People don't realize that it's not big business that has been the backbone of the economic health of this country, it's been small business, the entrepreneur. That's disappearing, and that's why economically the US is crumbling. The US used our tax dollars to bail out banks and insurance companies, but nothing to help the ordinary citizen. They could care less how many people become unemployed.

Oh, but none of this affects you? Anyone in your family unemployed? Any of your friends unemployed? Ask them if they feel affected.

Wake up USA traders,the order of the day is to force you to trade Currency futures at 10/1 leverage.The idea is to get the little fella's out of fx,and leave fx for the big boys as it was before.The less leverage you trade with the quicker you will get margin calls if you don't have a large account.Leverage don't change the size of the pip,but will force you to trade for scratch grain(small change) all you mini traders out there.

The Tea Party was then and is now, a joke. A political decoy for the Neocons who are at the core of the very things you talk about. It is the Imperialistic Mindset of Neocons, that give rise to the Tea Party. Conservatives in America, have been debilitated and fractured, ever since it realized that the Party was skyjacked by the extreme right wing in America. So, to regain Executive control of the Constitution (the White House), it tries to make it seem like there is a true "grass roots" party in the making that is tired of "both houses" on the hill. Not true - not true at all.

Behind the so-called Tea Party, you will find hardcore Necons. Don't let the smooth taste fool you. Neocons have a documented manifesto called the Project for The New American Century, and they are not about to give up on their strategic plans for making the U.S. the preeminent and unchallenged "Superpower" of the world. And, they will step on the head of anyone who dares to get in their way - including President Obama and his Administration. That's why there is so much "racial" under-toning going on with respect to almost every single comment you see coming out of many right wing mouths today.


That is because we have become accustomed to being ignorant and apathetic and our politicians bank on our massive stupidity. We are doing so many dumb things in this country, that it hurts my heart to the core. I love my country, but we have become a basket of absolute nut cases. Our educational systems are collapsing. Our political systems are bloated and corrupted. Our fiscal policies have pushed us to the bring of economic disaster. Our foreign policy with respect to the Middle East, has cost untold thousands of innocent lives. Our image around the world has dropped off a cliff.

We are leaking integrity, character and morals like a broken down Chevy. We don't manufacturing nearly enough to sustain a healthy Middle Class. We've shipped more Middle Class jobs overseas, than China ships green tea to the rest of the world. Japan owns both ears ears and China owns both eyes. We maintain twin deficits that nobody can comprehend and we act like we cant spell the words "Monetary Policy." We produce more than 11,000 homicides by "fire arm" - the largest murder-by-gun rate of all "advanced" nations. Essentially, my beloved country is/has fallen apart at the seams and the horizon looks even worse.


What good guys?

We just got done with eight (8) years of hell on earth, complete with economic ruin, yet Americans, now want to vote the same clueless people who caused this mess right back into office - after only two years of cleaning up a mess that took 400% longer to create. If the polls are any indication, the American People are about to make the exact same massive mistake that we made back in 2000 and 2004. Those same politicians to a multi-billion dollar budget surplus and blew it to bits in less than 1.5 years. They took a multi-trillion dollar projected budget surplus and turned into a pipe dream in under 1 year.

They gave us two unpaid for wars that will ultimately cost us Trillions, in the Middle East. And, they provided the environment for a weakened dollar across the board against most other major currencies. We have no major economic engine to speak of anymore to forestall deep recession and capital has been flying out of the U.S. for more than 6 years now. We continue to borrow form both China and Japan, while we no longer receive the currency off-sets (compensating balances) from the U.K., like we did in the 1990's which helped to spur a lot of economic growth.

We are in a serious pickle and I'm afraid that because the American People have been sold a bill of goods by those who created the problem more than eight (8) long years ago, about what's recently been put into place to help solve some of our problems and because on average, the typical American Voter has the attention span of a nat, while getting their vital information from mainstream media outlets; we just might find ourselves putting exactly the WRONG people back into office.

We want instant economic recovery prepared in a microwave oven, and because the current President can't provide it, his cohorts in Congress will mostly likely take the fall and we will most assuredly repeat history by making the exact same voting errors again.

We vote ideologically in this country - we don't give a rats tail about rationale, logic, better judgment, good reason, good cause, common sense, strategic thought or what's right or America. We just want "our guy/gal" in office, scoring ideological points along the way. So what, if we end up going Tactical on Iran, and spending $1 Trillion more to shore-up yet another Middle Easter regional base of operations, while ringing the cash register of the military industrial complex, as the homeless, un-insured and jobless number continue to soar back at home.

Who cares. We are a superpower and that's what superpowers do - we blow $%#^$#! up and take what we need and want. The fact that the trajectory of our history is beginning to run parallel with Rome, just before its decline into the history books, is of no concern to the Imperial cause. Rome fell because it spent its way into oblivion, by feeding a Military Infrastructure and a military war campaign schedule that did not have the tax base to support. And, just think about how ridiculously high Rome's taxes were during its peak of power and global dominance.

Imperialist, to the core? Yes. But, when you live by the sword, you enable the very process of dying by the ........... [fill in the blank].

We still have a chance to correct our path. However, it is going to take a massive wake-up call the United States of America has yet to see. I'm afraid that it might take Soup Lines - yes - I said it - Soup Lines in America again, before we find a way to unite behind the single cause of getting our own house in order and stop being the worlds Biggest Hypocrite.

Rome was not built in a day. But, it was very nearly burned to the ground in as much time. We need to educate ourselves and stop hurting our future generations with our rank stupidity in the present. There is so much at stake here, and we need to get this right.

I'm off the political soap-box now.

Banks are not regulated by the CFTC. A Foreign Bank, is especially not regulated by the CFTC. Dodd/Frank amended a Federal Law that puts the United States Government in direct conflict with every single Bank and every single Foreign Bank around the world, that offers Retail Forex Services to U.S. Citizens.

But, it did so much more than this.

It created direct violation of United States Code, with respect to monopolistic business practices. It in effect, cleared the way for U.S. Retail FX Services providers, to engage in a monopolistic pretext for doing business here in the United States. It also opened a massively large door with extensions into every other type of financial service offered to U.S. Citizens, through Foreign Banks.

How is it possible, for the United States Government to dictate to an American Citizen, that it cannot take its own private funds and establish an account with a non-national Foreign Bank? The government cannot dictate the private business decisions made by private Citizens and Foreign Banks. Congress has zero jurisdiction over any Foreign Bank and zero jurisdiction over any private Citizen's decision to use said Foreign Bank.

So, if said Foreign Bank wants to continue offering FX Services to U.S. Citizens and U.S. Citizens still desire to maintain accounts with said Foreign Banks for the purpose of engaging in foreign exchange transactions, then who is the United States Congress to say they are prohibited from doing so? Congress shall make no law abridging the free choice of personal and private commerce decisions of the Citizens of the United States of America. The government cannot tell you where, how, when and with whom you can spend, deposit and/or transfer your private funds.

Furthermore, it takes a LOT of arrogance to think that you have "control" over an international market place, that is engaged by private citizens, business entities, governments, regional banks and central banks from around the world, via a global computer network. The level of bravado necessary on the part of anyone coming up with such a theory, is mind blowing.

A Citizen's private funds are their own. A Citizen's private decisions about where to deposit those funds are their own. A Foreign Bank's decisions about to whom it will offer FX Services, is its own. If those two entities decide to engage each other in a private business transaction - then that is not a decision that the U.S. Government can or should interfere with - on any level.

If the Congress wants to sequester, through the CFTC and Dodd/Frank, a private monopoly business network, whereby certain U.S. Citizens having been so duly informed, decided on their own to engage such a network for the delivery of FX Retail Services, then by all means, the government should go ahead and get in bed with those private FX business entities wishing to be a part of such a monopolistic network. But, if "other Citizens" of the United States, also having the desire to engage in FX Service offerings, decide that they wish to do so with a Foreign Bank offering the same or similar services, then "those Citizens" should be allowed to do so, without impeachment from the United States Congress.

What the United States has done is illegal - patently and plainly - illegal. And, no Citizen of the United States of America is obligated or bound to abide by that which is illegal. The entire thing is replete with holes, illogical inconsistencies, irrational assumptions and a seriously flawed first order premise.

As for me and my house, we will not abide any illegal push from Congress.

There is a lot about your post that I agree with - mainly, all of it. We are missing the point and there is an effort to try to put the cat back in the bag on leverage. But, that should beg the common sense question: Who Let The Cat Out of The Bag to Begin With?

Why was 400:1 allowed and who promoted it?
Why did it take real banks so long to get into the Retail market?
Why would some banks offer 200:1 and 100:1 at the start?

You know, it is funny. The entire leverage question, from a mathematical standpoint, is a total red herring. This is not about leverage, its about Taxes. If anything is being missed here, then its the par of the new legislation that calls for more quant reporting on accounts held by Retail FX Intermediaries, to the Federal Government. Why is such reporting necessary? Does it protect the consumer, as we are told? Of course, not. The reporting is to discover who is making money and who is not, so that a Tax Liability can be attached to those making money in Retail FX. Why else would the Government be involved! To protect "We the People?" LOL, that's a sick joke. They don't care one rats abdomen about us - not one rat. They are only trying to fill their coffers with more money they can spend on dumb Wars and Earmarks.

Wars and Earmarks, my friend. That's what this whole thing is about. Wars and Earmarks. Don't kid yourself into thinking otherwise.

Wars & Earmarks. That's the name of THEIR game.

As far as the leverage hype the government spews about, you can set your cost basis in the trade at X = 100% and trade at 100:1. Or, you can accomplish the exact same thing by setting your cost basis in the trade to 100% of X, while trading at 50:1. Your net maximum draw-down before margin call will be the same in absolute dollars, though your per pip value will decrease by 100%.

So, a trader can do just as much damage with 50:1 as they can 100:1. The differential? Time. It will take 100% more time to reach the same equity goal at 50:1, as it would have if you could have remained at 100:1. The trade-off? Less front-side gain potential per pip at 50:1, but reduces back-side risk during the draw phase of the trade.

However, you must not forget that at 50:1, while maintaining the same equity goals that were set at 100:1, you have to increase your cost basis per trade and therefore, on a relative absolute dollar basis you are at higher risk profile, than the same equity goal at 100:1. Lots of traders do not understand this and I am almost certain that neither Dodd nor Frank, took the time to understand it either.

I'm not angry about 50:1. I'm not here bytching about 50:1. And, I know how to trade - better than most in this business. I'm not even a Retail trader anymore, so none of this will impact me - though I do still have a retail account for other purposes. I trade with a bank at a higher level than most in the retail business.

I'm angry about the intrusion into the Private Lives of United States Citizens. That's what I despise. The whole leverage and consumer protection spin is just that, spin.

Wars & Earmarks.

FX was never meant to be a retail product. It was launched as an additional revenue stream for Banks after massive losses in the 1990's. Surprise... surprise.

I am not as much about leverage. 50-100 to 1... I like a to trade at 1/100 of a penny. Micro, micro accounts. The issue for me is 1.) how much do I want to trade at once. I don't always like full lots 2.) Do my ea's work. 4 digit works versus the 5 digit currency.SL and TP which are not allowed 3.) can I hedge. I want to go in both directions at times for setup. 4.) can I move my money anywhere without reams of paperwork 5.) do I have a lot of choices to what I can trade and is the spread reasonable. ....I don't scalp so I don't mind a broker making a buck here and there. Sorry, but restricting us customers to their way of doing business...retail or not is wrong.

If it wasn't for the democrats that caused the financial meltdown in the firstplace for accepting loans they couldn't afford to pay back we wouldn't be in this mess. Now republicans have to pay the price for their stupidity.

Financial institutions had highly leveraged bets that the borrowers couldn't possibly be that stupid and knew what they were getting into. Well they were wrong.

From Wavetop

[quote=WaveTop;4066670]The Tea Party was then and is now, a joke. A political decoy for the Neocons who are at the core of the very things you talk about. It is the Imperialistic Mindset of Neocons, that give rise to the Tea Party. Conservatives in America, have been debilitated and fractured, ever since it realized that the Party was skyjacked by the extreme right wing in America. So, to regain Executive control of the Constitution (the White House), it tries to make it seem like there is a true "grass roots" party in the making that is tired of "both houses" on the hill. Not true - not true at all.

Behind the so-called Tea Party, you will find hardcore Necons. Don't let the smooth taste fool you. Neocons have a documented manifesto called the Project for The New American Century, and they are not about to give up on their strategic plans for making the U.S. the preeminent and unchallenged "Superpower" of the world. And, they will step on the head of anyone who dares to get in their way - including President Obama and his Administration. That's why there is so much "racial" under-toning going on with respect to almost every single comment you see coming out of many right wing mouths today.



What's wrong with that...do you want to be number 1 or a "number 2" ?
I think the tea party is exactly what need to straighten out this mess. Do you prefer to keep the people we have now that created the mess (principaly Democrats) for if you do nothing will improve it will get worse....think about it

This is 'part' of what burns me up so much about this whole thing. I'm a Democrat and the more I think about what Frank and Dodd are doing, the more angry I get. Not at them in particular, though they are the lever that makes all this happen in Congress; but about the entire damn system of government America has created for itself, in this era of its history. The encroachment that comes from government with power-plays like this, is beyond what our founding fathers had in mind. All (without exception) of the founding fathers would look at this as an absolute ABUSE of power.

Folks, just think about how insane this really turns out to be. The name of the game is to use larger leverage to "leverage" yourself into a commercial and/or institutional account and onto a 'real' FX trading platform, like FXall, or something with righteous liquidity and a wide range of trade entry types, along with a good API, so you can build your Bot to run your business or trade manually, but do so, knowing that you are dealing with real liquidity from real players on Interbank. That's it in a nutshell, folks. That's why were are all here.

Some of us are already at that level but many are not. Those that are not, NEED the darn leverage to augment the skills they have developed over the years. It takes years to learn this business - no different than the time it takes a Lawyer or a Doctor to develop confidence in there respective regimes. Those that fail in this business, are those that typically give up too soon. Stick around long enough and you will find something that works for you.

In steps the United States Congress. Doubling the time it takes you to get from Retail to Commercial/Institutional status and removing one of the most useful tools a Trader can have, The Hedging. Can a Bond Trader hedge? Can a Sugar Trader hedge. Can a Gold trader hedge. Can the Equity Derivatives Trader hedge. So, they say: Yeah, but those guys don't have the same high leverage. Well, that's because the industry does not provide that kind of leverage in those markets. However, with Options done right, you can rack-up some huge relative leveraged returns on individual trades - if you can find high enough Open Interest at the contract level(s) you need.

That's precisely why many of us left the Equity Options business. Not just the leverage, but the liquidity. There is vastly more liquidity in FX than in any other trade worthy niche out there. Now, that same Congress, wants to gear the Retail guy/gal down and open up a black-hole on trades moving in the wrong direction by outlawing Hedging. Now, its is going to take the Retail'er that much longer to reach their goals and with more risk - NOT less.

Look, any U.S. Citizen, can open an account with Barclays, UBS, Standard Chartered Bank, etc., and trade almost any financial market in the world (almost, not quite). Yet, Frank and Dodd don't seem to have a problem with that. Yet, all of a sudden, they want to protect you from yourself, if (and only if) you are trading spot currency markets? What kind of sideways double-standard is that. You can open up with SAXO Bank, trade Gold and Equities side-by-side and do it with no problems from Frank and/or Dodd. But, if you dare attempt to toss a singular pip around the Interbank circuit, all of a sudden, the FBI comes knocking on your door, because YOU broke the "law?"

What planet are we on? This can't be earth anymore - nothing is making any darn sense. This stuff is so blatantly DUMB and transparent, that I really don't know how either Frank, or Dodd, or anyone at the CFTC or the NFA for that matter; can look themselves in the mirror each morning and conclude that a rational, sane human being is looking back at them. That's not hyperbole - I mean that. This is totally irrational.

I mean, this is not merely dead wrong - this whole thing is flat out bizarre. And, when things get this illogical and this irrational, you KNOW there MUST be an ulterior motive somewhere, lurking.

Have Frank and/or Dodd, placed No Hedging Federal Laws into effect for those using so-called institutional accounts. Of course, not. Does a "Hedge Fund" get to "Hedge" its portfolio using currencies. How absurd! So, why the double standard for the little guy/gal trading so-called Retail FX. The "Hedge," to anyone knowing anything at all about trading hyper fast markets like FX, can be a tremendously valuable tool for protecting and preserving capital if used correctly. So, all the pontificating about how these new Federal Rules being put into place are there to "protect the public," are all at once a bunch of malarkey. Taking away the "Hedge" is one of the most azinine things they could have done to "protect the public." They HURT the public by doing that.

Here's what I suggest to all Foreign Banks delivering Retail FX services to U.S. customers:

(A)

Continue Doing Exactly What You Are Doing! Don't give-in to the power-play and scare tactics of a governing body that has zero jurisdiction over your institution. If you have an FX Retail footprint here in the U.S., then SHUT IT DOWN NOW. Move the entire contents back to your country of origin and continue to accept applications from all global customers - period.

Simply remove the U.S. Mailing Address off of the New Account Set-Up Forms and replace it with your home base local address (Germany, London, U.K., Australia, etc.). Have all "new accounts" use your local [non-U.S.] address. This way - DOJ can't file suit in retaliation against that part of your institution that still conducts business here in the U.S., but that does NOT offer FX Retail services to the general public.

That's one way Foreign Intermediaries (especially banks) can start to deal with this. Here is another:

(B)

Fund the spin-off of a completely separate and fully independent FX Services Company in your own country and then simply accept global applications for Retail FX. This way, DOJ can't claim that any of your institutions with a U.S. footprint, have any concurrent business relations with any FX Intermediary - anywhere on the planet. Multi-billion dollar companies are funding the start-up of independently managed smaller companies every day of the week, somewhere around the world - so this should not be a difficult or time-consuming task to undertake.

[As a side note: This would force DOJ to come after the "little guy," when it can't even stop on-line gambling, now blowing its top, as online gambling revenues skyrocket here in the U.S. More importantly, it would force Dodd, Frank and the CFTC, to re-evaluate just how insane their draconian decisions have been thus far on the matter, here at home.]

In conclusion:

What really needed here in the U.S., was regulation of the rouge brokers and FCMs in Retail FX. Con artists and Bucket Shops running spikes on their charts that don't appear anywhere on other legit charts from other legit platforms. Intermediaries that have a direct counter-party conflict of interest with the Trader, by algorithmically taking the opposing side of the trade. Intermediaries that don't have anywhere near the capital requirements to settle all transactions, if that became necessary. FX Dealing Rooms, that are run like 1980's Stock Broker Boiler Rooms, etc. These are the kinds of things that needed to be regulated. The Trader needed help defending itself against THIS kind of malpractice. The Trader did NOT need the Congress of the United States, dictating to him/her how and with whom he/she should conduct private business.

Government (aside from taxes) should keep its paws off of the Trader's capital and the decision about how and where it gets used or leveraged in a private business transaction. There are ZERO national security concerns ZERO public risk with allowing a U.S. Citizen to trade through a Foreign Intermediary under the terms and conditions agreed upon by and between both parties. This is NOT - I repeat NOT a Congressional matter.

To Frank/Dodd:

You need to be about the business of figuring out how to deal with the twin deficit problem that you have helped to create in this country, as opposed to sticking your power-play in the back of the U.S. FX Trader.

You have a hard enough time controlling your own wild spending habits, yet you want to dictate to the U.S. FX Trader, how he or she should use leverage? You and the rest of the entire Congress, are spending our nation right down the tubes and into oblivion, yet you somehow retain the capacity to know what's best for the FX Trader? You know that 100:1 is more dangerous than 50:1? You know that Hedging is somehow a thing that Trader's just don't need and thus, should not be allowed to use in the course of trade recovery?

If you "know" so much, then why is our nation in debt up to its eyeballs?

Why are you constantly appropriating spending with money that we don't have? Why are you placing the financial burden that we should be dealing with ourselves, in our own generation, on the backs of our children and THEIR children? Why the heck are you tampering with online FX Retail? Why are you here? What the heck are you doing and why are you doing it?

What moxie, you must have - telling a bank that you DO NOT have regulatory authority over, that it cannot offer services to a U.S. Citizen! On what planet will you find the authority to enforce that insanity? Are you going to packet-sniff my PC's tcp/ip connection to find out which server I'm connected to - that where this whole thing is going, Dodd and Frank? Are you going to use this as the training grounds for the FBI, CIA and NSA Cyber Warfare Divisions? [I know you have them - don't pretend as if you don't.]

You over-reaching Congress people stink. You preach Freedom, Democracy and the American Way, yet you act like Joesph Stalin. In fact, you are worst than Joesph, ever could have hoped to be, because what you do is hidden behind that fake, phony, facade of "Consumer Protection" that you hold so high for the world to see, and as far as I am concerned, that makes you FAR more dangerous than ole Joe, turned out to be. At least people KNEW where Joe, stood. Joe, was........ Joe. A simple minded, one-way ticket dictator of the highest order, but you put Joe to shame! You are worse than a 20th century garden variety dictator, because you do what you do smiling at us head-on, while stabbing us in the back with BOTH hands.

We KNEW where Hitler, stood. We hated it, but the world knew what that dog was all about. We knew he was the face of evil, yet The People still trust YOU, because you smile and stab at different times. [Smile - Stab - Smile - Stab - Smile again - Stab again] You beguile, collude, mis-inform, dis-inform and otherwise set-out to jerk the American Public around every chance you get.

I can't trust you anymore, sorry. I'm done trusting you. Democrat, Republican, Tea Party or Independent, I no longer trust anything you say, do or offer my country. As far as I am concerned YOU are the "Enemy of the State." It is not us (The People) who should be feared. It is YOU - the Government, who should be feared. You steal freedoms and then have the temerity and the audacity to tell us that its "for our own protection." I don't believe you, I don't trust you and I'm darn sure not going to support you anymore. I will continue to do my duty as an American Citizen and I will continue to support our brave Men and Women in Uniform, but until we get a Government that is: of The People, for The People and by The People, you can kiss my support goodbye.

I don't hate you, government officials. I distrust you. You people ought to be ashamed of yourselves. You hypocrites! "You white sepulchers! All shinny on the outside, yet filled with dead men's bones on the inside."

I smell Rome...... all over again.

I said I was done with my soap-box, so I had better let this be the last of the rants about my Broken and Incompetent Government.

Taken from the link:

"Dummy offshore corporations: Not a good idea

Even if you hear from some that the CFTC may focus its enforcement efforts against foreign unregistered intermediaries rather than on individual traders, it’s important to understand the CFTC considers evasion a “prohibited transaction.” Forming a dummy offshore corporation to open a retail off-exchange forex trading account with an unregistered offshore bank or broker is considered evasion, according to the CFTC. Attorneys, CPAs and financial advisors who suggest using dummy corporations to evade these CFTC rules may face challenges by their professional license boards and bars on infractions to their ethical codes of conduct.

If you are foolish enough to use a dummy offshore corporation in this regard, you still need to disclose your American ownership of the corporation to your foreign broker, who may deny the account treating it as an American-owned account. If you don’t make that “know the client” disclosure, the broker may have grounds to take action against you."


Whomever drafted this online article, has not the slightest clue about what they are saying. "Not a good idea?" "If you are foolish enough to use a dummy offshore corporation...?"

Clearly, this individual is not a real Trader. A corporation has full entity status. The laws of the United States (and each state within the union) recognizes corporations full independent entities, with their own unique identity. The legal concept of "piercing the corporate veil," only applies for liability purposes in civil lawsuits, where the corporation is being sued for having liability and the plaintiff seeks damages to extend to the corporate officers.

A corporation by definition, is separate and distinguishable from its corporate officers, relative to accounting practices, civil liability, and tax liability. Therefore, any Foreign FX Intermediary taking an application from a registered U.S. corporation, does engage in a business relationship with that corporation and NOT its officers. The corporate entity owns the trading account and has liability with respect to contractual terms and conditions by and between itself and the FX Intermediary. The fact that a representative of the U.S. corporation just happens to be a U.S. Citizen, is moot on this matter.

Secondarily, and probably most important, is the fact that when a corporation opens an account with an FX Intermediary, that account is deemed a commercial and/or institutional trading account and thus, is not subject to the new CFTC and/or FinReg rulings with respect to limits placed on "Retail Trading Accounts." And, the entity does not even have to be an "Offshore" corporation, to have the "commercial and/or institutional" status. Depending on the size of the initial deposit, that will determine whether or not the corporate entity's status is commercial or institutional. The "Retail" rulings are moot at this level. They don't even belong in the same conversation.

Whomever wrote that article, needs to recheck their facts. The only question is, whether or not the Intermediary accepts the corporations initial deposit. If that deposit is accepted, then the account classification MUST (by definition) be deemed either commercial or institutional and thus, not subject to CFTC/FinReg as it relates to "Retail" accounts.

My question (and its position in my post) was meant to be sarcasm. I've feeling very sarcastic these days with respect to our Congress. Sorry, for the confusion - if any.

However, it has been a much bigger boon for the intermediaries than it has been for the banks. The middle-men and buck shops like FXCM, have raked in all the bucks on the learning curve of those moving out of retail equities.

I remember a time when having an "Ameritrade" or "Scott Trade" account and trading stocks, used to be a big deal.