What ICMarkets did to my Account | Forex Factory

Options

Go to
Permalinks
Print Thread

Similar Threads

Tickmill or ICMarkets? 4 replies

ICMarkets Discussion 29 replies

List pepperstone and icmarkets crashes here 3 replies

How big of an account did you start with? 8 replies

Attachments: What ICMarkets did to my Account
Exit Attachments

What ICMarkets did to my Account

  • #1
  • First Post: Edited 11:46pm Jan 4, 2015 9:43pm | Edited 11:46pm
How on earth this could happened? They did purposely so that They can wipe my account with margin call. At the time of Hedging my available margin is 1978.09 plus i also have 2 others winning trade GPB/USD and USD/CHF that mean my available margin should increased. There is no way my margin felt below. So what They did was to put my winning trade in a lost trade so that They could close out all my others GBP/CHF trades as margin call. Here is the proof of my winning trade turned out to be a lost trade.
Sell 4 lots of GBP/CHF at 1.53669 and profit target at 1.52995. That's 70 pips profit. Well Profit target hit but order didn't get filled for reason. They said i closed it manually which i didn't. I was watching closely with my margin i know it looked like the trade closed it manually.
Attached Image (click to enlarge)
Click to Enlarge Name: proof.PNG Size: 30 KB





I was watching very closely for my margin still have a lot of room and look at price action

Attached Image (click to enlarge)
Click to Enlarge Name: cheating.PNG Size: 254 KB



what can we do to stop this kind of broker business practice?
  • #2
  • Jan 4, 2015 11:34pm Jan 4, 2015 11:34pm
If you are talking about the gbpchf sell trade of 4 lots (order number 6845899), it was opened at 1.53669 and had a target price of 1.52995, but the target price is not highlighted in green which is what happens if the trade is closed at the target price. Hence, from the Account History table you are showing us, it seems that you did close the trade the manually at 1.53807 (third column from the right), so the loss is correct. Are you saying that the numbers in the table are erroneous? If so, you should contact the broker for sure.
  • #3
  • Jan 5, 2015 3:43am Jan 5, 2015 3:43am
Quoting ForexDao
How on earth this could happened? They did purposely so that They can wipe my account with margin call.
I doubt they did it to wipe your account. It's annoying, but trading anywhere near your margin is likely to cause this.

Interbank rates and margins vary widely when there is high volatility and low liquidity, like at this time of the year. These spreads are often not properly reflected in broker spreads because they can change rapidly (milliseconds) and so to avoid you owing the broker money, and endless arguments, they have closed you out.
Gone to a better place
  • #4
  • Jan 5, 2015 4:56am Jan 5, 2015 4:56am
Forex Dao

I am so sorry about your losses but if I am not mistaken you carried forward these trades based on the SWAP charges over the weekend.

I did notice that for GBPCHF from 22:00 GMT the spreads were very volatile on IC Markets on Sunday ranging from 19 to even 95 at one point!

I compared this to FXCM and the spreads were also volatile for at least 2 hours. Other pairs partcularly GBPNZD and EURNZD were also showing large spreads.

I learnt many years ago, never to hold positions over the weekend because as soon as the markets open, the spreads can easily wipe you out. and sometimes it feels as if the brokers are hunting our stops.

Regards
  • #5
  • Jan 5, 2015 5:13am Jan 5, 2015 5:13am
read my posts on IC market thread, they robbed me as well.....
Don't speculate trade with surety.
  • #6
  • Jan 5, 2015 5:19am Jan 5, 2015 5:19am
I request all serious traders to withdraw money from IC market and move on to some better broker....

http://www.forexfactory.com/showthre...62#post7961062
Don't speculate trade with surety.
  • #7
  • Jan 5, 2015 10:27am Jan 5, 2015 10:27am
Quoting KingHussain
I request all serious traders to withdraw money from IC market and move on to some better broker.... http://www.forexfactory.com/showthre...62#post7961062
15 pips slippage is nothing at a news release. It isn't a good strategy to have pending orders at news release time regardless of currency pair. Even excellent brokers can freeze for a few seconds at the time of release and if some very unexpected number in the release appears then it could potentially be a 100+ pip slip and I'm not only talking about the NFP. Bad trading strat imo, take it on the chin and move on, regard it as a learning experience, we've all been there.
As the lights go by so too do the shadows move
  • #8
  • Jan 5, 2015 12:49pm Jan 5, 2015 12:49pm
Quoting Matts Micro
{quote} 15 pips slippage is nothing at a news release. It isn't a good strategy to have pending orders at news release time regardless of currency pair. Even excellent brokers can freeze for a few seconds at the time of release and if some very unexpected number in the release appears then it could potentially be a 100+ pip slip and I'm not only talking about the NFP. Bad trading strat imo, take it on the chin and move on, regard it as a learning experience, we've all been there.
I agree. If you REALLY want to be in on the news, it's best to put in a market order BEFORE the scheduled news release time. That way you are sure to get filled. Trading during the news time will be subject to slippages and widened spread and that's just the nature of the game. If you look at the feed from more than one broker, you will notice widened spread being displayed at one time or another so if your trade(s) happened to be executed during those times, slippages will occur.

The only problem that I do have with these brokers,however, is their servers going offline during and/or after the news release and we traders are not able to connect to close our trade(s), profitable or not. That is incredibly annoying and unacceptable. This is something that the brokers DO have control over, unlike the spread and the slippages, and it is well within their abilities to eliminate this problem but so far they haven't done enough regarding it.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #9
  • Jan 5, 2015 1:18pm Jan 5, 2015 1:18pm
I have the same incident this morning on 5 Jan. 15 with IKON Finance. As soon as it passed 00:013, their spread on GBPUSD went wild, it was a whooping 201 pips (20.1 pips), I was right in front of the computer, and didn't see this widest spread. The spread at time showing on order panel was only 25 pips (2.5), but in all the sudden my account went red and one by one my orders were forced closed by computer. I have over $2500 equity in the account, all my positions were hedged which my buy and sell orders were in equal size. When I saw the GBPUSD dropped on Sunday night before changing to Monday morning GMT, I placed a smallest lot size 0.01 at 1.5198, immediately it turns in profit, but still it did not help with the margin and my account was wiped out in a matter of 2 second, with a spread over 20.1 pips, an equivalent of a 15 min. bar range.

I must say thanks to IKON Finance back office support, they re-opened all my positions after they found out I didn't have large open positions and it was not a problem with margin.

This shows how vulnerable our traders could be. In a matter of seconds, it can wipe out completely your account without any reasons. My heart goes out to all those who suffered the same fate.
  • #10
  • Jan 5, 2015 9:13pm Jan 5, 2015 9:13pm
Quoting ForexDao
How on earth this could happened? They did purposely so that They can wipe my account with margin call.
I am sorry to hear about your losses.

In my eyes, the recipe for a margin call here are:
1. Holding a trade over a weekend with a tight stop
2. Holding a trade during an extremely low liquidity period (NY/xmas holidays)
3. Trading close to your margin (I know you had trades in profit as well as 4 figures of unused margin but see points 1+2 above)

As Smikester said above, interbank rates on an ECN broker will vary widely with low liquidity and high volatility. It is a simple reality of trading with ECN's. It may appear in situations such as this that they are trading against you, however they don't have a conflict of interest or vested interest whether you lose. They are merely providing you with the liquidity that exists from their providers at the time.
Follow me on twitter @FxLester
  • #11
  • Jan 6, 2015 4:44am Jan 6, 2015 4:44am
Quoting LizzyBennet
If you are talking about the gbpchf sell trade of 4 lots (order number 6845899), it was opened at 1.53669 and had a target price of 1.52995, but the target price is not highlighted in green which is what happens if the trade is closed at the target price. Hence, from the Account History table you are showing us, it seems that you did close the trade the manually at 1.53807 (third column from the right), so the loss is correct. Are you saying that the numbers in the table are erroneous? If so, you should contact the broker for sure.
Agreed. The fact that the PT price is not highlighted green tells that the price at broker level was not executed there, and suggests manual close. Of course the chart shows that the price did go some 26 pips below your PT level...but, given that time of day at this time of year, the spreads can be ridiculous. It could have been a spread issue.

Was there any journal entries regarding this close? Off quote messages?
Generally if the PT is set at broker level, then it will execute providing the spreads permit. Yes, slippage can happen, but even then, the PT value would be highlighted in green indicating that the trade close was triggered at that price.
Wealth comes from what you keep, not what you earn
  • #12
  • Jan 6, 2015 10:45am Jan 6, 2015 10:45am
I took a loss of 3k on a 5k account with this broker because he closed my hedged trades.
Customer support said that i closed the trades manually at 6 am although i never wake up before 8 am. They did not re open the orders or show me how/why they were closed.
My bet is that they changed leverage when they knew i won't be on and burned me.
  • #13
  • Jan 6, 2015 3:41pm Jan 6, 2015 3:41pm
Quoting Matraguna
I took a loss of 3k on a 5k account with this broker because he closed my hedged trades. Customer support said that i closed the trades manually at 6 am although i never wake up before 8 am. They did not re open the orders or show me how/why they were closed. My bet is that they changed leverage when they knew i won't be on and burned me.
You mean they changed the spread? Even if they changed the leverage, if the trade is hedged, the loss will be exactly offset by the gains. I just did hedged trades today and my margin level never changed. Widening the spread is the only way even hedged trades can get you stopped out because the gain is just not be able to offset the losses. And they can do that during news time claiming higher volatility.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #14
  • Jan 6, 2015 5:37pm Jan 6, 2015 5:37pm
I look at what you all saying spreads are a problem from what I see a bigger problem A; you are trading 5000.00 account so the rule is 5% of your capital on trades
B; with a small account playing with 1.00 and .50 per pip is fraught with disaster unless you have $100,000.00 in the account , www.babypips.com as a lot of reading regarding margins etc etc , I take it hard when I see people lose money
people leave, but this thread will go on for ever
  • #15
  • Jan 7, 2015 2:16am Jan 7, 2015 2:16am
Quoting Forexia
{quote} I agree. If you REALLY want to be in on the news, it's best to put in a market order BEFORE the scheduled news release time. That way you are sure to get filled. Trading during the news time will be subject to slippages and widened spread and that's just the nature of the game. If you look at the feed from more than one broker, you will notice widened spread being displayed at one time or another so if your trade(s) happened to be executed during those times, slippages will occur. The only problem that I do have with these brokers,however,...
I completely agree with you, Forexia. It is unacceptable for brokers to go offline at any time. What traders forget, though, is that computers are relatively new. It used to be done by phone and pretty much no leverage. As Aussi says above, any trader should only be risking a maximum of 5% per trade and in case of outages should have stops in place as soon as possible. I have internet and power issues where I live and so my side of the equation has to be solid.

Brokers do vary in quality and policy. Most, if you talk nicely, will put things right, but I wouldn't expect much sympathy if I were risking more than 50% of my account.
Gone to a better place
  • #16
  • Jan 7, 2015 2:22am Jan 7, 2015 2:22am
Quoting smikester
{quote} I completely agree with you, Forexia. It is unacceptable for brokers to go offline at any time. What traders forget, though, is that computers are relatively new. It used to be done by phone and pretty much no leverage. As Aussi says above, any trader should only be risking a maximum of 5% per trade and in case of outages should have stops in place as soon as possible. I have internet and power issues where I live and so my side of the equation has to be solid. Brokers do vary in quality and policy. Most, if you talk nicely, will put things...
you are correct smikester thank you , my point is to all traders don't risk your account because of greed it is that what kills account trade within you account so you can grow until you can afford $1.00 per pip
people leave, but this thread will go on for ever
  • #17
  • Jan 7, 2015 3:45am Jan 7, 2015 3:45am
Quoting Forexia
{quote} You mean they changed the spread? Even if they changed the leverage, if the trade is hedged, the loss will be exactly offset by the gains. I just did hedged trades today and my margin level never changed. Widening the spread is the only way even hedged trades can get you stopped out because the gain is just not be able to offset the losses. And they can do that during news time claiming higher volatility.
He might mean that they changed the leverage. Dukascopy do it as a matter of policy over a weekend. They also publish that policy.

Not many brokers allow hedging in the same instrument (!?) which means a trader has to hedge using a different instrument. Opening a new hedging position will eat into available margin - and a change in leverage requirement could take out the trades.

Some brokers close out trades until there is sufficient margin for whatever is left. Some brokers just close all the trades. As Smikester wrote, they don't need the grief of a client with a negative account balance.

The best course is not to sail too close to the wind.
Carbon-Dioxide: the gas of life! https://youtu.be/ttJBdr6eBuo
  • #18
  • Jan 7, 2015 4:01am Jan 7, 2015 4:01am
Quoting Exodus
{quote} He might mean that they changed the leverage. Dukascopy do it as a matter of policy over a weekend. They also publish that policy. Not many brokers allow hedging in the same instrument (!?) which means a trader has to hedge using a different instrument. Opening a new hedging position will eat into available margin - and a change in leverage requirement could take out the trades. Some brokers close out trades until there is sufficient margin for whatever is left. Some brokers just close all the trades. As Smikester wrote, they don't need...
people leave, but this thread will go on for ever
  • #19
  • Jan 7, 2015 4:25am Jan 7, 2015 4:25am
hotforex did the same thing to me!
I am what Many Dream to be but only a few can achieve, im a part of the 1%
  • #20
  • Edited 8:17am Jan 7, 2015 7:09am | Edited 8:17am
Quoting Exodus
{quote} He might mean that they changed the leverage. Dukascopy do it as a matter of policy over a weekend. They also publish that policy. Not many brokers allow hedging in the same instrument (!?) which means a trader has to hedge using a different instrument. Opening a new hedging position will eat into available margin - and a change in leverage requirement could take out the trades. Some brokers close out trades until there is sufficient margin for whatever is left. Some brokers just close all the trades. As Smikester wrote, they don't need...
Yes but IC Markets informs you when there is a leverage change by emailing you beforehand to all your registered email addresses as well as in MT4. They changed leverage on EURCHF and USDRUB and there were emails notifications on both of them. And IC Markets allow hedging on the same currency pairs for ALL of the pairs. This is why I suspect it might be a sudden change in spread that really burned this trader which could very likely happen during high volatility times and when that happens, hedging or no hedging, you are screwed.

IC Markets and my previous broker just closes enough trades to return you to their margin stop-out levels instead of all of the positions. It's crap for the trader who got stopped out but overall it protects the brokers and the rest of us traders because if the trader DOES end up in negative balances, it's all of our money that's on the line. Until they ABSOLUTELY audit the bank accounts of these brokers I will assume that they have access to all of our money now matter how they state that they are in a segregated client account separate from their operating funds. IC Markets even state in one of their legal documents that our funds are expected to cover for the shortfall of other clients and maybe exposed to possible loss. So those tight stop-out levels might not be a bad thing as long as the broker is not triggering them on purpose by artificially widening spreads and/or changing leverage for their own profit-taking.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
0 traders viewing now