Do not invest more money than you can afford to lose.
US forex giant Forex Capital Markets (NASDAQ:FXCM) reported on Tuesday its preliminary retail and institutional trading volumes both dropped by a double digit in the third quarter of 2016, compared to the same period a year earlier. Retail volume was down by an annual 10% to $875 billion and institutional volume declined 27% on the year to $96 billion.
Compared to August, last quarter’s volumes from institutional trading services decreased by 47%, while retail trading operations posted a 4% increase in volume. The broker noted that 38% of the retail volume for the July-September period was from indirect sources.
In September alone, trading volumes increased by double digits from the previous month, when FXCM posted very low values.
Retail volume posted a 20% monthly growth to $324 billion in September, reaching close to the strongest levels for 2016 reported in the beginning of the year. The figure, however, represents a slight annual increase of 0.6%. The average daily trading volume from retail clients stood at $14.7 billion in September, which is up by 26% from August and by 0.7% over the year.
In the institutional segment, the September volume grew 12% from August (when the value hit all-time low) to $29 billion, posting an annual increase of 38%. The daily average was also up by a double digit both over the year and on the month, reaching $1.3 billion in September.
FXCM handled in September on average 563,001 retail client trades and 41,397 institutional client trades per day.
Retail active client accounts totaled 177,818 in September, slightly up from the previous month and down on the year. Meanwhile, tradable accounts, or such with enough funds in them to place a trade, were 155,067, which represents a slight decrease of 3% from a year earlier and a drop of 11% month-on-month. No such information was provided for institutional clients.
In comparison, Gain Capital, another one of US’ leading forex brokers, also saw its September trading volumes recover from August. It saw its retail operations post a monthly increase of 8.3% to $207.8 billion, while institutional volume via electronic communication network (ECN) increased by 24.1% on the month to $186.3 billion.
FXCM is a registered futures Commission Merchant (FCM) and Retail Foreign Exchange Dealer (RFED) with the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). It has units registered and regulated with the relevant authorities in the US, the UK, Australia, and France. The broker offers forex, contracts for difference (CFDs), and spread betting services.
The FXCM Group is 50.1% majority owned by FXCM Inc. The rest of the group is owned by lender Leucadia National Corporation.
