Do not invest more money than you can afford to lose.
Japan’s forex and binary options markets increased in September 2016, after hitting in August the lowest trading volumes since the beginning of the year, according to the data published on Monday by the Financial Futures Association of Japan (FFAJ). The figures are still very low, compared to the rest of the months.
The combined trading volume of brokers offering over-the-counter (OTC) forex in Japan went up by a monthly 12.4% to JPY 352.5 trillion last month, while volumes form on-exchange forex trading jumped by 25.9% on the month to JPY 3.2 trillion. However, when compared to a year earlier, September OTC volumes fell by 35.7% and on-exchange ones dropped 32.8%.
In the binary options segment, trading volumes increased by 7.4% month-on-month to JPY 37.84 billion in September. Year-on-year, the figure represents a drop of 17.7%.
Since the beginning of the year, the trading volumes of forex brokers in Japan have been bouncing up and down, while those of binary options brokers have been continuously on the decline. Brokers started the year strong, but lost momentum over the course of the year. In comparison, the trading volumes in January of forex brokers amounted to JPY 532.3 trillion from OTC contracts and JPY 4.8 trillion from exchange-traded forex, and binary options volumes were JPY 62.1 billion the first month of the year.
Forex | Binary Options | ||||||
Trading volume | Number of brokers | Trading volume | Accounts | Number of brokers | |||
Over-The-Counter | On-Exchange | Existing | Active | ||||
Jan | 532.32 trl | 4.76 trl | 53 | 62.06 bn | 337,932 | 13,703 | 8 |
Feb | 593.97 trl | 4.85 trl | 53 | 51.65 bn | 339,997 | 13,656 | 8 |
Mar | 439.89 trl | 3.72trl | 53 | 40.35 bn | 341,946 | 12,786 | 8 |
Apr | 416.41 trl | 3.17trl | 52 | 36.48 bn | 343,455 | 12,225 | 8 |
May | 365.99 trl | 3.14trl | 52 | 30.40 bn | 344,396 | 11,880 | 7 |
June | 429.31 trl | 4.73trl | 52 | 41.04 bn | 346,292 | 12,676 | 7 |
July | 454.35 trl | 3.40trl | 52 | 44.59 bn | 348,508 | 11,873 | 7 |
Aug | 313.53 trl | 2.52trl | 53 | 35.15 bn | 350,123 | 11,194 | 7 |
Sept | 352.46 trl | 3.18 trl | 53 | 37.84 bn | 352,151 | 11,905 | 7 |
September volumes of trading in the USD/JPY, the most traded currency pair in Japan, also increased from the previous month by 13.3% to JPY 336.1 trillion from forex operations and by 2.5% to JPY 17.8 billion from binary options on the pair.
Meanwhile, Monex Group and GMO Click, two of the leading brokers in Japan, both reported improved trading metrics for the month of September after a significant slump in August.
