TickMill vs ICMarkets: choosing a ForEx broker

Choosing a broker platform for a ForEx trader is now quite tricky: you have to navigate yourself through a lot of scammers and unreliable providers. Let us take a look at the two extremely popular ForEx brokers: TickMill and IC Markets. We'll discuss in detail each of the two platforms and provide a comparison.

TickMill

The TickMill broker is owned by Tickmill Ltd. It is not known exactly when it started operating. Presumably in 2014. It is headquartered in the Seychelles at F28-F29 Eden Plaza, Eden Island, Mahe. The regulator is the FSA SC. It is this organisation which has issued it with a securities dealer's licence.

What else a TickMill customer needs to know

This broker has two divisions:

• Tickmill UK Ltd. Regulated by the British FCA. Has membership of the FSCS, a compensation fund that deals with UK clients.
• Tickmill Europe Ltd. Regulated by CySEC - Cyprus Securities Commission. Is a member of the ICF, a compensation fund that works with clients from Europe.

Problems with Tickmill

The most common reason for withdrawals being declined is a failed identity verification. SMARTGUIDE recommends doing this immediately after registration (before making a deposit). Otherwise, you risk losing money. you can't take them back.

Tickmill pays more attention to customer verification. After successful verification, some people may need to verify their identity again. This leads to a lot of complaints, but the broker is solid.

Commercial terms

The minimum deposit amount is $100. Spreads vary by account type and are always fluctuating. That means you can expand before big news or weekends. They warn about this in their terms and conditions description.

Leverage

It reaches 1-500 in currency pairs. For all other instruments it holds from 1 to 100.

All Tickmill accounts are protected against negative balances. In other words, the trade ends before the loss exceeds the account balance. With a leverage of 1 in 500, it doesn't take long to see results like this.

Minimum transaction size

0.01 lot. Although the broker promises NDD on all accounts, it is doubtful whether orders are sent to real liquidity providers. May be merged to move.

IC markets

IC Markets (ICM) is a broker that provides direct access to ECN markets, with liquidity from over 50 companies and banking institutions. The firm's clients are high-volume traders, scalpers, and amateurs who trade with advisors.

Let's explore the favorable terms offered by the broker. This material is intended to help the trader decide whether to choose her icmarkets.com as her trading broker or to continue searching.

In 2007, a group of professional financiers in Sydney, Australia, sought to reach both retail and commercial clients by creating a new brokerage offering everyone access to high liquidity, tight spreads, and fast execution. Decided to reduce the disparity in terms of trade between customers.

The official website www.icmarkets.com is available to users in 16 languages:

• English;
• Chinese;
• Thai;
• Bulgarian;
• Russian;
• Arabic;
• Vietnamese;
• Korean;
• Malaysian;
• Indonesian.
• French;
• Spanish;
• German;
• Portuguese;
• Italian;
• Croatian.

Reliability and regulation

The broker operates under an Australian Financial Services License (AFSL). The registration number is 123289109. This broker is regulated by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). License number is 335692.

Customer accounts are segregated from the company's operating accounts at Westpac, a major Australian bank, National Australa Bank (NAB). Funds in these accounts are held for trading purposes only. Your account is insured against loss by Lloys'of London.

Demo account

The IC Markets demo account provides a great opportunity to practice Forex trading without risking your own money.To open a demo account you must complete a registration form. All data must be entered in Latin characters.

Especially if you have a demo account with this broker, you can open a second account by entering a new email address in the application. trading platform
The broker offers clients who open standard and raw spread accounts a wide range of instruments and a convenient interface to work with the most popular and functional MetaTrader platforms (MT4 and MT5). You can download a desktop version of Terminal and software for iPhone, iPad, Android, Mac, and Windows. If you don't want to download the trading platform, web versions of MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 are available on the IC Markets website.

What is FOREX and why is it sometimes dangerous to trade in it?

When someone says the phrase "FOREX exchange", experienced traders immediately understand that this person is poorly versed in exchange trading. The fact is that stock exchanges are platforms for trading certain assets. There are stock exchanges like the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange), LSE (London Stock Exchange); commodities exchanges like the LME (London Metal Exchange); as well as universal exchanges, on which a whole range of markets are traded, for example . As for FOREX (Foreign Exchange, literally "foreign exchange"), it is not an exchange, but an international inter-bank currency market. It is also incorrect to call it a stock market, because stocks, bonds, investment fund units and depositary receipts are all traded on the stock market.

What is the FOREX market

FOREX is an international marketplace where banks buy and sell currencies of interest at free exchange rates. In addition to banks, participants of such trades can only be very large companies, which need to make conversion transactions in order to conduct their business. The minimum lot for currency transactions is several million dollars, and access to trading itself costs a lot of money. Thus, it is at least inexpedient for individuals to make transactions on FOREX. 

The first reason for the birth of FOREX was the abolition of the gold standard and the Bretton Woods currency system, according to the rules of which only one currency, the US dollar, was secured by gold, while all the other participants of the system secured their currencies by dollars. The gold standard was abolished in 1971 by decree of US President Richard Nixon. 

The abolished gold standard was replaced by the Smithsonian Agreement, which provided for wider currency fluctuations, from 1 to 9 percent. But not everyone was happy with this ruling, and in 1971 Jamaica adopted a new agreement that allowed for an even wider range of currency fluctuations, but with a fixed peg to gold. 

This innovation, too, did not satisfy everyone, and in 1975 another meeting, hosted by German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and French President Valérie Giscard d'Estaing, was devoted to the problem. The US, Great Britain, Japan and Italy took part, and a year later Canada joined the discussion. On the recommendations of the G7, the IMF adopted a series of amendments to its charter in 1978. From this moment on, the member countries of the new monetary system freed their currencies from pegging to both gold and the U.S. dollar, operating at a free exchange rate. This was the beginning of the history of FOREX currency exchange market.