Brokers that are doing badly

[Sig]

Hi everyone,

As traders, we take lots of risk with our own capital. That is normal. But what shouldn't be normal is having to deal with a business infested with crooks, hypocrites and deceitful liars.

My trading career has been marked by these experiences (amongst others):

1) RefcoFX (USA): Apparently, at the time, this was the biggest, safest broker on the block. The crook at the helm of the firm, Phillip Bennet (British educated in Cambridge University), was hiding $430 millions in bad debts, hid behind the USA bankruptcy (crook protection) laws, and more than 200,000 creditors (including myself) lost their trading account with all the money inside it.

2) MtGox (Japan): Was the world leading bitcoin exchange. Mark Karpeles (French educated in Paris) was spending MtGox customer's money on prostitutes instead of fixing the security holes of his firm. Result: MtGox went bankrupt, and all the creditors (including myself) are still waiting for their money.

3) AvaTrade (Ireland): It is not bankrupt, but recently, just like Cassini crashing into Saturn, it suddenly went silent, customer support not answering phone neither email, and creditors (including myself) are waiting....

My question: Any safe, reliable, honest, virtuous broker around? I can say good things about Oanda, having done business with them for almost 10 years. But will it last? I want good execution. I want to be able to withdraw and deposit my money without problems. I want small slippage. I want to deal with honest people, not crooks that steal my money and go hide behind their local bankruptcy laws.

I'm just curious what relevance the country in which a firm's CEO was educated in has to do with anything? Perhaps you're focusing on the wrong evaluation metrics!

 

[Visaria]

He's looking for a pattern. Current findings are to avoid any firms with CEOs educated either in the UK or in France.

 

[helpme_please]

On hindsight, what were the warning signs that you could have heeded before these brokers went bankrupt?

One thing I can think of is when the share price crashes if the brokers are listed. If they start dropping >10% each day for consecutive days, time to take some money out.

Hi everyone,

As traders, we take lots of risk with our own capital. That is normal. But what shouldn't be normal is having to deal with a business infested with crooks, hypocrites and deceitful liars.

My trading career has been marked by these experiences (amongst others):

1) RefcoFX (USA): Apparently, at the time, this was the biggest, safest broker on the block. The crook at the helm of the firm, Phillip Bennet (British educated in Cambridge University), was hiding $430 millions in bad debts, hid behind the USA bankruptcy (crook protection) laws, and more than 200,000 creditors (including myself) lost their trading account with all the money inside it.

2) MtGox (Japan): Was the world leading bitcoin exchange. Mark Karpeles (French educated in Paris) was spending MtGox customer's money on prostitutes instead of fixing the security holes of his firm. Result: MtGox went bankrupt, and all the creditors (including myself) are still waiting for their money.

3) AvaTrade (Ireland): It is not bankrupt, but recently, just like Cassini crashing into Saturn, it suddenly went silent, customer support not answering phone neither email, and creditors (including myself) are waiting....

My question: Any safe, reliable, honest, virtuous broker around? I can say good things about Oanda, having done business with them for almost 10 years. But will it last? I want good execution. I want to be able to withdraw and deposit my money without problems. I want small slippage. I want to deal with honest people, not crooks that steal my money and go hide behind their local bankruptcy laws.

 

[mlawson71]

I had no idea that Avatrade were doing badly. Since when has this been happening?

 

[Neuroway]

I'm just curious what relevance the country in which a firm's CEO was educated in has to do with anything? Perhaps you're focusing on the wrong evaluation metrics!

I'm just curious why do you assume I'm focused on the country the CEOs of these firms were educated? I just mentionned it, and it is as relevant as their names, their wealth or their age. Well, perhaps I struck an irrational, emotional chord there!

 

[Neuroway]

He's looking for a pattern. Current findings are to avoid any firms with CEOs educated either in the UK or in France.

I'm just curious why do you assume I'm looking for a pattern?

 

[Neuroway]

I had no idea that Avatrade were doing badly. Since when has this been happening?

Seems it has gotten worse, ultimately, as per the comments I see on forexpeacearmy.com.

 

[Visaria]

I'm just curious why do you assume I'm focused on the country the CEOs of these firms were educated? I just mentionned it, and it is as relevant as their names, their wealth or their age. Well, perhaps I struck an irrational, emotional chord there!

You didn't mention their wealth or age. You did however mention their country of education, which to be frank, is a little odd and therefore it was picked up by Sig.

 

[tommcginnis]

I'm just curious what relevance the country in which a firm's CEO was educated in has to do with anything? Perhaps you're focusing on the wrong evaluation metrics!

As far as bona fides go, I'd much rather know where/from whom someone was degreed than their age or citizenship. Age is accidental; citizenship is mostly accidental; education is a choice and so something I'd want to know.

 

[Neuroway]

Hmm... That's probably because I work with educated people most of the time. For them, their country of education is more important than their country of citizenship or their birthplace. If you talk to your local farmer, bus driver, police officer or shopkeeper though, he's gonna ask you where you're from, not where you were educated.