Fazzaco Weekly Digest: USGFX Rebrands；IG Enhances Fees Transparency......

Take a look at the latest happenings in this week's news digest from around the forex, fintech and crypto industry. Here are some of the top headlines from this past week.

1. Retail Broker Forex CT Fined AUD $20 Million For Misconduct

Fazzaco learned that retail OTC derivative issuer Forex Capital Trading Pty Ltd (Forex CT) was fined AUD $20 million for misconduct. In addition, Shlomo Yoshai,  CEO, responsible manager and sole director at Forex CT, was fined $400,000.

Back to the beginning of June 2020, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission(ASIC) cancelled the AFS licence of Forex CT. The firm’s license was cancelled because the agency found that its business model disregarded key obligations of an AFS licensee, resulting in unconscionable conduct, misleading and deceptive conduct and a failure to manage conflicts of interest.

2. USGFX Rebrands to United Strategic International

Fazzaco learned that the Union Standard International Group Pty Limited (USGFX) has announced its rebranding to United Strategic International Group. 

The broker currently operates three licensed entities in United Kingdom, South Africa, St. Vincent and the Grenadines. These local subsidiaries will be known as United Strategic International Limited (USG UK), United Strategic International (Pty) Ltd (USG SA), and United Strategic International LLC (USG SV) respectively.

3. PrimeXM Sees 15.18% Dip in April’s Total Trading Volume

PrimeXM, an award-winning technology provider to the global financial industry, has released its trading volumes for the month of April across the 3 major Data Center locations, revealing a dip in all trading metrics compared to March 2021.

More specifically, the company registered a total trading volume of $897.59 billion in April, indicating a 15.18% decrease compared to the previous month. 

In addition, the Average Daily Volume (ADV) for the month was $40.80 billion as compared to $46.01 billion in a month ago. Moreover, the number of trades reached 27.03 million, down by 21.79% on a MoM basis.

4. Tradeweb Sees 17.5% YoY ADV Jump in April 2021

Fazzaco learned that Tradeweb Markets, the leading fixed income, derivatives and ETF electronic trading platform, has posted its trading volumes for April, showing a solid increase year-over-year in total trading volume and average daily volume (ADV) as well. 

According to the press release, the company reported a total trading volume of $19.3 trillion in April, which is a solid increase year-over-year. For April, the ADV on the Tradeweb platform rose by 17.5 percent to $896.8 billion compared to the same period in 2020.

5. IG Group Enhances Fees Transparency for Leveraged Accounts

IG Group, a financial broker listed in London, announced that it has created a new link on the deal ticket to improve communication of charges for Leveraged accounts. This enhancement in fees transparency came as the broker was getting feedback from many traders that the fees and charges were confusing. 

The new "Learn More" link, which is directly from the deal & order tickets, opens a pop-up with information on charges from CFD commission (shares & ETFs), overnight funding and FX conversion fees.  

6. ETX Capital Receives $2.3M Fresh Capital Injection from Guru Capital

London-based ETX Capital has received, through its parent company Monecor (London) Limited, an additional fresh capital injection of £1.64 million (USD $2.3 million). The money came from the companies' new owner Guru Capital SA, a Switzerland-based fintech investor.

The Retail FX and CFDs broker was acquired by Guru Capital from UK private equity firm JRJ Group last year. Later, Guru Capital also bought ETX's EU-licensed subsidiary ETX Cyprus with CySEC's regulatory approval.

7. eToro Implements Maximum Exposure Limits to Crypto CFDs​

eToro, an Israeli social trading and multi-asset brokerage company, has released a notice about cypto CFDs.

The broker has implemented temporary maximum exposure limits for clients holding CFD crypto positions in certain countries due to what it sees as extremely high volatility in crypto markets.

eToro mentions that these measures only apply to eToro clients who hold or plan to hold CFD crypto positions. eToro’s real cryptoasset offering remains unchanged and the measures will not exert influences on clients that hold real cryptoassets.