AvaTrade

4
Global Forex & CFD broker founded in 2006. AvaTrade is regulated by several financial authorities, such as the Central Bank of Ireland.
Trading Platform:
MT4/5,
Max Leverage:
1:400
Instruments:
Forex, Crypto, Stock CFD, Indices CFD, Commodities CFD
Regulation:
CBI, ASIC, FSCA, FSA, BVI
Min. deposit:
$100
Open an account Read full review

Summary

Forex and CFDs on Stocks, Cryptocurrencies, Indexes & ETFs are the core of AvaTrade’s business. 

Regulated by multiple high profile jurisdictions, Central Bank of Ireland (No.C53877), Australia ASIC (No.406684), Japan FSA (No.1662) and the FFAJ (No.1574), B.V.I. Financial Services Commission, South African Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA No.45984), Abu Dhabi Global Markets (ADGM) Financial Regulatory Services Authority (FRSA) (No.190018).

AvaTrade signifies accountability in providing regulated access to financial markets.

⚠ Risk Warning: CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 71% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Overall

Pros
  • Prompt Account Opening & D/W
  • Wide Range of CFD markets
  • Automated Trading
Cons
  • Stock, Index, Crypto, Commodities trading Limited to CFDs

Fees

Pros
  • Low non-trading fees
  • No withdrawal fee for payment systems and low for wires above €300
Cons
  • Average trading fees
  • Inactivity fee

Trading Instruments

Pros
  • Forex
  • CFDs on Stocks, Indices, Crypto, Commodities
  • Options
  • Cryptos
  • Futures
  • CFD
Cons
  • No Availability of Futures, Bonds
  • Stock & ETF limited to CFDs

Account Opening

Pros
  • Fast On-boarding (fully digital)
  • Customer-friendly
Cons
  • Sometimes over the border sales & default email notifications
  • Not intuitive MAM onboarding

Deposit & Withdrawal

Pros
  • Quick D/W
  • Credit/Debit Card Supported
  • Low Wire Fees
Cons
  • High electronic wallet fees

Platform & Trading

Pros
  • Stable platform
  • Rich pool of third party EAs and Indicators
Cons
  • Takes time to master

Customer Service

Pros
  • Phone Support
  • Live Chart
  • Professional & Relevant
Cons
  • No weekend support

Research & Education

Pros
  • Demo Trading
  • Tutorials, Strategies & Handouts
  • Basic Analytical Tools
Cons
  • Not enough Fundamental Data

Regulation & Safety

Pros
  • Central Bank of Ireland
  • ASIC
  • FSA
  • FFAJ
  • FSCA
  • ADGM Financial FRSA
Cons
  • No US License
  • Not Public

Full Review

👍 We recommend AvaTrade for short term CFD on Stocks & ETFs and Indices, as well as forex reading (automated, manual).

Fees

Ok trading fees and no non-trading fees on Forex, within which fees on CFDs are more expensive.

Let’s first go through the fess terminology:

  • Trading Fees occur when you trade (spreads, commissions, financing rates, and conversions)
  • Financing or overnight rates are charged when you hold your leveraged positions for more than 24 hours. Leveraged position means that you borrow money from the broker to trade.
  • Non-trading fees are withdrawal fees, inactivity fees, or hidden fees. 

To put things in a proper context, we compare AvaTrade with the competing services, based on product offering, fee structure, and customer profile.

Non-trading fees

AvaTrade XM Axi
Account fee No No No
Inactivity fee $50 after 3 months of inactivity, $100 after 1 year No No
Withdrawal fee $0* above $300 only for bankwire, always free for e-wallet or credit card $0 $0

Except for a slight difference depending on your country, non-trading fees are low to non-existent. You won’t be charged for inactivity, as well as a deposit of over €100.

Trading Fees

Raw account holders would have to pay both commissions and spreads, whereas Fixed & Classic traders are limited to just spreads.

Comparing trading fees among CFD brokers may get convoluted pretty quickly, for the purpose of making things more straightforward, we’ve decided to showcase all fees for trading the most common set of products using a Raw account. The leverage we used is:

  • 5:1 for stock CFDs
  • 30:1 for forex
  • 20:1 for stock index CFDs

We define a typical trade as a €2,000 and €200,000 buy position for stock & forex respectively, held and sold after 7 days.  

The commissions are calculated for the RAW account.  

The benchmark fee takes into account commissions, spreads and financing costs. Below is the result for AvaTrade.

Forex Fees

Forex Fees are low in comparison to XM & AxiTrader. 

  AvaTrade XM AxiTrader
EUR/USD benchmark fee 16 spread, 0 swap  17.1  13.8
GBP/USD  benchmark fee 29 spread, 21 swap  13.8  –
AUD/USD benchmark fee

20 spread,

8 swap

13.9 9.5
EUR/GBP benchmark fee

34 spread,

15 swap

12.2 11.0

Stock & Index CFD fees

Stock & Index CFD are similar to XM & AxiTrader. 

  AvaTrade XM AxiTrader
Apple CFD benchmark fee 4 spread,
2 swap
 3.4  –
Vodafone CFD benchmark fee 6 spread,
2 swap
 5.6  –
S&P 500 CFD Benchmark 0.46 spread,
1 swap
2.4 1.7
Europe 50 CFD Benchmark 1 spread,
1 swap
2.4 1.2

Finance Rates

These fees occur when you decide to hold your position. The longer you stay in CFD or FOREX trade, the more fees will accumulate, making the final amount rather hefty.

Trading Instruments

Focused on CFDs & Forex AvaTrade will only let you trade CFDs on Stocks & ETFs, Commodities, Crypto and Indexes.

Markets & Products General

AvaTrade XM Axi
Stock - - -
ETF - - -
Forex 65 48 34
Fund - - -
Bond - - -
Options - - -
Futures - - -
Cfd About 700 Stock CFD's on MT5 + 57 other CFD's 122 51
Crypto - 5 3

Stocks & ETFs

At the time of the review, AvaTrade hasn’t offered any stock and ETFs directly. They did offer CFDs on stocks & ETFs – see below.

CFDs, Forex & Crypto

⚠ Keep in mind, that CFDs are complex instruments and are usually traded with leverage, which significantly increases the chances of losing money. At the time of the review, 76% of retail investor accounts were losing money when trading CFDs with this provider. It’s your responsibility to understand the inner workings of CFD instruments and understand the underlying risks. 

AvaTrade offers an ok amount of CFDs, most of the traders will find the most popular instruments around here.

Account Opening

Despite salespeople trying too hard sometimes, the account should be ready within the same day – without complicated procedures involved.

Account Eligibility

You are fine as long as you don’t currently reside in the following countries:

  • USA 
  • Pakistan
  • North-Korea
  • Afghanistan
  • Libya
  • Iran
  • Iraq
  • Syria

AvaTrade Min Depo

The minimum deposit is £100/ €100/$100.

Contact your local sales team for more info. 

Account Types 

There aren’t account types in AvaTrade.

How to open an account at AvaTrade

The account opening is very straightforward and mild when it comes to identity verification and money operations. 

You’d need to: 

  •   Fill in your personal data
  •   Answer questions about your trading experience
  •   Verify identity (you need to supply both document ID and proof of residence)

Deposit & Withdrawal

Available via several options, the deposit & withdrawal (d/w) process is quick and inexpensive (except for digital wallets).

With an exception of electronic wallets (≈ 2% of the amount), the fees are free. Among the popular transfer options are: 

  • Bank transfer
  • Credit/Debit card
  • Skrill
  • Neteller
  • Webmoney

Deposit options

AvaTrade XM Axi
Bank transfer Yes Yes Yes
Credit/Debit card Yes Yes Yes
Electronic wallets Yes Yes Yes

You can only d/w from entities on your name. The debit/credit card and digital wallet deposits arrive instantly, whereas wire transfers might take up to 3 business days. 

There are no withdrawal fees after $300, while the funds can only be requested via a wire transfer.

Withdrawal fees and options

AvaTrade XM Axi
Bank Transfer Yes Yes Yes
Credit/Debit card Yes Yes Yes
Electronic wallets Yes Yes Yes
Withdrawal fee $0 $0 $0

Platform & Trading Experience

AvaTrade  offers a basic version of MetaTrader (4/5) and comes without a native macOS support (no Catalina), as well as proprietary desktop and mobile platforms and a Webtrader

MetaTrader is the most popular forex and CFD platform, available in multiple languages and supported by the largest FX community. 

Unfortunately, the platform is also quite dated and unlike with competitors, lacks any changes to the UX/UI.

User Experience & Functionality

The website and back-office offer a comfortable browsing experience at the first glance. Most of the information is easy to find and comprehend. 

Despite a somewhat outdated MetaTrader 4 experience, the platform will be familiar to non-novice traders. Traders looking for a simplified interface may find the web version of the platform more to the point. 

Unfortunately, unlike other trusted brokers on the website, AvaTrade’s MetaTrader experience doesn’t pack any added value features or the support of macOS. 

Therefore, you will be limited to the following order types:

  • Market Buy/Sell
  • Pending Buy/Sell

Alerts and Notifications

MetaTrader allows you to configure the following notification:

  • Margin Call
  • Deposits & Withdrawals
  • Orders

AvaOptions Platform

The platform is designed to provide access to Options on Forex. Sporting a refreshed interface the platform boost an ample of built-in tools & indicators, pulling its weight to offer speedy market access. 

Should you be coming to FX just now, the platform should be easy to grasp and build up your technical arsenal. 

Mobile Trading

Trading from iOS & Android is handled by MT4/5 mobile as well as a dedicated solution. Most of the desktop counterpart order types are also available on mobile, leaving the decision of where to execute the trades to you. 

Customer Service

Although AvaTrade is less impressive over email, you will always find help via phone or live chat. Make sure to time your queries during the traditional 24/5 hours.

Available in many languages, the AvaTrades support is available to you 24/5, over the phone, live chat, and by email.

The random cheek of AvaTrade’s CySec support chat via phone and live chat, left us satisfied in terms of response time, quality of answers and general tone of communication.

A minor red flag on the quality of support showed up when the account manager hasn’t clarified the difference between CFD and Actual stocks. Keep in mind, that the quality of customer service may vary depending on each local branch.

Research & Education

Research and education are well structured, easy to comprehend, and useful for any novice and intermediate traders.

AvaTrade’s trading education offers a clear-cut path to important trading principles and can be sorted by meid types – ranging from beginners courses and generic MT4 videos to trading strategies and trading tools overviews.

Each lesson is followed by relevant quizzes and offers an opportunity to leave feedback and ask questions.

Via AvaTrade’s market research workshops you can prepare for the week ahead, as well as to learn about the larger trends. 

People looking for live education will find plenty of information from experienced coaches via workshops. Furthermore, AvaTrade organises free offline events and meetups in some regions.

Charting

Charting tools are quite robust, packing over 20 indicators. Surprisingly, you won’t be able to save the chart settings for later.

Fundamental Reports

You won’t find much besides an economic calendar – which, to AvaTrade’s credit, provides easy access to a comprehensive amount of reviews.

Other Research Tools

AvaTrade’s research tools are limited to the following types 

  • Trading calculator
  • Web-based news feed
  • Economic calendar 

All perform basic functions and will come in handy as a point of reference. For a more comprehensive analysis, you might want to look at other brokers or service providers. 

News Feed

Traders looking to stay on top of the latest news will find a basic feed, with a list of top news according to the AvaTrade staff of editors. 

Safety

You should be safe with AvaTrade, as it’s regulated by 6 authorities around the world.

AvaTrade legal entities & background

Established in 2006, currently, AvaTrade operates under the following legal entities: 

  • AVA Trade EU Ltd
  • AVA Trade Ltd
  • Ava Capital Markets Australia Pty Ltd
  • Ava Capital Markets Pty
  • Ava Trade Japan K.K.
  • Ava Trade Middle East Ltd

To make sure your branch offers a required level of protection contact the local client service.

AvaTrade legal entities
Client country Investor protection amount Regulator Legal entity
United Kingdom Not provided Bank of Ireland AvaTrade EU Ltd
European Union Clients Depends on ICCL Investor Compensation Company Ltd Bank of Ireland AvaTrade EU Ltd
Clients outside of Europe Not provided B.V.I. FSC AvaTrade Ltd
Dubai Not provided Abu Dhabi Global Market AvaTrade Middle East Ltd

In a nutshell

Despite its limitation in product offering and sometimes-pushy sales team, AvaTrade manages to offer competitive services. Although the main instruments are limited mainly to FX & CFDs, there are also stocks & ETFs for those that live in the E.U. (except for Hungary & UK).

Its abundance of Forex & CFD instruments, research tools, well-executed web/mobile platforms & low deposit/withdrawal fees make Avatrade a good solution for manual and automated FX & CFD trading.

AvaTrade Brief Overview

🏛 Country of regulation EU, Japan, Australia, BVI, South Africa and Abu Dhabi
💸 Trading fees class Average
💸 Inactivity fee charged Yes
💸 Withdrawal fee amount $0* after $300
💸 Minimum deposit $100
⏰ Time to open an account 1 day
💳 Deposit with credit card Available
👛 Depositing with electronic wallet Available
💱 Number of base currencies supported 4
🎮 Demo account provided Yes
📊 Products offered Forex, CFDs on Crypto, Stock and ETF and Commodities

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