Playtech Buys AvaTrade, Markets.com Fined and Plus500 Revenues Drop

During the past week, a number of the most popular stories on Finance Magnates were directly related to Teddy Sagi's expanding FX trading conglomerate. From Safecap Investments getting fined by CySEC CySEC The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) is a financial regulatory authority of Cyprus. CySEC is one of the key watchdog authorities for brokerages in Europe, whose financial regulations and operations comply with the European MiFID financial harmonization law.Founded in 2001, CySEC is instrumental in providing licensing and registration for forex brokers and previously binary options providers.CySEC is responsible for a variety of different functions, which includes the supervision The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) is a financial regulatory authority of Cyprus. CySEC is one of the key watchdog authorities for brokerages in Europe, whose financial regulations and operations comply with the European MiFID financial harmonization law.Founded in 2001, CySEC is instrumental in providing licensing and registration for forex brokers and previously binary options providers.CySEC is responsible for a variety of different functions, which includes the supervision Read this Term to Plus500's Q2 report and of course Playtech's latest acquisition, all firms involved are at least in part controlled by the online business mogul.

Other noteworthy stories included new details that came to light about the high level of scrutiny firms will have to pass in order to get an Israeli Forex Forex Foreign exchange or forex is the act of converting one nation’s currency into another nation’s currency (that possesses a different currency); for example, the converting of British Pounds into US Dollars, and vice versa. The exchange of currencies can be done over a physical counter, such as at a Bureau de Change, or over the internet via broker platforms, where currency speculation takes place, known as forex trading.The foreign exchange market, by its very nature, is the world’s largest tradi Foreign exchange or forex is the act of converting one nation’s currency into another nation’s currency (that possesses a different currency); for example, the converting of British Pounds into US Dollars, and vice versa. The exchange of currencies can be done over a physical counter, such as at a Bureau de Change, or over the internet via broker platforms, where currency speculation takes place, known as forex trading.The foreign exchange market, by its very nature, is the world’s largest tradi Read this Term license, as well as a sneak peek of a new platform claiming to revolutionize social trading.

ISA Demands

It was revealed this week that Israeli regulators have demanded from brokers to supply detailed white papers on the core technology, including specific technical material. This demand is unheard of in similar processes for obtaining licenses in other jurisdictions around the world, according to a lawyer who handles such affairs.

Material from technology providers MetaQuotes Software Corp, Inc. and Panda Trading Systems, Ltd, has already been submitted for incorporation into the relevant applications by local brokers.

Do Not Copy

On Tuesday, Finance Magnates was offered an exclusive peek into the new “Crowd Trading” platform called Trade360. The developers believe that they have found gaps in the online trading market, and social trading specifically.

One of the most interesting features of Trade360 is showcasing which positions are taken by traders worldwide, from the home country of the user, and the most profitable traders only.

Plus Pain

Additionally on Tuesday, Plus500 released its latest trading update revealing the amount of damage from the impact on the firm’s operations in the U.K. Revenues in the second quarter have decreased 47.5% quarter-on-quarter and remains lower than a year ago by about 5%.

Plus500 has also indicated that on-boarding of new customers in the U.K. is likely to resume in about three weeks time after the company hires external consultants to address compliance issues. Meanwhile, a shareholders’ vote on Playtech’s purchase of Plus500 will take place on the 16th of July.

Playtech Buys AvaTrade

On Wednesday, the forex broker AvaTrade confirmed it had reached an agreement with Teddy Sagi's Playtech on the sale of the company.

The acquisition deal was speculated at around $100 million back in May, with some estimating the revenues of AvaTrade at about $20 million for 2014. It appears that these estimations have been mostly correct with the purchase price standing at $105 million.

Record Fine for 2015

On Thursday, the Cyprus regulators (CySEC) announced that they have applied a large fine to the firm behind Markets.com, Safecap Investments, for €168,000. This is the largest such penalty applied by the financial watchdog this year.

According to CySEC, the violations were found during onsite inspections that were carried out in May 2013 and October 2014 at the firm’s offices. Its holding company, TradeFX, was also recently purchased by Playtech.