The Dublin headquartered broker operating the AvaTrade brand, with several offices across Europe and Asia-Pacific, has launched a new educational website under the name Hush Trade, in an effort to provide its clients with content that it expects will help increase their profitability in trading.
In addition, a binary options offering that has been in the works is finally live, according to the PowerOption.eu website, and which we will look at more closely in the second half of this article further below, after first reviewing HushTrade.
The new trader portal offering was launched on a dedicated website under HushTrade.com and initially features two professional traders with foreign exchange and commodities trading experience, who will share their strategies and trading ideas in content created, such as short videos, articles and weekly live webinars, according to the official press release.
Commenting in the official press release, Leonard Mills, Director at AvaTrade said,“We searched the market globally to find professional traders who were not only well respected in the industry but would bring a unique perspective to financial trading based on their own successes.”
HushTrade Usage Expected to Increase Clients' Profitability
Mr. Mills concluded, “To be successful you need to think and act like a professional trader. The pros at Hush Trade will share with our clients what they do, day in and day out, to help our clients gain a level of consistent profitability.”
One of the Forex mentors, Jimmy Young, is described as a full-time Forex trader with more than 30-years trading experience, including hands-on experience with numerous investment banks across the globe, helping to build his experience as a Forex educator.
In addition, Erkut Ozer is listed on the website as a professional commodities trader specializing in energies, metals and soft commodities, and has more than 15-years trading experience, including appearances on CNBC, according to the press release from AvaTrade.
Rise of the Forex Brokers' Blogs and Portals
One recent trend that has picked up is the appeal of having a Forex blog, or dedicated site for providing traders with educational material, market analysis and news related to financial market price action. Indeed, brokers are increasingly trying to provide all the possible things that a trader might need throughout their customer-journey within the firm, when it comes to trading and the collective goal of making money.
As online brokers continually look for ways to convert prospective customers to become live trading clients, whether through paid or organic search engine marketing, face-to-face meetings, via the telephone or Skype, from IB partnerships, by hiring internal salespersons, or even acquiring entire businesses, new sales efforts can be neatly packaged in many ways.
For example, in the HushTrade.com website description, some of the content is listed as premium, but if a live account is opened that can be obtained for free, and the site makes it clear in a disclaimer that the data is for informational purposes only and not meant to be considered investment advice. In addition, the site has beginner content, in addition to the premium content offering.
Free Lunch Seminars About Sales or Education?
Forex education has been discussed from many different perspectives by industry experts and to varying degrees, however, the common point is that it's designed to provide valuable information at either a discount or premium, or even for free, with the perceived value from the customer that the information will help their trading. Regulatory organizations such as the NFA have frowned upon free-lunch seminars described as educational yet really more sales-like in nature.
Thus, any educational related offering must properly balance any sales related offerings that may exist within it, in order to keep a clear message, and to appear less gimmicky or at worst case a cause for regulatory action -if deceptive.
Indeed, even some firms that produce research through such dedicated mediums aimed to help add value to clients' trading experience are required to maintain 'Chinese Walls' or strict processes in place to prevent the sharing of information back-and-forth with a trading desk or dealing room, so that any trade recommendations are not in conflict with positions the firm may have as principal (the key here is that one side doesn't know what the other side is doing/ and vice versa).
With so many educators and market analysts, it's necessary for any competing service to really differentiate itself, unless the bare minimum offering will suffice in lieu of any prior offering in the first place. Thus, brokers continue to jump on the blog/education bandwagon, while others with existing solutions build upon theirs even more.
AvaTrade's Binary Options Offering Live Under PowerOption.eu
Following prior reports that AvaTrade has launched a binary options offering under the PowerOption brand which is a trading name of its CySEC regulated entity Ava Trade Ltd, and as per a description on the PowerOption.eu website, the site appears operational and live.
Despite the challenges that binary options have met with regards to regulation, the appeal for firms to offer these products to their clients continues to gain support. The multinational company has regulatory standings across several jurisdictions, including Japan, Ireland, British Virgin Islands, Australia and Cyprus.
The PowerOption offering is purely web-based, with no downloadable software necessary – according to the page descriptions, and features binary options trading technology powered by MarketsPulse, a 3rd party platform developer that serves a wide number of binary options brokers.
The web-based platform offering includes a range of FX pairs, commodities, stock indices and equities, according to product description, and provides a full range of Forex pairs, commodities, stock indices and equities, and a variety of trading styles, including high/low, one-touch, 60-second, range, and options on demand style binary options.
Binary Options Progress and Related
The binary options industry has also had considerable success with regards to gaining regulatory support, such as its acceptance in Japan last year and in the US where it can be trading on certain regulated exchanges. Meanwhile, debates over whether it’s closer to investing as opposed to a game or gambling, continue.
However, Alpari UK’s recent announcement citing regulatory reasons for its withdrawal of its binary options offering, depicts the challenges still facing this product segment, although the firm is apparently rescinding its decision. On the other spectrum, numerous unregulated binary options brokers have been warned about by regulators across the world in recent months, including Canada, France and Luxembourg.
Meanwhile, the convergence of asset classes as part of broker’s offerings and multi-asset platforms, may continue to draw products together – along with new things like crypto- currencies, that could lead to a more standardized approach to both the offerings and authorities regulating them.
Recent withdrawal problems at Mt. Gox escalated today when the Bitcoin Exchange operator updated that it was also having security related problems. Forex Magnates recently interviewed its CEO following the development.
Speaking of digital currencies, AvaTrade was one of the first few to launch Bitcoin trading, as covered by Forex Magnates last August.
