The CFTC has posted financials for FCMs as of the end of May. For the month, total Retail Forex Funds totaled $644,593,164, a drop of $3,166,759 (-0.49%) from the end of April. The decline was mainly the result of a near $9 million drop at Oanda, which resulted in a 6% contraction of Retail Forex Funds. Elsewhere, ILQ, client funds grew 9% from $12 to $13.1 million. In other individual names, US customer holdings at Alpari continued to fall, marking the third month in a row, while Knight Capital reported the largest percentage change, as Retail Forex Funds rose 13.6%.
Also being reported along with the financials was the exclusion of Advanced Markets, which withdrew its licenses recently from the US as new capital requirement rules were set to go into effect (see story).
A new name that was listed among the report, was Whotrades FX, which was granted an FCM license and admitted as an NFA Forex Firm member on May 23rd. Unlike forex brokers, Whotrades FX isn’t a Forex Dealer Member (FDM), and as such isn’t included in the figures below as it doesn’t hold Retail Forex Funds, but acts as an agent to other firms. Whotrades FX is the FX arm of a new social trading initiative called Whotrades. Whotrades offers multi-asset trading through partnerships with various brokers, as well as holding a CySEC license. The firm is tied with Russian brokerage firm Finam, and the Cypriot subsidiary was renamed from Finam Inc to Whotrades in 2011. Finam's FX unit, Finamfx.ru, operates under the Whotrades CySec regulation.
In regards to Whotrades FX, the Finam Founder and Chairman of the Board, Victor Remsha is listed as an owner of Whotrades FX. In the US, Whotrades Inc is a registered Broker-Dealer with FINRA and the SEC, with accounts held by Vision Financial Markets according to the firm’s end of 2012 filings.
