Since launching in 2010, Australian Pepperstone has been one of the fastest growing brokers by volume. Using a model of ECN Execution , low latency, and tight spreads, the firm has been able to attract active MT4 users, primarily across the APAC region. As a result, during 2013, Pepperstone has grown its volumes near those in the Top 10 of our Forex Magnates Quarterly Non-Japan Broker Survey. During its ascent, the broker has exclusively offered the MetaTrader line of trading platforms to clients.
Marking a change, Forex Magnates has learned that Pepperstone will soon begin to offer cTrader to its customers. The news occurs as rival Australian broker, IC Markets launched the platform late last year, and has recently stated that cTrader now accounts for nearly 10% of its overall volumes.
Learning more about the offering, Forex Magnates reached out to Pepperstone Director, Owen Kerr. Explaining the rationale behind the launch, Kerr stated that “Clients are demanding a more sophisticated platform than MT4. We have an increasing segment of traders who have progressed from MT4, and look for a platform with increased functionality and stability.” He added that “As our market segment is the more sophisticated segment of retail traders -we have long had requests for a platform with more institutional style characteristics. After a long search and testing a multitude of options, we settled on cTrader.”
Owen Kerr, CEO of Pepperstone
Among reasons for choosing cTrader, as opposed to other products that they had tested, Kerr noted that the platform is development in HTML5. In addition, using cAlgo, clients can operate automated strategies without the need of a VPS. Kerr added that developing in-house was never much of an option, due to the challenges involved such as costs and time, “We are a brokerage and not a software house, so we would rather rely on Spotware and their programming talent pool.”
In terms of MetaTrader, Kerr explained that he believes that it will continue to be the firm’s “core platform” for clients, but “it is important to have an auxiliary and more sophisticated platform available for clients to actively compete in the brokerage marketplace.”
The launch is expected to take place in the next several weeks after the conclusion of integration and testing. Upon launching, Pepperstone will be among the largest brokers to offer cTrader.
