FXCM's August 2011 Monthly Metrics - Crazy August means volumes are up!

As we already know August was one crazy (volatile) month. This means two things - brokers will report volumes higher than the average and many traders will have lost money. We'll see this reflected both in the public brokers' data, such as FXCM below, and in this quarter's profitability report (due in October). Not surprisingly FXCM shows a very strong growth in volumes, especially institutional ones, amid slow growth in number of accounts.

FXCM Inc. (NYSE: FXCM) today announced certain key operating metrics for August 2011 for its retail and institutional foreign Exchange Exchange An exchange is known as a marketplace that supports the trading of derivatives, commodities, securities, and other financial instruments.Generally, an exchange is accessible through a digital platform or sometimes at a tangible address where investors organize to perform trading. Among the chief responsibilities of an exchange would be to uphold honest and fair-trading practices. These are instrumental in making sure that the distribution of supported security rates on that exchange are effectiv An exchange is known as a marketplace that supports the trading of derivatives, commodities, securities, and other financial instruments.Generally, an exchange is accessible through a digital platform or sometimes at a tangible address where investors organize to perform trading. Among the chief responsibilities of an exchange would be to uphold honest and fair-trading practices. These are instrumental in making sure that the distribution of supported security rates on that exchange are effectiv Read this Term business. Monthly activities included:

Retail Trading Metrics

• Retail customer trading volume(1) of $363 billion in August 2011, 17% higher than July 2011 and 36% higher than August 2010.
• Average retail customer trading volume(1) per day of $15.8 billion in August 2011, 7% higher than July 2011 and 30% higher than August 2010.
• An average of 462,353 retail client trades per day in August 2011, 26% higher than July 2011 and 51% higher than August 2010.
• Tradeable accounts(2) of 174,944 as of August 31, 2011, an increase of 638, or 0.4% from July 2011, and an increase of 2,175,or 1%, from August 2010. The increase excludes 3,118 accounts that are no longer considered Tradeable due to new Leverage Leverage In financial trading, leverage is a loan supplied by a broker, which facilitates a trader in being able to control a relatively large amount of money with a significantly lesser initial investment. Leverage therefore allows traders to make a much greater return on investment compared to trading without any leverage. Traders seek to make a profit from movements in financial markets, such as stocks and currencies.Trading without any leverage would greatly diminish the potential rewards, so traders In financial trading, leverage is a loan supplied by a broker, which facilitates a trader in being able to control a relatively large amount of money with a significantly lesser initial investment. Leverage therefore allows traders to make a much greater return on investment compared to trading without any leverage. Traders seek to make a profit from movements in financial markets, such as stocks and currencies.Trading without any leverage would greatly diminish the potential rewards, so traders Read this Term requirements in Japan that went into effect in August 2011.

Institutional Trading Metrics

• Institutional customer trading volume(1) of $120 billion in August 2011, 100% higher than July 2011 and 96% higher than August 2010.
• Average institutional trading volume(1) per day of $5.2 billion in August 2011, 86% higher than July 2011 and 86% higher than August 2010.
• An average of 8,388 institutional client trades per day in August 2011, 34% higher than July 2011 and 136% higher than August 2010.

1. Volume that FXCM customers traded in period translated into US dollars.
2. An account that has sufficient funds to place a trade in accordance with FXCM trading policies.

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