The securities investment arm of one of the biggest banks in Turkey, Akbank, has announced that it will begin offering Metaquotes’ MetaTrader 4 platform to its customers.
The brokerage powerhouse Ak Investment, which is one of the biggest in the country, will begin providing a foreign exchange trading service for retail investors. Aiming at the broadest possible network of forex traders, the company will be using as front-end the most popular retail FX Trading Platform in the world starting today.
Ak Investment has already launched a multi-asset trading platform which was developed with the assistance of PFSOFT a couple of years ago. Despite having a platform branded as TradeAll, the broker is looking to compete with companies which are already offering MetaTrader 4 in the country.
Commenting on the announcement, the CEO of Ak Investment, Mert Erdoğmuş, said, “As Ak Investment, we are proud to introduce MetaTrader 4, the world’s most preferred FX trading platform, under the trademark TradeAll.”
“We are confident that we will contribute to expand the volume of the Turkish FX market with the enhanced technology of MetaTrader 4 and our extensive distribution channels and client base,” he explained.
MetaQuotes Grows in Turkey
This marks the second big launch by MetaQuotes in Turkey this month, after a couple of weeks ago the local stock exchange Borsa Istanbul announced the addition of MetaTrader 5 to its list of platforms.
The CEO of MetaTürk Software, Mehmet Yıldız, commented on the deal, “Our cooperation with Ak Investment signifies a milestone for our company and Turkish traders, and we are looking forward to further expansion and development.”
The addition of forex trading through MT4 reveals a bigger push by a bank-backed brokerage into the world of retail forex trading. In a country where foreign exchange rates have been far from stable for years, the appeal of trading FX has picked up with volatility.
Rapidly Fluctuating Turkish Lira
The Turkish lira has been widely affected by the local central bank’s policy. Commenting on inflation and currency trends, the foreign exchange Analytics team from Barclays stated in a recent note, “We expect inflation to accelerate in September as a result of the inflationary impetus from currency weakness.”
“While the inflation profile looked favorable in Q3, recent depreciation in the Turkish lira and food price pressures have changed the outlook. We think risks to the inflation outlook are still skewed to the upside: the volatile nature of food prices warrants caution, and the risk of further currency depreciation is non-negligible.”
With volatile inflationary trends persisting, investing in trading the foreign exchange market should remain an appealing idea to local retail investors.
