After a week of turmoil and loss of access to popular trading platforms provided by MetaQuotes, the prop firm Funding Pips announced that it has successfully completed the migration of user accounts and transaction history to a competing platform offered by Match-Trade Technologies.
From MetaTrader to Match-Trader: Funding Pips Completes Migration
Less than a week after Funding Pips announced that MetaQuotes had terminated its partnership with the prop trading firm due to serving clients from the USA without necessary regulatory approvals, the company's CEO confirmed that they have achieved a 100% migration from the existing servers and switched the service provider to Match-Trade Technologies, the creator of the Match-Trader platform.
On the official Discord channel, Khaled Ayesh, informed that "Match-Trader is 100% done, everything is migrated," and the platform is conducting additional stress tests of trading conditions and connections with liquidity providers.
Ayesh further assured that the commissions and spreads previously available through Meta Trader 4 and 5 platforms have been retained within Match-Trader and other trading conditions. Meanwhile, the Funding Pips technical team is working on implementing additional alternative platforms, including Dxtrade and Ctrader, with TradeLocker being the final goal.
"Whatever is done will be released directly, then TradeLocker, while we wait on MetaQuotes response whether we are getting our own License or not," added the CEO of Funding Pips. He emphasized that the company is currently working on obtaining cryptocurrency and futures licenses to avoid future service provision issues to clients from the USA.
The Onset of Funding Pips' Troubles
Funding Pips abruptly halted trading and stopped services for all traders on February 14th. As exclusively reported by Finance Magnates, Funding Pips sent notices to clients citing "unexpected urgent maintenance" as the reason for the shutdown.
Hello, community and friends,
— Khaled (@Khldfx) February 14, 2024
From day one, we have been completely transparent with each and every one of you. We have always adhered to our promises and commitments, unlike many others, and will continue to do so.
Today, MetaQuotes decided to abruptly halt services, due to…
The disruption of services occurred after Funding Pips' only brokerage partner, Blackbull Markets, terminated its partnership. A Blackbull representative confirmed that MetaQuotes, forced the broker to stop providing services to Funding Pips.
"We we’re unfortunately in breach of our grey label licence ability to offer this for prop firms so we’re forced to immediately shut down Funding Pips as a client and their server on our Demo environment. Note, they only ever operated on our Demo server via MT5," a Blackbull Markets representative told Finance Magnates.
This incident illustrates MetaQuotes' crackdown on prop trading firms utilizing its platforms. By compelling Blackbull Markets, which was grey-labeling its MT5 license to prop trading companies, to cut ties with Funding Pips, MetaQuotes flexed its licensing power in the sector.
While the MetaTrader platforms are widely used for leveraged forex and CFDs trading, MetaQuotes' licensing policies have been opaque and restrictive. However, grey-labeling of licenses enables brokers to offer MT4 and MT5 to companies that MetaQuotes itself would have rejected.
Metaquotes restricts access in the US.
— S. BACH | Risk Manager (@TraderBach) February 15, 2024
While certain eval. firms exclude residents of the UK, Germany, India, the Czech Republic, and Turkey.
In these uncertain times, waiting for the storm to settle is advised.
Best of luck to traders affected, hoping for fair…
US regulators heavily control leveraged trading services for retail investors, even banning CFDs. However, prop trading firms operate outside regulatory oversight.
As MetaQuotes forces brokers to cease services to prop trading platforms, competitors seize opportunities from the fallout. For example, Devexperts launched a dedicated prop trading platform solution and several other tech firms have rolled out prop trading technologies.
