I have had FXCM's UK rate card open since the transfer timetable went up, and I am reading the PDF rather than a retelling of it. The document is Stratos Markets Limited's, dated 25 June 2026, pulled this morning from FXCM's own docs host. On a sterling account, Active Trader Tier 1 is £2.00 a side for each £100,000 of notional. The dollar column of the same tier is $2.50 a side, which is $5.00 if the ticket is opened and then closed. Standard CFD commission on that card is nil. The spread, which is where a standard account actually charges, is not given a figure. A UK client who has only seen the sale headlines is still on this card until the November dates, and the card is much more specific about financing mark-ups than about the price of the trade.
What the headlines compress into one sale is two agreements. Trade Nation's page for these clients, which I read on 11 October 2026, says it has agreed to acquire the retail and professional accounts of FXCM UK, and that open positions will be closed by FXCM on Friday 20 November. FX News Group reported on 9 October that AvaTrade has agreed to acquire the majority of FXCM Group, the deal that would let parent Jefferies Financial Group leave retail brokerage, and that report says the parties have not defined "majority". Read together, a UK account changes firm and does not carry its open trades across, while the rest of the group is a separate negotiation that still has an institutional arm, FXCM Pro, which neither write-up cleanly includes.
Key facts
- Active Trader Tier 1 is £2.00 a side per £100,000 of notional, or $2.50 a side per $100,000; Tier 2 is £1.70, €2.00 or $2.00 — Stratos Markets Limited rate card, 25 June 2026, retrieved 11 October 2026
- A Tier 1 round turn is £4.00 or $5.00 on 100,000 of account currency; standard CFD commission is nil, and opening is free — same rate card
- The FX financing mark-up on EUR/USD is 35%, and dividend adjustments keep a 25% mark-up — same rate card
- An inactivity fee is the lesser of 50 units of base currency or the remaining balance after 12 months without an order; a US-dollar wire withdrawal is $25 — same rate card
- UK accounts are due to close at FXCM shortly after 22:00 GMT on 20 November 2026, with an opt-out deadline of 5 November — Trade Nation's FXCM page, retrieved 11 October 2026
- 67% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider — FXCM UK site risk banner, retrieved 11 October 2026
- Stratos Markets Limited is given as FCA firm reference 217689, company 04072877, with the group at 110 Bishopsgate, London — FXCM site footer and FX News Group, 11 October 2026
The UK contract, in one box
| Rating | 3.4 out of 5, on the UK contract as published |
|---|---|
| UK entity | Stratos Markets Limited, trading as FXCM |
| FCA reference cited by FXCM | 217689 |
| Companies House number cited by FXCM | 04072877 |
| Group address on FXCM's pages | 110 Bishopsgate, 17th floor, London EC2N 4AY |
| Founded, as reported | 1999 |
| Platforms named on the UK site | Trading Station, MetaTrader 4, TradingView |
| Active Trader Tier 1 | £2.00 or $2.50 a side per 100,000 of that currency |
| Standard CFD commission | Nil |
| UK transfer window | Opt out by 5 November 2026; FXCM accounts close 20 November 2026 |
Two acquirers, one brand
Trade Nation put the dates on its own site. On Tuesday 6 October 2026, FXCM UK was to write to clients. The opt-out deadline is Thursday 5 November. Accounts close at FXCM shortly after 22:00 GMT on Friday 20 November, and the new accounts are described as ready when markets open at 22:05 GMT on Sunday 22 November. An inactive account may move earlier, in the week of 16 November. Funds are described as staying in segregated accounts, with the balance moved in full. A position still open is to be closed at the close of business on the 20th.
The same page cites FSCS figures of £120,000 per banking group for deposits and £85,000 for investment firms. That is Trade Nation's wording, not a register extract.
Jon Noble, chief executive at Trade Nation, said: "FXCM's UK clients are exactly the traders we built Trade Nation for: experienced people who know precisely what they want from a broker." The line is in FX News Group's 6 October account. Brendan Callan, chief executive at Stratos Group, the firm behind Tradu and FXCM, said there: "Our priority throughout has been finding the right home for our UK clients."
The second agreement is looser. The 9 October report says AvaTrade announced a deal for the majority of FXCM Group, and that the parties did not define the word. Daire Ferguson, chief executive at AvaTrade, said: "By combining FXCM's established market presence with AvaTrade's technology and product innovation, we aim to expand our global reach and build a stronger, more diversified trading group." AvaTrade's website returned a Cloudflare block on 11 October, so the sentence rests on that report, not on a page I could open at avatrade.com. The report says the sale lets Jefferies Financial Group Inc, ticker JEF, exit retail online brokerage. The 11 October week in review puts UK clients first and the rest of the business second. I have not seen a Jefferies filing, and I am not treating the exit as done.
Those reports date FXCM to 1999 and Jefferies' control to the 2015 Swiss franc rescue, a loan that became equity. The Trade Nation review and the AvaTrade review already cover the acquirers. This one does not reprice them, and Trade Nation's welcome page does not print the schedule the closed positions will meet.
The June card, priced
Active Trader replaces the standard spread-based account for clients FXCM designates. The firm can remove the label on notice, or automatically if requirements the card never prints are no longer met. Two tiers are published. Per 100,000 of notional, per side, Tier 1 is £2.00, €2.50 or $2.50. Tier 2 is £1.70, €2.00 or $2.00.
The card does not say what volume gets a client from Tier 1 to Tier 2.
A Tier 1 round turn is £4.00 or $5.00 on 100,000 of account currency. The card's euro example, Tier 2, opening 90,000 EUR/USD, is €1.80 on the open: €2.00 times 0.9.
On a standard account the line "Commission Fee for CFD Transactions" is nil. Opening, maintenance and statements are free. The spread "is displayed on our Trading Facility" and is "subject to variation". A worked example uses a 1.3 pip spread on 10,000 EUR/USD, pip cost $0.10, trading cost $1.30 before financing. That illustration is dated 25 June 2026. It is not a platform quote from 11 October. FXCM's live rates feed returned a Cloudflare block on Sunday 11 October, so no intraday spread is printed.
The bars are commission only, in US dollars, not an all-in cost. Pepperstone's figure is per unit. The other three are per $100,000. The spread is still extra on every row.
| Account | Round turn | Unit, as that firm states it | Entity on the page |
|---|---|---|---|
| FXCM Active Trader Tier 1 | $5.00 | $2.50 a side per $100,000 notional | Stratos Markets Limited, FCA |
| FXCM Active Trader Tier 2 | $4.00 | $2.00 a side per $100,000 notional | Same rate card, 25 June 2026 |
| IBKR UK spot FX, Tier I | $4.00 | 0.20 bp on $100,000 per order, which equals the $2.00 minimum, twice for a round turn | Interactive Brokers U.K. Limited |
| IC Markets cTrader and TradingView | $6.00 | $3 a side per $100,000 traded | Raw Trading Ltd, Seychelles FSA SD018 |
| Pepperstone TradingView, Razor | $7.00 | $7 round trip per unit | Pepperstone Limited, FCA 684312 |
IBKR sets Tier I at monthly trade value up to $1 billion and says it passes dealer prices through. The $4.00 is commission only, and a smaller ticket still pays the $2.00 minimum per order. IC's page is Raw Trading Ltd, Seychelles FSA SD018, not its separate CySEC firm. MetaTrader 4 Raw Spread there is $3.50 a side, $7.00 round turn, per standard lot. Pepperstone Limited, FCA 684312, is the source of the $7, and of a 73.6% retail-loss warning. FXCM's UK banner says 67%.
The IC Markets review and the Interactive Brokers review go further into those firms. The rows here were read on 11 October 2026 from the Stratos Markets rate card, the IBKR UK spot page, ic.com and Pepperstone's UK costs page. Nothing was copied out of an older review on this site.
Licences that do not travel together
Stratos Markets Limited is the UK firm being transferred. FXCM's footer, on the South-East Asia site that loaded on 11 October, gives FCA reference 217689, Companies House number 04072877, and a group address at 110 Bishopsgate, 17th floor, London EC2N 4AY. The 6 October story uses the same reference. The FCA register did not return a readable firm record this session, so 217689 is from FXCM and from FX News Group, not from a register line I can quote.
The UK site chrome names Trading Station, MetaTrader 4 and TradingView, plus spread betting, CFDs, Active Trader and a professional-client route. The markets-site footer says spread betting is only for UK residents.
The footer is where the brand splits. Stratos Global LLC, 1776 LLC 2022, is in St Vincent and, in FXCM's words, needs no financial-services licence there. That site says it is not aimed at the UK. Stratos Europe Limited is cited with CySEC 392/20, Stratos Trading Pty. Limited with ASIC AFSL 309763, a South African firm with FSCA 46534, and an Israeli firm with the local authority. FXCM Global Services, LLC is described as not regulated.
AvaTrade's reported deal is for "the majority". Trade Nation already has the UK book, with a date and a named FCA firm. A login that says FXCM does not tell you which contract you hold. After 20 November the UK login is not supposed to be FXCM's.
Fees that sit behind the spread
Commission is the easy line. The rest of the card is formulas.
FX financing on EUR/USD, GBP/USD, USD/JPY and other majors, plus XAU/USD and XAG/USD, carries a 35% mark-up on the benchmark swap, either side. USD/TRY, USD/ZAR and USD/CNH sit in a group marked up 50%. Forex is charged three times on Wednesday to cover the weekend. The card's example takes an illustrative swap of 0.25, applies 35%, and gets a financing debit of $0.34 on that 10,000 EUR/USD, against $1.30 of illustrated spread. Financing is a number the card will print. A typical spread is not.
Index CFDs add 3% on both sides for US30, SPX500 and NAS100, and 2.5% on the short side against 3% on the long side for UK100 and GER30. Dividend adjustments then keep 25%. The share example turns $0.04 into a $0.03 credit. Close before 17:00 New York the day before the ex-date and nothing is applied.
Deposits are free "under normal circumstances". A US-dollar wire is $25 wherever it goes. Sterling by BACS is £0; other sterling wires are £15 in the UK and £30 outside. SEPA is €0, and a non-SEPA euro wire is €15 or €30. Converting currency for a cash movement adds 0.1%. The wrong FXCM bank account costs 50 units of base currency.
Dormancy is the same 50, after 12 months with no new order and no open order, and only after an email. An open position counts as activity. Pepperstone's UK page, read the same day, charges no inactivity fee. On this card, 50 units is a real debit.
What is actually in the client's favour
- The UK rate card is dated 25 June 2026 and states Active Trader commission as a currency amount.
- Tier 1 at $5.00 round turn per $100,000 is below the IC cTrader and Pepperstone TradingView figures read the same day. Standard commission is nil.
- Opening, statements and ordinary deposits are free. Sterling BACS withdrawals are £0.
- The UK site names Trading Station, MetaTrader 4 and TradingView, and it prints a retail-loss percentage in the banner rather than a slogan.
What the card and the sale leave open
- No typical EUR/USD spread is published, and the live feed was blocked.
- Nothing says what volume moves Tier 1 at £2.00 to Tier 2 at £1.70.
- A 35% financing mark-up, a triple Wednesday charge, and a 25% dividend haircut sit behind the commission.
- Inactivity can cost 50 currency units, and a dollar wire is $25.
- Open UK positions are due to close on 20 November 2026, and the receiving page does not restate the £2.00.
- Stratos Global LLC uses the brand and, FXCM says, needs no licence in St Vincent.
Where the 3.4 comes from
I rate the UK business 3.4 out of 5. That rates Stratos Markets Limited's contract as it could be read on 11 October 2026, not the logo in December.
RelatedJustMarkets Review 2026: Raw Spread Is $3.00 a Side
The card has a date, and the commission is a sum of money rather than a label. Tier 1 is $5.00 round turn per $100,000: under IC cTrader at $6.00 and Pepperstone TradingView at $7.00, over IBKR UK's $4.00 of commission before the dealer spread. Opening and ordinary deposits are free. The pages name an FCA reference and Bishopsgate, and the UK banner still says 67% of retail CFD accounts here lose money.
Against that: no typical spread, and the feed did not load. No published test for Tier 2, so £2.00 a side is the figure to assume. A 35% financing mark-up and a 25% dividend haircut are easy to skip, and they are not small across a Wednesday and an ex-date. The St Vincent company on the brand is unlicensed where it is incorporated, on FXCM's own account. The UK book is on a clock. Opt out by 5 November. Positions close on 20 November. Another firm's contract from the evening of the 22nd.
Trade Nation's page describes fixed spreads and zero commission, and does not publish what those closed positions will meet. I will not pretend £2.00 survives, or treat "majority" as a list of entities. FXCM Pro is still described as part of the group, and Jefferies as leaving retail brokerage, without a filing I could open. A readable UK spread table, a finished transfer, or a document naming the entities sold would move the 3.4. Until then it is a regulated contract, a clear commission, an unclear spread, and a November date.
I will not tell anyone to opt out, to stay, or to open an account. The deadline is printed. Positions still open on the afternoon of 20 November are due to be closed. That choice belongs to the client.
Questions the sale actually raises
Is FXCM closing?
Not as one firm, on the documents in hand. Trade Nation has agreed to take the UK client accounts of Stratos Markets Limited, with closure at FXCM timed for the evening of 20 November 2026. FX News Group reported on 9 October that AvaTrade has agreed to acquire the majority of FXCM Group so Jefferies can leave retail brokerage. "Majority" is not defined there, and the report still names FXCM Pro as a business the group operates.
What does Active Trader cost?
On the 25 June 2026 rate card, Tier 1 is £2.00 a side per £100,000 of notional, €2.50 per €100,000, or $2.50 per $100,000. Tier 2 is £1.70, €2.00 or $2.00 on the same unit. The charge hits on the open and again on the close. The card does not print the volume that earns Tier 2, and it says FXCM can remove the Active Trader label.
Does a standard account pay commission?
The card says commission on CFD transactions is nil, and that opening and maintenance are free. The cost is the spread, which the card says is variable and shown inside the trading facility. A worked example uses 1.3 pips on 10,000 EUR/USD, costing $1.30 before financing. That example is not a live quote from 11 October 2026.
What happens to open UK positions?
Trade Nation's FXCM page says open positions will be closed by FXCM UK at the close of business on Friday 20 November 2026, and that the balance then moves across. The opt-out deadline on that page is 5 November. Nothing on the page says the position is reopened at the same price with the new firm. Inactive accounts may transfer earlier, in the week of 16 November.
Who regulates a UK FXCM account?
Stratos Markets Limited, which FXCM's own pages and FX News Group identify as FCA firm reference 217689, company 04072877. The group address those pages give is 110 Bishopsgate, London. Other FXCM names, including a St Vincent company that says it needs no licence there, are different contracts. They are not the UK book Trade Nation has agreed to take.
Is £2.00 the whole cost of the trade?
No. It is the Tier 1 commission on one side, per £100,000, and only if FXCM has designated the account Active Trader. The spread is extra. So is financing, with a 35% mark-up on EUR/USD in the card and a triple Wednesday charge, plus a 25% mark-up on dividend adjustments. A forgotten account can also be charged 50 currency units after 12 months without an order. A standard account pays no commission and pays the spread instead.
Disclaimer. This is analysis of published charges and announced transactions, not a recommendation to open, close, transfer or keep an account. CFDs and spread bets put capital at risk, and FXCM's own UK warning, retrieved 11 October 2026, says 67% of retail CFD accounts with this provider lose money. Commission comparisons exclude the spread. Every figure is from the broker page or FXCM document named in the text and was retrieved on 11 October 2026, except the rate card's own printed date of 25 June 2026. Schedules change. The November dates are Trade Nation's, and they can move.