Hi everyone

On Friday I got this short message from US Forex broker GFT:

“Wednesday was one of the most volatile trading days in the FX market for USD/JPY in years. Through it all GFT provided traders with consistent spreads of 3 pips or less, executed all market orders requested, and executed all stops and limits which were due to be filled.”

I’m not supporting nor going to enter into discussing who is the most handsome broker in town, who is the best or the winning horse, I think that the consolidation of the industry has brought along a sophistication of the firms operating in it as they get better and better.

I just want to say that JPY is the third currency more transacted with a daily market turnover of 19 percent right after  the USD (84%) and the EUR (29%) upon the latest “Report on Global Foreign Exchange Market Activity” in 2010 released by the Bank of International Settlements showed.

With such huge liquidity is quite understandable that the operation costs must be low, but to maintain them tight in a moment of great volatility is without a doubt a demonstration of technology capacity and good relationships with liquidity providers in the interbank market.

Congratulations guys

Francesc

Hi everyone

I’m very happy to announce here today that one of the leading Forex brokerage firms GFT - GLOBAL FOREX TRADING, Division of Global Futures & Forex, Ltd. - has renewed the sponsorship deal of the FXstreet.com English Sites for the 6th consecutive year when it took over the site’s sponsorship in early 2005.

The agreement is for one year and includes:

1. FXstreet.com All Sites Sponsorship excluding Spanish that won’t be included till current sponsor contract finishes

2. Forex Trader of the Year 2011 Demo & Real Contest

3. All Live Events (webinars and live coverages) made by FXstreet’s in-house analysts along the extremely popular monthly Non-Farm Payrolls webinar run by Wayne McDonell.

For the seven year in a row I must congratulate myself for having a top notch Forex broker as GFT is sponsoring FXstreet’s sites and once again I want to thank them for their trust and support all this years.

A big thanks guys!

Francesc

Hi everyone

This morning I got an e-mail announcing the release of a offering coming soon from GFT: position-based trading.

As you already know, I’m not a trader so I went to our Content Advisor Mr. Gonçalo Moreira to look for his view on it.

This is what Gonçalo told me:

“GFT’s DealBook used to be net-based account, where multiple positions in a same instrument are combined and price averaged. The new position based order placement allows the trader to handle the positions separately: here every trade you make maintains a unique entry price.

With position-based trading, you can open as many positions in a particular instrument as you like, but keep in mind that you cannot open contrary positions.

Note as well that DealBook follows a First In, First Out (FIFO) policy; this means that the system will automatically close the oldest position first.

With net-based systems, the swap procedures are as follow: you can hold a position for as long as you want, but DealBook simultaneously closes and reopens your positions to credit (or debit) an interest payment to your account.

With a position-based system, however, positions will remain open for as long as you want at the same prices. Interest credits or debits are settled as cash adjustments to your account automatically.”

Gonçalo Moreira

Charts courtesy of GFT

Hi everyone

At the beginning of July I announced here the goodbye of Marc Prosser as Chief Marketing Officer at FXCM

Marc Prosser To Leave FXCM. A Big Loss for the Forex Industry

If you allow me to quote myself, I said: “Marc and Joe Force at GFT are probably the two most talented Forex marketing guys I have ever met and both deserve to be recognized as important key factor in the success of their companies. Both have been industry trend setters and entrepreneurs, tough negotiators but at the same time patient and understanding.”

Well…, today I have the sad news to let you know that I’ve just found out that Joe Force, Vice President of Global Marketing at GFT left the company in July as well.

I would like to add here today that since I got started with FXstreet.com website 10 years ago it’s been a pleasure and a pain in the ass experience - if you allow me to use a nasty word - to have to deal with these two very smart and talented guys who, unfortunately for all the Forex industry, have both left us.

From my side, nothing more than thanking both of them for betting heavily for FXstreet.com and considering the website as strategic for their branding/client acquisition purposes in early 2000 in the case of Marc and late 2002 in the case of Joe. Both envisioned that FXstreet.com would become something important in this industry and with no doubt their bet helped us to accomplish their vision or at least, to get close to it as the years went by.

Well… I’m getting a little over-dramatic here…

Just wanted to say that we are going to miss you guys!

All the best of lucks in your new entrepreneurship

Forex Margin Broker GFT To Expand Japan Ops
TOKYO (Nikkei)–Global Forex Trading, a division of U.S. foreign exchange brokerage Global Futures & Forex Ltd., will sharply expand its margin trading operations in Japan, increasing its local staff by 50% to around 70 over the next two years.

Coming soon: Fractional Pips in your live GFT account

Dear Valued GFT Customer,
Following a successful preview of fractional pips last month, we’re excited to announce that this new feature will soon be available to trade in your live account.
If you haven’t had a chance to view fractional pips in your practice account, login now >
As a quick review, fractional pips represent one-tenth of a pip and appear in DealBook® as an additional digit on the price of all currency pairs. When you place an order, the fractional pip appears smaller than the other numbers (example: 1.48266).
The most notable benefit of fractional pips is more precise pricing, which is in addition to GFT’s already competitive spreads.
Over the next several weeks, we’ll be sending out more information about when you can expect fractional pips to appear in your live account. In the meantime, you can learn more about this feature by reading our free guide: Trading Fractional Pips in DealBook® 360 and DealBook® WEB. Download it now!

Have questions? Contact us via live chat 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

As always, thank you for trading with GFT.

Top 5 Forex Events of the Decade
by Kathy Lien, Director of Currency Research at GFT
In 2010 we are ringing in a New Year and a New Decade. Before we start thinking about what could come in the next year however, we want to take this opportunity to talk about the 5 most memorable forex events of the decade. The past 10 years has been a rollercoaster ride for everyone. The highs include the birth of social networking, the growing popularity of Google, the online video revolution led by YouTube and debut of Apple’s iPod and iPhone products.

Interesting move….

Francesc

Online Trading Company GFT Launches Free iPhone® App for Financial Traders
GFT, an online forex dealer and market-maker in other tradable derivatives, launched its free iPhone application for traders worldwide today – the fifth mobile trading platform the company has developed since 2004.
The free app is immediately available for download from iTunes®, providing GFT customers with on-the-go access to trade real-time financial markets, including the more than 120 currency pairs it offers worldwide and the more than 3,000 tradable markets it offers as spread bets in the United Kingdom, and as CFDs in Europe, Australia, Asia and the GCC region.

Hi everyone,

As I already announced in this blog a few days ago, GFT - GLOBAL FOREX TRADING, Division of Global Futures & Forex, Ltd. - has renewed the sponsorship deal of the FXstreet.com English.

Here you will find the press release we have published about the news, including quotes.

Francesc

Hi everyone

I’m very happy to announce here today that one of the leading Forex brokerage firms GFT - GLOBAL FOREX TRADING, Division of Global Futures & Forex, Ltd. - has renewed the sponsorship deal of the FXstreet.com English site for the 5th consecutive year.

From December 2009 to December 2010, GFT will sponsor all of FXstreet.com’s web pages which are expected to reach approximately 80 millions page views. During the same period of time in 2009, the portal received 60.3 million page views.

For me it’s been a critical issue that the sponsor of our site would be a leading company that we could be proud of crossing brands with each other. Well… I must state here that since GFT is sponsoring our site I’ve always considered this issue as accomplished.

I want to thank here GFT and his Chief Marketing Officer Mr. Joe Force his trust in FXstreet.com and I hope that site’s sponsorship for 2010 - our 10th anniversary year - will bring an excellent return to its investment. GFT has accompanied FXstreet.com for half of its life and I hope we will keep growing hand in hand.

Thanks

Francesc