LeapRate Exclusive… LeapRate has learned from Bank of Russia documents that retail forex broker Forex Club has become the fifth company to receive a license to operate in Russia with retail clients.
Russia passed a Forex Law last year, requiring any broker soliciting or engaging in trading with retail clients to receive a license as of January 1 of this year. Most of the brokers serving the Russian market have applied for the license, but to date only five licenses (including Forex Club) have been handed out by the Bank of Russia, which acts as the country’s financial regulator. The other four licenses were granted to Russian banking giant VTB and its VTB 24 Forex subsidiary, FINAM Forex, TeleTrade and TrustForex.
Companies which were rejected by the Bank of Russia include 24option and 24FX.
The largest two retail forex brokers serving the Russian market have traditionally been Forex Club and Alpari, so to date Alpari is the one main noticeably absent name from the list of brokers to have received Bank of Russia licenses. We had reported late last year that Alpari had indeed applied for a Russia license, but Alpari was formally rejected by the Bank of Russia back in June. Interestingly, Forex Club was also initially rejected by the Bank of Russia on the same day as Alpari (June 2, 2016). However its application clearly was reexamined, and finally approved.
Forex Club subsidiary company Indication Investments Ltd, which operates the fxclub-global.com website, also holds a CySEC license, passported throughout the EU.