It hasn’t been formally announced yet, but we understand that retail forex and CFD broker Plus500 (LON:PLUS) is about to be awarded a CFD market maker license by Cyprus’ financial regulator CySEC.
Plus500 is already regulated by the FCA in the United Kingdom and by ASIC in Australia.
So why the CySEC license?
Well, Plus500 won’t be able to do any more than they already do (across the EEA) with their existing FCA license, thanks to MiFID. But having CFD trading clients register with their new Cyprus subsidiary instead of their UK subsidiary will make things a lot less expensive for Plus500, with lower variable capital requirements and less expensive overall reporting costs.
The FCA has also become an issue lately for Plus500. Last month Plus500 shares took a dive after reports surfaced that the FCA was investigating Plus500 regarding customer signup procedures.
Plus500 was advised by Limassol-based regulatory consultant MAP S.Platis in obtaining its CySEC license. MAP S.Platis has worked on about 85 successful CIF licenses for clients which have included Saxo Bank, Alpari, iForex, ForexClub, EXNESS, and AvaTrade.