Losses can exceed deposits
At CleanFinancial.com we want you to select the broker that fits your investment needs. One option comes from CMC Markets.
- CMC Markets Spread Betting
- CMC Markets
- CMC Markets Awards
- User Ratings & Comments on CMC Markets
- CMC Markets Mobile Trading
- CMC Markets Charts
- CMC Markets Account
- Markets on the CMC Platform
- About CMC Markets
Although we find the platform to be fairly user friendly, we have added some short videos to help you get more out of it:
- Video Guide: CMC Markets Platform
- Video Guide: CMC Markets Mobile App
- Video Guide: CMC Markets Charts
CMC Markets Spread Betting
With CMC Markets you get all the normal advantages of spread betting:- Tax Free Investments* i.e. no capital gains tax, no income tax, no stamp duty
- You can buy (go long) or sell (go short) stock indices, shares, forex, commodities, interest rates, bonds etc.
- No commission fees
- No stockbroker’s fees
- A wide range of markets generally offered, for more detail see CMC Markets – Spread Betting Markets
CMC Markets
With a CMC Markets account you also get:- An Award Winning Platform: See CMC Markets Awards below for details.
- Mobile Trading Apps: See CMC Markets Mobile Trading below for details.
- Advanced Charts: See CMC charts below for details.
- Chart Message Boards: These allow full sharing of trade set-ups between investors. There’s also market commentary from in-house analysts.
- Client Sentiment Readings: Simple charts that show whether the clients are long or short of a particular market. Interestingly they can be split by ‘All’ or just ‘Top’ CMC clients. For more, see Client Sentiment below for a screenshot and/or the video guide to the CMC charts.
- CFDs: The comprehensive CFD service lets clients trade thousands of markets and covers global shares, stock market indices, commodities and treasuries.
- An Extensive Forex Service: Clients can trade over 300 forex markets.
- Daily Commodities: As well as commodities futures, unlike most spread betting companies, CMC also offer a range of daily commodity markets.
- Price Depth Ladder: The price ladder allows clients to enter trades which are far larger than the normal market size, in just one transaction. Note that when trading in the largest sizes, CMC normally offers a similar price but with a slightly wider spread. Editor’s comment – we haven’t heard of this negatively impacting any investors trading normal sizes.
- MT4: Use the popular MetaTrader 4 platform.
- Price Alerts: Clients can receive alerts when prices reach a predetermined level on a selected market. Alerts can be sound based, via pop-up or email.
- Risk Management: There are risk management tools to help maximise profits and minimise losses. Tools include Stop Loss orders, Trailing Stop Loss orders and Boundary orders.
- Watchlists: By creating and personalising watchlists, clients can organise and focus their trading.
- News & Insights: As well as an economic calendar from Dow Jones, clients can access a live Reuters stream as well as the latest insight from in-house analysts.
- Demo Spread Betting, CFD & FX Trading Accounts: Investors can open a demo account and practice their trading strategies with £10,000 of virtual funds. Demo accounts can also be accessed via the mobile apps.
The CMC Markets Trading Platform
User Ratings & Comments on CMC Markets
Add Your View – if you have any comments or questions on CMC Markets, feel free to add them here:
Readers can leave comments by logging in securely to their Facebook, Twitter or Intense Debate accounts (CleanFinancial does not see, or keep a record of, your login details).
CMC Markets Client Sentiment and Message Boards
CMC Markets Mobile Trading
Clients can download the spread betting and CFD trading apps in order to access their accounts, place trades and amend positions. Also see video guide to the CMC app below.The mobile apps are available on iPhone, iPad and Android devices. The secure trading apps let clients:
- Place new trades and manage existing positions
- Use advanced order tickets with boundary choices, customisable margin (CFDs only), trailing stops etc.
- Apply risk management orders e.g. Stop Loss and Take Profit orders
- View live prices and multiple chart types. The charts come with features such as date range and interval size
- Manage and fund their account
- Search and filter markets by type, country, volatility and performance
- Check the market fact sheets which detail spread sizes, margins, volatility, market hours etc.
- Create and update personalised watchlists
- Access 24 hour client support
- Test the app using a demo account which comes with £10k of virtual funds
CMC Markets iPhone Trading:
CMC and IG are Your Best Bet if You’re Looking for an Obscure Market (But…)
Editor’s comment (June 2015): When users write in looking for a particular market then we invariably send them to IG or CMC.Want to trade Rough Rice? Try CMC. Want to trade an individual Japanese stocks? Try IG.
Both firms have an impressive selection of markets.
But…and there is always a but… check the spread widths of those markets. They are likely to be very wide.
We are often so used to trading the popular markets with very tight spreads that we forget how painful it is to trade markets with a wide spread.
That’s not a complaint about the above firms. Readers should know that, in this industry, irrespective of the firm you use, the lesser traded markets often have painfully wide spreads.
Financial Spreads trade the euro/dollar at just 0.7pts but if you want to trade sterling/rand you are looking at 20pts (and 30pts in out-of-hours trading).
Capital Spreads are also known for their tights spreads. They trade dollar/yen at just 0.8pts but dollar/peso will set you back a whopping 88pts.
The lesson?
If you can’t find a market, check CMC and IG.
But, before you trade, check the spread. The markets that don’t see much action often have prohibitively wide spreads (whichever platform you use).
Jacob Wood
CMC Markets Charts
The advanced charts on the CMC Markets platform offer a wide range of features and functions:- Trade Directly from the Chart‡: Clients can trade directly from the charts, they can also see open positions and edit stop loss and take profit orders on the charts.
- Pattern Recognition‡: There is a built in scanner to alert and identify 9 common pattern types and 50+ candlestick formations.
- Chart Comparisons‡: This allows users to drag and drop any number of additional markets onto an existing chart so they can compare the price history, correlations, potential pairs-trading opportunities etc.
- Subscriptions: Clients can set up to 5 subscriptions that will scan for a specific pattern, interval or product. The results from a subscription will appear and show any emerging patterns that have yet to break out and which ones to look out for.
- Back Testing: The back testing tool helps to identify potential trading opportunities by showing the previous success rates of particular patterns over a specified time period and interval.
- Overlays: There are 25+ technical analysis overlays such as Moving Averages, Bollinger Bands, Pivot Points, Ichi Moku Clouds and Parabolic SAR etc.
- Technical Studies: There are 45+ technical studies including MACD, RSI, DMI and Stochastics.
- Drawing Tools: These let clients add their own trendlines, support and resistance lines as well as Fibonacci retracements, price channels etc.
A typical CMC Markets Chart
CMC Markets Account
A quick overview of the CMC Markets account:CMC Markets Services |  |
| Average User Rating | 7.1 |
| New Account Offer |  |
| 24 Hour Trading |  |
| Live Charts | |
| iPhone App | |
| iPad App | |
| Android Apps | |
| Web Platform | |
| Stop Loss Available | |
| Automatic Stop Loss | |
| Credit Account | |
| Deposit Account | |
| FCA Authorised and Regulated | |
CMC Markets iPad Trading
CMC Markets Awards
In 2013 CMC had a good year at the awards ceremonies:-
2013 Shares Magazine Awards
- Financial Services Provider of the Year: CMC Markets
- Best Online Trading Platform: CMC Markets
- Best CFD Provider: CMC Markets
-
2013 Financial Times and Investors Chronicle Investment Awards
- Best Spread Betting App: CMC Markets
- Best Spread Betting App: CMC Markets
-
2013 MoneyAM Awards
- Best Online Trading Platform: CMC Markets
- Best Online Charts: CMC Markets
- 2012, Best Online Spread Betting Service, Money AM
- 2012, Best CFD Mobile App, Investment Trends Report
- 2012 & 2011, Best Value Australia Award, Canstar
- 2011, Australia’s Cheapest Online Broker, Money Magazine
- 2011, Best Spread Betting Service, Shares Magazine
- 2011, Financial Provider of the Year, Shares Magazine
- 2011, Best Spread Betting Broker, Trade2Win
- 2011, Best CFD Broker, Trade2Win
Markets on the CMC Platform
Below we have listed a selection of the thousands of markets available with CMC Markets.For each market you will find the typical in-hours spread size and the minimum stake for that market.
Typical In-Hours Index Spread Sizes with CMC Markets | |
| FTSE 100 (UK 100) Daily | 2 |
| Dow Jones (Wall St) Daily | 1.4 |
| DAX 30 (Germany 30) Daily | 1 |
| S&P 500 (SPX 500) Daily | 5 |
| NASDAQ 100 (US Tech 100) Daily | 1 |
| CAC 40 (France 40) Daily | 1 |
| ASX 200 (Australia 200) Daily | 1 |
| Japan 225 Daily | 5 |
| Hong Kong Daily | 7 |
| Stock market indices minimum stake | £1 |
- European Indices: Dutch 25, Euro Stoxx 50, German Mid 50, Irish 60, Italian 40, Norway 25, Spanish 35, Sweden 30 and Swiss 30.
- US Indices: US Russ 2000.
- World Indices: Australia 200, Hong Kong Enterprise Index, Indian 50, Singapore 30, South African 40 and Toronto 60.
Typical In-Hours Forex Spread Sizes with CMC Markets | |
| EUR / USD Daily | 0.7 |
| GBP / USD Daily | 0.9 |
| EUR / GBP Daily | 0.9 |
| USD / JPY Daily | 0.7 |
| Forex minimum stake | £1 |
- Majors: Australian Dollar/Yen, Australian Dollar/US Dollar, Euro/Australian Dollar, Euro/Swiss Franc, Euro/Yen, Sterling/Yen, Swiss Franc/Yen and US Dollar/Swiss Franc.
- Minors: Australian Dollar/Canadian Dollar, Australian Dollar/Hong Kong Dollar Australian Dollar/New Zealand Dollar, Australian Dollar/Swiss Franc, Sterling/Danish Krona, Euro/New Zealand Dollar, Sterling/Australian Dollar, Sterling/Singapore Dollar, Sterling/South African Rand, Sterling/Swiss Franc, US Dollar/Canadian Dollar, US Dollar/Danish Krona, US Dollar/South African Rand, US Dollar/Singapore Dollar and US Dollar/Swedish Krona.
- Exotics: Euro/Czech Koruna, Euro/Hungarian Forint, Euro/Turkish Lira, Sterling/Turkish Lira, Dollar/Czech Koruna, Dollar/Mexican Peso, Dollar/Polish Zloty, Dollar/Slovakian Koruna and Dollar/Turkish Lira.
Typical In-Hours Commodities Spread Sizes with CMC Markets | |
| Gold Daily | 4 |
| Gold Futures | 5 |
| Brent Crude Oil Daily | 3.5 |
| Brent Crude Oil Futures | 4 |
| US Crude Oil Daily | 3.5 |
| US Crude Oil Futures | 4 |
| Commodities minimum stake | £1 |
- Metals: Copper, Palladium, Platinum and Silver.
- Energies: Carbon Emissions, Heating Oil and Natural Gas.
- Softs: Corn, Cotton, UK Cocoa, US Cocoa, UK Coffee, US Coffee, Corn, Feeder Cattle, Lean Hogs, Live Cattle, Lumber, Oats, Orange Juice, Rough Rice, Soybean, Soy Oil, UK Sugar, US Sugar and Wheat.
Typical In-Hours Interest Rate Spread Sizes with CMC Markets | |
| Euribor | 2 |
| Euroswiss | – |
| Short Sterling | 3 |
| Treasuries minimum stake | £1 |
Typical In-Hours Bonds Spread Sizes with CMC Markets | |
| BOBL | 2 |
| Bund | 3 |
| Gilt | 2 |
| Schatz | 2 |
| US T Bond 10 Year | 3 |
| US T Bond 30 Year | 3 |
| Treasuries minimum stake | £1 |
With CMC Markets you can also trade other bonds markets including: Australian 3 Year Bonds, Australian 10 Year Bonds, Canadian 10 Year Bonds and US 2 Year Bonds.
Readers should be aware of the comparison / company spreads notes.
Video Guide to the CMC Platform
Below, we have an 8 minute video looking at the CMC platform.Video Guide to the CMC Mobile App
This video gives a basic overview of mobile trading appAbout CMC Markets
Losses can exceed deposits
CMC Markets was established in 1989. The company now has over 75,000 clients and executes over 33m trades per year.
CMC Markets is the only spread betting company to have received the UK government’s Millennium Award for technology innovation.
According to the CMC Markets website, the organisation is “focused on providing award winning education and support for all levels of experience”. As such, they were the recipients of the Best Online Education award from MoneyAM for the years 2010, 2011 and 2012.
The platform and service have also won a number of other important awards, please see CMC awards above for some of the more recent accolades.
Spread betting and CFD trading carry a high level of risk to your capital and you may lose more than your initial investment. Spread betting and CFD trading may not be suitable for all investors. Only speculate with money that you can afford to lose. Please ensure you fully understand the risks involved and seek independent financial advice where necessary.