No Forex business in Latin America? Think again!

Just three weeks after going live with Brazilian Real (BRL), Chilean Peso (CLP) and Colombian Peso (COP), emerging markets FX specialist R5FX, led by avantgarde industry figure Jon Vollemaere, has recorded a record day of trading since its establishment.

Hot on the heels of the introduction of these three Latin American currencies, R5FX introduced ‘LATAM in London’ at the conclusion of a meeting with the Banco Central de Brasil, Securities and Exchange Commission of Brazil (CVM) and London-based traders of the Brazilian real.

Many firms have steered clear of the Latin American market, hence its relative sparseness when it comes to FX industry participants, despite it being a continent with very few entry barriers, and no language or cross cultural difficulties, due to its lack of net worth, stable government or acumen among its populace, however London-based R5FX may well be onto something interesting with its different approach.

The very few companies which have made forays into Latin America this far have concentrated their efforts on education programs for potential traders in the region, and on attempting to onboard local clients via local representatives.

Bringing Latin America to London is better than attempting local presence

By bringing the actual currencies to London, and offering them to an astute base of traders in the world’s largest financial center with the assistance of authorities and central banks in South America, the likelihood of generating any level of volume from these regions is amplified several thousandfold and is not fraught with the difficulties of expending resources to tread unknown waters and return with nothing as so many have done.

R5FX has also taken the step of placing itself on the Foreign & Commonwealth Office’s Emerging Markets Capital Markets Taskforce for Brazil. The company supports a project between the UK government and the Brazilian authorities (Banco Central do Brasil and the Brazilian Securities and Exchange Commission) on among other things increasing the international use of the BRL.

Mr. Vollemaere’s initiative has borne fruit already, as he today publicly posted that yesterday’s trading activity surpassed all since inauguration, accrediting a significant part of this to the BRL trading.

All in all, a smart initiative by Mr. Vollemaere as he is bringing untapped, emerging currencies to the world’s currency epicenter, you could say that in this case Sao Paolo becomes St Pauls.