The multi asset platform revolution is here, available on MetaTrader 5 and goes live today!

Your MetaTrader platform will now take your brokerage into the giant exchange trading arena, with no need to change any operational aspect of your brokerage. This is a milestone in retail trading.

For many years, FinanceFeeds has advocated the need for retail FX brokerages to cost-effectively elevate their business potential by offering an exchange-traded, multi-asset product range via their existing platforms, be they proprietary or off the shelf systems such as MetaTrader 5. 

In developed regions with world-leading financial market economies such as Britain, very few non-domestic companies are anywhere to be seen with regard to market share, and the London-based CFD and spread betting giants dominate, knowing their customer well, garnering loyalty and ensuring a 30 year presence with a largely British customer base.

Astute investors in first tier jurisdictions, which form the client bases that retail brokers should be looking to onboard and retain, may well be conservative and prudent, but they are very technologically analytical and expect to be provided with proprietary trading systems that are developed, supported and continually evolved in the way that only London’s world-leading FinTech sector can provide.

Multi-asset trading environments, offering connectivity to massive asset bases is a pre-requisite in order to engage these good quality traders and investors, who are usually well-read, strategic and pragmatic.

Thus, there is now a fully accessible multi-asset solution for retail brokers which allow the trading of spot OTC derivatives on the same platform as multi-asset exchange listed futures and equities.

This not only elevates the potential client base of brokerages, as it accesses the equities and futures traders on exchanges, many of whom reside in first tier regions such as the United States, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia and Switzerland, but also generates a highly sustainable environment for brokers in which long-term traders with less leverage and larger capital margins operate, bringing them into the realms of the portfolio holders rather than CPA/lead conversion short term business.

As regulation ebbs toward limited leverage and looks to encourage brokerages to provide exchange-traded, less high risk investments, maintaining existing client bases on a familiar trading environment whilst extending the new product to them and in the process bringing on board equities and futures traders has to be a good move forward.

Quite simply, it is high time that the entire FX brokerage and OTC retail electronic trading business went multi asset, and by that, we mean properly multi-asset, providing derivatives exchange connectivity and access to futures, equities and stocks on Chicago and New York exchanges, on the same platform as spot FX – namely MetaTrader 5.

Many brokerages, especially those which do not wish to invest in their own trading infrastructure and then spend an equal amount of resources supporting it, are almost in a self-perpetuating rut, in which they are reduced to accept a limited appeal by highly experienced traders, accepting instead a high rate of churn, and a lot of service-heavy low end clients in third tier regions who have all been approached by literally hundreds of identical entities, offering the same spot products via the same sales-led method, including the same pitches, the only differentiating factor being the brand name on the platform.

This is a status quo, because many small to medium sized retail brokers do not wish to become involved in software development, or have the expense of maintaining a separate exchange trading platform along with membership fees and clearing charges, only to find that their existing clients and those which are the potential target market for such brokerages only want to use MetaTrader 4 and 5 as they are used to it for many years.

Those days are over, and a new and very much game changing era is here, in which retail brokers in all regions can now offer multi-asset trading as well as their existing product range, all via front ends CQG Desktop. Netdania mobile, and MetaTrader 5.

Founded in 2018, Markets Direct was built with the goal of providing investors and traders access to global markets, listed futures, US equities and OTC FX from a single cross margined account. Markets Direct can now offer traditional FX brokers this same access by leveraging our infrastructure built by industry professionals through partnerships with the industry’s leading technology providers.

The solution operates via a B2B integration to the CQG API to stream tradable FX, US equities and Futures prices via MT5, CQG and NetDania platforms.

It is a 100% turnkey solution, including all of the technology, regulatory compliance, and banking solutions, and has the EU Level 3 license which offers the following unique opportunities to the small and medium broker. A multi-asset solution developed through a combination of unique participants.

 – Cross margining functionality empowers your clients to leverage their investment portfolio to trade/hedge across all asset classes from a single account.

 – Brokers can leverage Markets Directs compliance infrastructure including the rigorous Qualified Intermediary (QI) process that certifies that it conforms to all US compliance issues, US KYC inspections, US AML procedures that are required to gain access to the US markets.

 – Competitive fee structure allows brokers to compete directly with traditional FX brokers and also recent startups in the commission-free stock trading arena.

– Access to multiple platforms – MT5, CQG and NetDania – for trading via desktop or mobile devices.

– Brokers can focus solely on sales and marketing efforts and expand your client base by offering a complete investment solution for active traders around the world.

One strategic partner that has worked closely with Markets Direct to bring this to fruition is DriveWealth. DriveWealth offers an API-driven brokerage platform, and the firm’s equities brokerage infrastructure is a central part of this project. Markets Direct has integrated with DriveWealth to handle clearing for U.S. equities. DriveWealth’s fractional share technology offers greater flexibility and product options to brokers using MetaTrader 5. 

CQG, based in Denver with roots in Chicago and the exchanges located there, brings 40 years of stable, customer friendly exchange connectivity to Market Direct. With over 45 global exchanges available, CQG gives true world wide access to any of the MetaTrader brokers connecting to Markets Direct.

NetDania, founded in 1998 by its current owners, pioneered streaming price technology, and have since delivered solutions to global Tier-1 banks, brokers, currency managers, and analysts.

Advantage Futures, which is Markets Direct’s Futures Commission Merchant (FCM) partner,is one of the largest FCMs by volume in the US. Markets Direct’s commercial terms and connectivity give brokerages access to the futures exchanges a price point that beats all competition. Advantage brings stability and market access in a very efficient manner.

Speaking to FinanceFeeds today on the launch of this game changing solution, Emil Assentato, who led this project along with senior Chicago-based futures industry professionals, explained “In the many years of my participation in the financial markets I have been lucky enough to witness and participate in game changing innovations such as; the first ‘over the counter’ (OTC) Eurodollar future trades; The interdealer broker community putting together distinct counter parties into bank to bank – peer to peer IRS contracts; watched as the toxic LDC debt situation transformed into the very successful Brady Bond market; experienced the grassroots seeding of the credit derivatives markets; initiated institutional type execution in the retail FX space with FXDD in the early 2000’s as the retail landscape changed dramatically, and probably much more.”

“As with these momentous changes before, this new multi asset solution being rolled out with cross margining capabilities is a GAME CHANGER!! Both for the retail investor and the institutional-player” – 

“This is the Holy Grail of retail FX and for the institutional trader a way to trade with lower capital/margin requirements through the cross-margining function.”

“Pure FX platforms are the thing of the past” he concluded.

Additionally, speaking today exclusively to FinanceFeeds, Joseph O’Mara, CEO Markets Direct stated “This project has been in development for three years, and I’m very excited to introduce its launch. With our partners we have assembled best in class technology and clearing partners, creating a unique, one-stop access point to the most liquid and respected markets. At its core, this represents the marriage of the exchange traded and OTC markets. I couldn’t be more proud of the group we Have put together to accomplish this feat.”

Alongside Mr O’Mara, Robert Cortright, CEO of DriveWealth and former founder and CEO of FX Solutions told FinanceFeeds “From my experience in the FX space I know how exciting this new opportunity is for retail FX providers who have had difficulty accessing the highly-regulated U.S. equities market. We’re thrilled to partner with Markets Direct to provide the clearing for exchange-traded U.S. equities as part of this multi-asset solution. We’re strong believers in increasing access to the U.S. markets and modernizing the way the world invests. Now more brokers than ever will be able to provide trading of US equities through MetaTrader 5, NetDania and CQG.“

Thomas Elster, CEO of Netdania stated “We are thrilled  to be releasing this now. It’s been a long process = certainly not something you build overnight. We view this as a game changer for us and for the  industry as a whole. This product has it all – true multi asset, ultra-low commissions, MT5 compatibility – even allows brokers to plug  their own liquidity into the mix. All of this is packed into an affordable tech offering. 

The collective teams behind the project are extremely ambitious and bring with them decades of experience within their industries. Add to that experience the time tested stability and technology of companies like CQG and Netdania and their out of box front ends. The solution includes excellent white labeled front ends from Netdania and CQG, along with alerts and algoritms run in Netdania’s cloud. Netdania feature the world’s highest user rated mobile app in the financial space

CQG Senior Vice President Mike Glista further explained to FinanceFeeds: “We are excited to partner with Markets Direct. This relationship fits our goal of providing leading edge technology to global traders and brokers requiring a multi-asset platform.”

We believe that to be the case, and this is the first example of a genuine solution to the issue that has been a silent bugbear of the retail sector, in that it removes all entry barriers to participating in the higher end of the retail trading sector, without having to change any aspect of the operations of brokerage businesses, including their MetaTrader platform.

Time to go multi asset? Absolutely!

 

For additional information, please contact [email protected]