Beatrix Fairmont

Germany's BaFin ran a market manipulation and insider trading analysis of NAGA after its shares spiked and fell following the 2017 IPO. The firm said it welcomed it.

CySEC reached a 40,000 euro settlement with Cyprus broker Exclusive Change Capital over organisational requirement failings assessed for 2021. The sum is modest, but the category is not — organisational requirements are the machinery that keeps client money safe.

ASIC cancelled the Australian financial services licence of CFD broker Velos Global Markets in 2025 after the firm stopped providing services under it from around May 2024. Regulated once is not the same as regulated now.

Israel's securities regulator fined AvaTrade's local arm ATrade 150,000 shekels over a misleading promotional video used in a marketing campaign. Here is the detail.

CySEC reached a 200,000 euro settlement with CFD broker Colmex Pro in 2025 over authorisation, organisation, conflicts of interest and client disclosure failings found across a two-year supervisory review. When a regulator settles across four load-bearing compliance areas for a substantial sum, the shape of the case tells you more than the absence of an admission does.

South Africa's FSCA has permanently withdrawn the licence of AfriMarkets Capital after finding it materially broke the country's financial laws, including through the misappropriation of client funds. The firm denies wrongdoing. The case is closely tied to the far larger collapse of Banxso.

NAGA cofounder Yasin Qureshi was sentenced in 2024 over the Cum Ex tax scandal, tied to his earlier role at Varengold Bank. He left NAGA in 2019. Full context.

AvaTrade settled with the Alberta Securities Commission in 2020 over unregistered CFD trading, paying 30,000 dollars and disgorging 213,428 dollars in revenue.

New Zealand's FMA cancelled Rockfort Markets' derivatives issuer licence in 2024 after the firm contravened eight of its licence obligations. Eight breaches is a pattern, not an accident.

CySEC reached a 150,000 euro settlement with NAGA Markets Europe over breaches spanning authorisation, suitability, best execution and product intervention rules.

Forex broker FXTM (ForexTime) is giving up its UK FCA licence in 2026, pulling back from the British retail market toward the UAE and Asia. The exit is voluntary — no misconduct alleged. But a UK FCA authorisation is one of the strongest credentials a retail forex broker can hold, and FXTM has now given it up, just as it gave up its Cyprus licence before.

The Cyprus regulator has repeatedly penalised Forex24, a licensed foreign exchange and CFD broker, over its inability to file the regulatory reports every Cyprus investment firm is required to submit. The individual fines are small. The pattern behind them is the part worth reading.

Australia's markets regulator has secured the largest penalties in its history. A$300.2 million has been ordered against collapsed CFD issuer Union Standard International Group and its two former authorised representatives — EuropeFX and TradeFred — for systemic unconscionable conduct that deliberately targeted inexperienced and vulnerable clients.

The FCA fined CFD broker FXTB (Forex TB) 276,100 pounds in 2024 for pressuring clients into trading, unauthorised advice and false professional client status. A system designed to reach directly into clients’ pockets.

TTCM Traders Trust Capital Markets, a foreign exchange and CFD broker better known simply as Traders Trust, has had its Cyprus licence withdrawn after choosing to hand it back. The firm exits the Cyprus investment firm regime after more than sixteen years on the regulator's register.

South Africa's FSCA has provisionally withdrawn the licence of Imermarket — the company behind the InvesaCapital trading platform — after finding it offered contracts for difference without proper authorisation and gave advice that caused clients to lose money.

South Africa's financial regulator has fined QuickTrade ZAR 710,000 — about USD 44,000 — for breaching the country's anti-money laundering rules, the latest in a steady run of enforcement actions against CFD and forex brokers across the region.

ASIC cancelled FXOpen AU's Australian financial services licence after finding the firm lacked adequate human resources to provide or supervise its licensed financial services — a failure of governance rather than misconduct.

The FCA cancelled XTrade's UK permission after finding the firm had marketed and sold contracts for difference to vulnerable clients who lacked the experience to understand the products. The regulator concluded the firm had failed the suitability and appropriateness tests its own rules required.

Australia's corporate regulator has cancelled the financial services licence of Trive, a contracts for difference issuer that stopped taking on new clients last year after ASIC found serious deficiencies in how it ran its business.

FOREX.com was fined $700,000 by the NFA after it responded to a trading-platform malfunction by clawing back $2.84 million from customers who had come out ahead — while returning just $35,000 to those who had lost.

OANDA, one of the best-known names in retail forex, was fined $500,000 by the CFTC after repeatedly falling below the minimum net capital it was required to hold — and paying itself three dividends while that restriction was in force.

FXCM, once one of the largest retail forex brokers in the US, was fined $7 million and permanently forced out of the American market after the CFTC found it secretly bet against its own customers while marketing a 'No Dealing Desk' platform it claimed had no conflict of interest.

Infinox Capital Limited has been fined £99,200 by the FCA after failing to submit 46,053 transaction reports over six months — a breakdown that left tens of thousands of single-stock CFD trades invisible to the regulator in its first-ever MiFIR enforcement action.

Pepperstone opened 2026 with four awards, then logged 130+ user complaints over withdrawals and slippage. BestForex.io weighs the trophies against the inbox.