Table of Contents

Background

IC Markets is a Forex and CFD broker that offers low spreads on commission based account types. The broker is regulated with ASIC and deals in MetaTrader and cTrader platforms.

Pros

Competitive pricing on commission-based accounts
CFDs trading supported in six major cryptocurrency pairs
Supports social copy-trading platforms
Supports MT5 web; as well as other desktop platforms such as MT4, MT5, and cTrader suite

Cons

Lack of flagship trading platform
Lack of news feeds in MetaTrader

International Capital Markets Pty Limited (IC Markets) started its operational journey back in 2007 and is headquartered in Sydney and is regulated by ASIC (Australian Securities and Investment Commission) and AFSL (Australian Financial Services License) in 2009.

At present, the broker offers a host of MetaTrader platforms (MT4, MT5) developed by MetaQuotes Software Corporation and the collection of cTrader platforms developed by SpotWare Systems.

At IC Markets, traders can access 63 FX pairs and 41 CFDs in instruments such as precious metals, cryptos, indices and futures contracts. In addition to the services mentioned above, IC Markets also supports social trading supplemented by Myfxbook and ZuluTrade platform.

IC markets Commissions & Fees

The broker provides three types of accounts to its traders, ranging from ‘Standard’ which is commission-free (spreads only) account to ‘True ECN’ and ‘cTrader accounts’ which are commission based (commission + spreads).

The difference between cTrader and the True ECN is virtually nothing with the commission being lower than about a tenth of that of charge in the ECN account. The notable distinction is the platforms supported. For instance, True ECN accounts through MT4 platform charges 3.5 dollars for every 100k units (a standard lot) or 7 dollars per round turn, on the other hand, cTrader has 0.3 dollar charge on a standard lot and 6 dollars on standard round turn.

The average spread on EUR/USD at IC Markets is 0.1 pips, which gives us the all-in cost of 0.7 pips after the 0.6 commission is added on the cTrader account and 0.8 for MetraTrader4, which is competitive from an industry standard. An additional discount is allotted to the traders that trade over 100 lots per month, which is similar to the active trade offering. On the other hand, the Standard account at IC Markets has an average spread of 1.1, which makes the other two account types more viable options.

Market analysis and education

IC Markets provides both in-house as well as third-party facilitated research content on its blog daily. The in-house experts contribute resources to several technical analysis and third-party content sources such as economic calendar by MQL5 and news feed by Myfxbook.

The broker also provides peer-to-peer copy trading functionality through the Zulutrade and Myfxbook platform and for the MetaTrader suite the dealer offers advanced trading tools add-ons developed by a third party developer, FX Blue LLP.

In the year 2017, IC Markets made another notable addition to its offerings – it added EA Lab developed by Trading View. The program allows traders to build their own Expert Advisors functionality for MT4 & MT5 by taking away some of the complexity around the code, through a simple drag and drop model. Although even with easier means to code, advanced technical knowledge is essential to use this feature.

Given that the broker provides social trading and platform add-on functionality, however, research is not IC Market’s strong suit as the offerings still lack news feed on MT4 and pattern recognition tools.

Platforms & Tools

IC Markets supports two of industry favorites – MetaTrader platforms by MetaQuotes Software Corporation and cTrader platform collection by the SpotWare system. Under the MetaTrader umbrella, MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 are available.

While MT4 and MT5 have a standard functionality with a slight alteration from broker to broker, there can be vast differences in how the platform is developed for trading, spreads and commissions, execution of trades, features, administrative functionality and a host of other tools.

The major difference between MT4 and MT5 platform interface at IC Markets and the default MetaTrader functionality is:

Advanced Trading Tools package is supported as an add-on
Lack of news streaming from top-tier broadcast providers
EA Lab featured is supported via Trade View
MT4 and MT5 web-based platforms are available for trading

The focus of IC Markets’ platforms offerings is the cTrader suite developed by SpotWare Systems. The platform is available as a web-based and desktop version for Windows and Mac. The platform supports complementary trading applications from third-party developers such as cAlgo for auto-trading and cMirror for social trading, in addition to ZuluTrade and Myfxbook.

Mobile Trading

IC Markets supports mobile versions of all the platforms it offers as web or the desktop version such as MetaTrader 4, MetaTrader 5 and cTrader for Andriod and Apple devices.

The Bottom Line

At IC Markets execution of traders are carried out based on agency offerings, which means orders are subject to positive or negative slippage as there is no room for re-quotes. The dealer allows hedging and provides a 0.2% margin (500:1 leverage).