Although ACM Forex offers several different trading platforms to its customers, none of them offer the intuitive and user-friendly pizazz that come along with many other popular online forex brokers. Advanced Trader, for instance, is touted as being highly customizable; many people will find that it falls far short of those big expectations, though. Web Trader allows you to access the platform online from any PC, but the confusing way that it is laid out can create problems for those who aren’t exceptionally careful. Flash Trader is available for those who prefer to use Flash applications. None of these platforms packs the same kind of wallop that many other major brokers’ software does; ACM’s trading platforms simply aren’t a strong selling point.
Beyond the software involved when trading through ACM, however, there are many other important things that you’ll need to know. They are outlined for your convenience below.
Minimum Deposit Amounts
Only serious forex traders are going to want to sign up for a full-fledged account with ACM, because the minimum deposit here is $2,000. This isn’t an insignificant amount for most people, and will probably be prohibitively expensive for many.
Account Set-Up
Due to some sort of strict Swiss regulations and laws, it is impossible to sign up completely through the ACM website. Instead, part of the process can be performed digitally – but hard copies of the signed paperwork must be mailed away. The process is, therefore, quite cumbersome and it really stands out in the lightning-quick world of online foreign exchange market trading.
Demo Accounts
Practice accounts at ACM are free and start off with a balance of $100,000. They offer all of the same capabilities as real, live accounts and are a great way to get to know the ropes at ACM. It is strongly recommended that you sign up for a free demo account to familiarize yourself with ACM and its trading platforms before depositing any real funds with them.
Dealing Desk
ACM offers no express guarantees or promises regarding trading against their own customers. Their dealing desk is fully operational and is available to assist traders as needed. However, the lack of a guarantee does make ACM compare rather unfavorably with several other major brokers.
Leverage Limits
Not surprisingly, the maximum leverage that is allowed at ACM is 100:1. This is quite standard among the major online forex brokers, but using the maximum leverage is generally not recommended. While profits can be large, losses can be huge as well.
Trailing Stops
ACM touts the fact that they offer no slippage on stop orders, which is a definite plus for many traders. Trailing stops are permitted on the ACM trading platform, so traders do not have to miss out on that important feature.
Trading Spreads
Unlike many of the other top forex brokers, ACM does not publish an extensive or easy-to-read list of its trading spreads. That point aside, it does offer an average of three pip spreads for the four most popular currency pairs. Additionally, spreads as low as 0.5 pips are available in some cases. Indeed, competitive spreads seem to be ACM’s biggest selling point and is one of the most popular reasons that experienced forex traders sign up with them.