Forex FAQ - Trading Platforms

Power Trader by Integral and MetaTrader by MetaQuotes. Power Trader is a professional-grade FX trading platform designed by Integral Development Corp., and customised for the ECN environment we offer. MetaTrader (MT4) is the most popular retail trading platform in the world today and is supported by a large community of enthusiasts. Our implementation of MetaTrader 4 (MT4) has been setup to route trades to the Integral FX Grid® aggregation system using Integral's own MT4 Bridge software on the trade server. The bridge allows us to provide a true ECN environment that connects you to institutional liquidity on Integral's FX Grid instead of a traditional retail FX dealing desk and still utilise the MetaTrader platform.

To open a demo account with us, please sign up using our open demo account form on our web site. Further instructions to download the trading software will be provided after you have submitted your request. (At present, you must also open a demo account on the server when you launch the software for the first time. Follow the on-screen prompts to do so. We appreciate your patience as we upgrade our demo server environment.)

We have made every reasonable effort to make the ECN demo accounts on our MetaTrader demo servers as realistic as possible within the limits of a demo trading account. The commission rates, spreads, and pricing will typically match those of the live servers with the possible exception of any technical problems on the servers (of course, our live servers will always receive priority in case of any unforeseen technical problems.) However, please note that regardless of our configurations and all reasonable efforts, demo trading in general will never fully reflect the real-life issues that you will face in a live trading environment, including your own psychological reactions to trading with real money.

MetaTrader was originally designed by MetaQuotes Software at a time when no retail price feeds included the "fractional pip" pricing (the extra decimal at the end of every quote -- for most currency pairs, this is the fith digit after the decimal; for Japanese Yen quoted pairs such as GBP/JPY, this would be the third digit after the decimal). In many features of the platform, such as Trailing Stops, Deviations, or the variables in the MQL language for Expert Advisors (MetaQuotes' programming language for automated trading in MetaTrader), you'll find that MetaTrader's internal programming tends to treat the last digit of any price as the "pip" value when, in the context of any discussions with real traders, it is not. Inside of the program, you will have to add an extra zero to the end for the purpose of features like Trailing Stops, Deviations, and MQL programming. (For Example: For a 10 pip trailing stop, by the definition of actual traders, you will need to input "100" in the MetaTrader Trailing Stop feature.) The proper definition of a pip (in the real world) is and always will be the fourth digit after the decimal for most currency pairs (the second digit after the decimal for Japanese Yen-quoted pairs). For example, if the bid price for GBP/USD is quoted at 1.45678, the pip value of the bid is 7 (not 8) but MetaTrader may erroneously treat the 8 as the pip value in many of its features. Likewise, if the EUR/JPY (a Japanese Yen quoted pair since the JPY is on the right side of it) is quoted at 123.789, the pip value of the ask is 8 (while the 9 may erroneously be treated as the pip value within MetaTrader). While MetaTrader remains the most popular platform demanded by traders, this is among the issues that traders must live with for the time being.

We do not currently place a time limit on your demo account. Whenever you're ready to experience the difference for real on our live accounts, you're free to do so. Until then, go ahead and play around in the demo and have some fun while you learn. We prefer winning traders join us, so keep training until you're sure that you feel ready to go live with us. (This may change in the future, but for now, we will not purposely delete your demo account unless you request it for any particular reason. If you've lost your demo account for some unknown reason, please contact our support staff so we can look into it for you.)

In the future, we may add other currency trading platforms as alternatives to MetaTrader.

At present, no. We may add one or more of these in the future, depending on demand. For now, all parties involved are more than satisfied with our premium pricing and execution on currency pairs.

One lot in MetaTrader is one standard lot: 100,000 units of the base currency (the currency on the left in the pair's symbol). For example, a trade of 1.00 lot of EUR/USD is valued at 100,000 units of Euros (which is most likely not 100,000 US Dollars unless the current price is at par). Likewise, 0.10 lot of USD/CAD is 10,000 US Dollars (0.10 x 100,000 = 10,000).

In the Power Trader software, the sizes of trades and positions are displayed in units of base currency (instead of Lots) by default. (You may change this in the Settings by going to BNFX Button > Settings.) 100,000 units of base currency = 1 Standard Lot (likewise, 10,000 units = 0.1 Lot). So if you want to place a trade for 0.10 Lot, then enter the size as "10,000".