If the Ninja Trader Brokerage’s minimum account balance of $2000 to trade Forex is still too steep for you, and for whatever reason you don’t want to trade Nadex’ Forex contracts, then FXCM’s mini account is another possibility.
FXCM offers a mini account for as low as $50 to open it. I believe the number of pairs available to trade is up to 21 different pairs now.
If you open a Forex account with Ninja Trader Brokerage at their minimum of $2000, then you can lease or purchase the Ninja Trader Platform and trade right off your charts. With the FXCM mini account, you use the FXCM platform to enter and exit your trades.
When you are trading an FXCM mini account, know that you are trading against their Dealing Desk. What does that mean? A Dealing Desk broker is a brokerage that has Forex “market makers” trade on their brokerage to provide liquidity to their customers. The market maker makes money on the spread between the sell and buy quote they provide. By providing both sides of the trade the market maker isn’t necessarily interested in the individual trader. With this setup FXCM creates a market for traders.
A Dealing Desk setup is not an exchange like Nadex. When you enter a buy order for EUR/USD the Dealing Desk first tries to find a match to a sell order from its other customers. If none is found, they look to the liquidity provider or market maker orders. This minimizes the Dealing Desk’s risk, as they will make money from the spread, without taking the opposite side of your trade. The Dealing Desk puts a markup on the liquidity maker’s spread. If there are no matching orders at all, the dealing desk will take the other side of your trade. Every broker has different risk management policies, so check with FXCM to see what theirs are, and to understand them. They offer live chat or you can call them if you need to ask questions.
Dealing Desk brokers have to stay competitive and they also need customers to remain open and attract market makers. For all of these reasons, it is to their advantage to have spreads and the markups within the spreads, as low as possible. Also note, when trading spot Forex you are taking on unlimited risk, unlike at Nadex where the risk is defined and capped up front, thereby eliminating margin calls.
FXCM offers demo accounts, and as Darrell Martin says, “it’s much cheaper to learn in demo, than it is live”.