Plus500

Plus500 review 2021

Plus500 is a renowned online broker founded back in 2008. It based in Israel and has several subsidiaries in the UK, Australia, Singapore, and Cyprus. The company was listed on the London Stock Exchange in 2018 and it offers CFD products to its customers globally.

Plus500 offers a built-in trading platform and does not support any third-party trading platforms like MT4. Its intuitive platform supports multi-device operations for windows, tablets, and mobile support.

Plus500’s listing and publishing of company financial information provide an additional layer of security to its clients. As public companies need to comply with certain financial and monetary regulations strictly.

We at Brokers-finder have analyzed different online brokers for you. Here is our comprehensive review of the Plus500 trading platform.

Overview

If you want to trade with a broker that offers an intuitive and clean user interface, Plus500 is your go-to option. Its expertise is in CFD trading with a good range of products and markets under the belt.

The company is regulated in five different global locations including the UK, Australia, Cyprus, Singapore, and Seychelles. The company is also a publically listed firm on the London Stock Exchange since 2018. According to Plus500, you’ll be part of a large customer base of 200,000 + customers with $ 1310+ billion trade volume for the financial year of 2019.

The Plus500 online trading platform is for you if you’re looking for a reliable trading platform thanks to its SSL protection. The user interface is clean and easier to navigate. Account opening is free with 0% commission on trading for CFDs.

Account Opening and Availability

Plus500 offers online trading services to its customers globally through its browser and mobile applications. Due to regulatory restrictions, it does not offer services in the US, Canada, and some other countries like Iran, Korea, etc.

Plus500 allows only individual account opening. There is no option for Institutional and corporate accounts as yet. However, individuals can start with a DEMO account first. The individual account opening process is simple and fast through an online set up with applicant ID verification and other details.

Users can register for an account with an email, Google, Facebook, or Apple ID providing an additional layer of security and ease.

The Plus500 professional account requires certain criteria to maintain as:

• Sufficient trading activities over the last 12 months, by sufficient it requires to perform at least 10 transactions quarterly
• Your trading portfolio value must accumulate over € 500,000 (note it’s not the account balance, it’s your portfolio volume of trading instruments)
• Or you can provide proof of professional expertise in the finance and trading industry

The minimum account deposits depend on the underlying financial asset and the country of operation you choose. For example, customers require £ 100 as a minimum account deposit to start trading with share CFD trading for a basic account that offers a 1:5 leverage.

Customers can opt for more than one accounts, but the platform explicitly discourages the practice.

Products and Markets

The Plus500 trading platform offers trading instrument as CFDs. You can expect to trade any financial instrument that online brokers offer these days. All trades will be on a CFD basis with no direct stock or ETF purchases as legal ownership.

With Plus500 you can choose anything from:

• Share CFDs with more than 1,900 stocks selected from top global exchanges
• FOREX CFDs
• Commodities CFDs
• Stocks CFDs
• Indices CFDs
• Options CFDs
• Cryptocurrency CFDs

Plus500 has a wide range of total trading instruments in their bank. Customers can choose from over 2,000 trading assets in different categories with little account opening balance requirements. Its options for CFD stocks are impressive with the collection. It offers basic leverage levels for a standard account, which you can enhance with a professional account, should you meet the qualification criteria.

Fee structure

The total cost of trading with an online broker always include trading and non-trading costs. Plus500 offers free account opening, free deposits, and free withdrawals for the customers. However, they do charge overnight, currency conversion, and account inactivity fees.

Leverage and Spreads

Plus500 does not offer a fixed percentage rate for its spread. It charges a varying rate of spreads on all CFD trading. The leverage for a standard account is usually 1:5 for stock CFDs which increases with a professional account.

For guidance purpose, we checked the currently offered spread on the top 10 most popular US stocks (Including the FANG club) to give you an idea of how the Plus500 spreads works as of December, 2020 (Those values vary over time).

• The initial margin requirement averaged 20%, and the maintenance margin at 10%
• The leverage for Standard Account remained at 1:5
• The average Spread for these 10 stocks remained at 0.096% with a range from 0.02% (for Microsoft) to 0.18% (for IBM)
• The average Spread for 07 major FOREX pairs is currently 0.023%

The leverage and Spread costs for a professional account holder change significantly as:

Trading platform

The plus500 firm has a built-in trading platform that offers support for browser versions with a desktop download option. It’s a clean and easy-to-navigate intuitive platform. The platform is available for:

• Desktop trader Windows 10
• Browser Version with popular internet browsers
• iPhone/IPad
• Android

The plus500 platform offers a clean user interface. Its dashboard is compellingly responsive and easy to navigate with most of the features and tools embedded for trading.

Users have the option of activating the two-factor authentication for extra security. The sign-up options with Google, Facebook, and Apple IDs also provide additional security for customers.

Customers can place four trading order types with Plus500:

• Set “Close at Profit” (Stop Limit)
• “Close at Loss” (Stop Loss) Price Levels
• Guaranteed Stop Loss order
• Trailing stop-loss order

76.4% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Platform Security and Regulation

If your online broker is a listed company, it should provide you another measure of security to stay comfortable with that broker. The online brokerage business must comply with at least one regulatory firm in the jurisdiction of its incorporation.

Customers’ deposited funds' management with segregated bank deposits with top tier bank is also a compliance regulation for brokerage firms.

Some key platform security features with Plus500 areas:

• The Plus500 company is listed on the London Stock Exchange and included in the FTSE 250 index
• It is regulated by the FCA in the UK
• Plus500CY Ltd authorized & regulated by CySEC (#250/14)
• regulated by the Seychelles Financial Services Authority
• Services license from the Monetary Authority of Singapore
• Licensed in Australia by ASIC, in New Zealand by FMA, and Licensed by FSCA in South Africa
• The Plus500 company is registered in Israel

What is the Plus500 protection money Policy?

• Plus500 participates in the Investor Compensation Fund for clients of Investment Firms regulated in the Republic of Cyprus. The ICF compensates the covered Clients for claims arising from the covered services provided by its members, as long as failure by the ICF member to fulfil its obligations towards its clients. The total payable compensation to each covered Client of the Company may not exceed the amount of twenty thousand Euros
• Clients from all other jurisdiction do not have any insurance or compensation cover on offer currently

Deposit and Withdrawal Options

Modern online brokers offer most of the payment processing options. One common restriction comes with the choice of base currencies on offer. Plus500 offers customers to operate in 14 different currencies to choose as their base currency. It can save you on the broker platform charges as well as high currency conversion and bank charges for international transactions. Most of the credit cards also charge high-interest rates and currency conversions.

With Plus 500 You can choose one of these payment methods depending on availability in your region:

• Credit/ Debit Cards such as VISA and MasterCard
• Bank Transfers for International Customers
• PayPal
• Trusty
• Skrill, iDEAL, iBPAY, Klarna, giropay, Blik

There are no funds deposit charges from Plus500. The withdrawal option will be the same as your funds' deposit option. The monthly withdrawals up to 5 transactions are free and charged at the US $ 10 per transaction above it.

Customer Support and Education

Customer support and education material play an important role for many of the young traders. You may need support initially to get things going with account set up, trading tool exploration, and other settings such as market orders and alerts.

Plus500 offers prompt customer support through:

• Email
• Live Chat and
• WhatsApp

There is no direct call service though on offer currently.

The platform offers learning and educational material through its extensive guides and blog posts. You can get hands-on training and learning experience with the Plus500 platform through their:

• Demo Account Set up
• Videos on Trader’s Guide Section
• Risk Management Guide
• Trade Alerts such as Price, percentage change, trader sentiments, etc. on a daily or hourly basis

Plus500 provides a Demo account option to its customers as most of the online traders do. However, additional education material such as live sessions or Webinars could have done a better job for Plus500 customers.

Things We Like About Plus500

A clean and user-friendly trading platform that aspires for simplicity in the company vision statement is one of the great features of the Plus500 platform. It’s an established trading platform for over a decade now with trading options in CFDs such as Forex, Stocks, Commodities, Options, and Indices.

Here are some features from Plus500 that made to our favorite’s list:

• It is a public company with listing on the London Stock Exchange Company and included in the FTSE 250 index
• It offers a simple and easy to use trading platform
• It is regulated by several financial regulatory authorities including the FCA in the UK
• Inclusise list of financial assets such as FOREX, Stocks, Commodities, Options, and Indices
• The language support for international customers is extensive with 32 supported languages
• International customers can choose from 14 international currencies to set as their base currency, saving substantial conversion fees
• Guaranteed stop-loss order for many financial assets
• Investors’ money protection for clients in the UK and EURO zone
• A New Islamic Trading Account feature for clients in the Middle East and other regions

Things We Wish to See with Plus500

For a well-established online broker and a listed company, there are certain features that users would expect from Plus500. It has grown a long way with its simple and intuitive trading platform. It currently has global office locations in 5 different countries, but user expectations and market competition is always demanding.

Here are our top wished-for features with Plus500:

• Additional third-party Trading platforms like MT4 to give professional traders better options
• Increased products and market range particularly with ETFs
• Direct Stocks and ETFs purchase enabling customer ownerships as the only trading option is currently through CFDs
• Advance Market Analytical tools and Trends
• Enhanced educational material

Although Plus500 provides more than 100 trading analysis tools such as charting and price alerts, most of these tools lack in-depth fundamental analysis. However, the lack of educational and research material is compensated for by the Plus500 prompt customer support.

A Quick Wrap-Up

If an intuitive and simpler trading platform is your choice, then Plus500 must be on your radar. It enjoys an additional reputational benefit of being a listed company. Its financial statements are publically listed.

The Plus500 firm is also regulated by several top regulators in the UK, Australia, and Cyprus. The lower funding fees, and competitive spreads make their platform a go-to option for many. However, currently, there are no direct stocks and ETF trading options as all trading is done through CFDs only.