AvaTrade is a trusted global brand best known for offering an extensive selection of trading platforms for forex and CFD traders, as well as exceptional educational content that helped it nab a Best in Class rating for Beginners for 2023.
AvaTrade pros & cons
Pros
- Founded in 2006, AvaTrade is regulated in three tier-1 jurisdictions and four tier-2 jurisdictions, making it a safe broker (low-risk) for trading CFDs and forex.
- Alongside MetaTrader, AvaTrade offers its proprietary platforms AvaTrade WebTrader and AvaTradeGO, with innovative features such as AvaProtect.
- The AvaOptions app, powered by Sentry Derivatives, provides AvaTrade clients with an excellent forex options mobile trading platform.
- AvaTrade offers 44 forex options, in addition to over 1,200 CFDs.
- AvaTrade offers AvaSocial, along with ZuluTrade and DupliTrade for social copy trading, and finished Best in Class for 2023.
- AvaTrade ranks Best in Class for Professional traders for 2022.
Cons
- Pricing for retail accounts is in line with the industry average, but trails industry leaders.
- The AvaOptions desktop platform is slow to load, and has an outdated design that doesn’t match up with the sleek responsive design of its mobile counterpart.
- Out of 1,260 available symbols, at least 351 are on hold for both the MetaTrader and WebTrader platforms at AvaTrade.
- Research is limited to Trading Central modules, and just one or two daily articles and videos.
Is AvaTrade safe?
AvaTrade is considered highly trusted, with an overall Trust Score of 93 out of 99. AvaTrade is not publicly traded, does not operate a bank, and is authorised by four tier-1 regulators (high trust), four tier-2 regulators (average trust), and one tier-3 regulator (low trust). AvaTrade is authorised by the following tier-1 regulators: Australian Securities & Investment Commission (ASIC), Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC), Central Bank of Ireland (CBI) – Ireland , and the Japanese Financial Services Authority (JFSA) .
Offering of investments
The range of markets available at AvaTrade will depend on which trading platform you choose, and which of the brand’s global entities holds your account. AvaTrade offers 1,260 symbols in MT5 and nearly the same number in WebTrader, though a few hundred of those symbols have been put on hold.
The following table summarizes the different investment products available to AvaTrade clients.
Cryptocurrency: Cryptocurrency trading is available at AvaTrade through CFDs, but not available through trading the underlying asset (e.g. buying Bitcoin). Note: Crypto CFDs are not available to retail traders from any broker’s U.K. entity, nor to U.K. residents.
Commissions and fees
AvaTrade’s spreads are close to the industry average at just under one pip (0.9 pips), yet are slightly higher than the spreads available on the entry-level accounts offered by CMC Markets and Tickmill.
Professional traders: If you qualify as an elected professional trader, spreads on AvaTrade’s Professional account are competitive at 0.6 pips and comparable to FP Markets.
Mobile trading apps
AvaTrade’s proprietary apps provide a mobile experience that will satisfy most traders (including beginners), though they aren’t quite as advanced as the mobile apps provided by category leaders such as Saxo Bank, CMC Markets or TD Ameritrade (U.S. residents only). That said, AvaTrade continues to make incremental improvements in this category, and provides a generally well-rounded suite of apps.
Apps overview: AvaTrade provides its own proprietary mobile platforms, AvaTradeGO and AvaOptions, as well as the full MetaTrader suite (MT4 and MT5) for Android and iOS devices.
Ease of use: The AvaTradeGo app closely resembles its web counterpart, and features a robust default set of syncing watchlists as well as a volatility protection feature called AvaProtect. AvaProtect allows a trader to reduce the risk on an open trade by partially hedging their position with a forex option – for an added cost.
Charting: Charts in the AvaTradeGo app come with 93 indicators – though I found that it took multiple steps to access them. However, there are no drawing tools and only three selectable chart types. Trading Central provides integrated research and related tools, mirroring what’s available within the web platform. Overall, mobile charts at AvaTrade are good, but have room to improve.
AvaOptions: The AvaOptions app is well-designed, and takes a unique approach to displaying option-chain data. AvaTrade overlays strike prices onto a chart, allowing traders to change the strike price simply by dragging it higher or lower – a feature I found to be incredibly helpful. There are also 14 default options-trading strategies available, and selecting an option plan will automatically populate the order ticket with the related options contracts. One notable annoyance: the entire app experience was displayed in landscape mode, forcing me to hold my phone like a gaming controller.
Market research
AvaTrade produces daily in-house research content in video and article format, and grants access to Trading Central research modules. While AvaTrade has made improvements in this category, its research offering can’t stack up against what the best forex brokers offer.
Research overview: Beyond AvaTrade’s support for ZuluTrade, AvaSocial, and DupliTrade for copy trading, the main highlight from AvaTrade’s research offering is Trading Central. Trading Central is directly integrated within the AvaTrade web platform and includes a variety of TC-powered features, such as its Market Buzz, Analyst Views, and Featured Ideas tools, as well as an economic calendar and streaming news (available in MT5).
Market news and analysis: AvaTrade provides daily market analysis articles on its blog, along with daily market video updates published to its Vimeo and YouTube channels.
Education
AvaTrade provides a rich array of educational content from its in-house staff and its SharpTrader brand, as well as from third-party providers such as Trading Central.
Learning center: AvaTrade’s website features 103 comprehensive articles that cover beginner and advanced topics. As part of its SharpTrader offering, AvaTrade provides in-depth courses that are organized by experience level. These courses include both video and written content, and feature progress tracking and integrated quizzes.
AvaTrade’s 48 educational videos cover a wide range of topics, and explore niche subjects like Donchian Channels (what they are, and how traders can use them). AvaTrade also uploads and archives video webinars on its YouTube and Vimeo channel, which help to round out its offering.