O-Markets: Is it legit or scam?

O-Markets makes fake claims and is an unlicensed and unregulated forex broker. Find out more in this O-Markets review.

O-Markets lies to its traders and requests their users to install AnyDesk, a remote access software that lets them control your PC. The website of O-Markets is in Arabic and English and has a very plain interface as you can see below:

The first impression of this broker hasn’t been very good. Another shady thing is that they don’t give you any contact information in their ‘Contact Us’ section:

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O-markets contact

In my O-Markets review, you’ll find out if it’s worthy of your trust or not. Let’s get started:

O-Markets License and Regulation

O-Markets has filled its ‘About Us’ section with useless information. They claim that their headquarters is in London but don’t specify its address, an indication that they are lying. 

The broker doesn’t give any information about its address and regulation anywhere on its website, which makes them more suspicious.

However, I wanted to be certain. 

As a broker who claims to be based in London, UK, O-Markets must have a license from FCA to operate. So, I checked the FCA register but I didn’t find any information on this broker. O-Markets doesn’t hold a license from FCA and is an unregulated and unlicensed service provider. 

How can you spot a broker who is trying to deceive you?

A broker’s credentials, registration, and job history can be reviewed using BrokerCheck, a free online tool provided by FINRA. Disputes with clients, disciplinary actions, and specific financial and criminal matters on the broker’s record are all covered in the disclosure portion of BrokerCheck.

Be wary of unlicensed and unregulated brokers. These brokers don’t follow the stringent rules and regulations of popular authorities such as the FCA or CySEC. Such brokers can use shady techniques to steal your funds or data and get away scot-free because of their unregulated nature. 

Regulatory authorities keep a close watch on licensed brokers so they don’t act against their clients’ interests. In case a broker does act against their clients’ interests, the clients can get insurance compensation from their respective regulator. For example, CySEC offers €20,000 in case the broker files for insolvency. Regulators ensure that the broker keeps their operation funds separate from their clients’ trading funds as well.  

Check out: Rockfort Global FX

Unregulated brokers don’t provide such benefits and that’s why it’s very risky to trade with them. If you want to keep your funds and data safe from fraudsters, it’s best to avoid trading with unregulated brokers. 

There’s a good chance that O-Markets is lying to people and is not a financial services provider. 

O-Markets is an unregulated forex broker who hides a lot of vital information. There’s a very high chance that it’s a fraud and you should stay away from them.

O-Markets Trading Conditions

Checking the trading conditions of a broker can help you a lot in understanding its reliability. I always recommend checking the trading conditions of the broker before signing up with them. It ensures that you don’t sign up with the wrong broker. Let’s see if O-Markets’s trading conditions are okay or not:

Trading Platform 

In terms of trading platforms, Metatrader is always the best. Metatrader 4 and 5 are among the most popular trading platforms in the forex industry because of the vast amount of benefits they offer. MT4 provides you with real-time and historical data, interactive charts, as well as, online quotes to help you make better trading decisions. You don’t get such facilities with other trading platforms. 

It’s clear that the people behind O-Markets recognize the popularity of these trading platforms that’s why they claim to offer MT5 on their site. 

But that’s completely misleading. These people don’t offer MT5, instead they give you a basic trading platform while claiming that it’s MT5. 

I believe this is a huge red flag that O-Markets is a scam. Otherwise, why would they resort to lying to their users. 

O-Markets lies about providing MT5 to its clients. They give you a generic trading platform in the name of MT5 and are trying to deceive people. 

Minimum Deposit

O-Markets offers multiple account types to its clients. The minimum deposit required to start trading with them is $500, which is substantially higher than the industry average. Regulated and reputed brokers keep their minimum investment requirement around $50 and some even go as low as $10 to keep themselves accessible. 

You shouldn’t trust brokers that have high minimum deposit requirements. It’s usually an indication that the broker is a fraudster. Because most regulated brokers keep their minimum deposit limit very low to make them accessible to a wider audience. 

Shady brokers keep their minimum deposit limit high so they can steal a substantial sum of funds right away. 

Leverage and Spreads

Another indication that O-Markets is a fraudster is that it provides no information about its leverage and spreads. Both of them are vital pieces of information and help one in determining whether a broker is reliable or not. 

It’s possible that O-Markets offers terrible spreads and leverage ratios. That’s why they have kept this data hidden. 

Brokers that offer very high leverage ratios, such as the one O-Markets offers, are usually scammers. FCA, the financial regulator in the UK, doesn’t allow its brokers to offer more than 1:30 leverage to their customers. They have added this restriction to ensure that clients don’t lose their funds because of recklessly high leverage ratios. A very high leverage ratio can cause you devastating losses.

Shady forex brokers keep their leverage ratios high so they can trap their clients in large piles of debt. 

Trading Accounts

O-Markets offers the following trading accounts to its clients:

o-markets accounts

Self-Employed

The minimum deposit for this account is $500. The broker claims to offer you access to their video library, 24/7 customer support, daily market analysis, and daily recommendations with this account. 

Simple Start

This account requires a minimum deposit of  $5,000. You get all the benefits of the Self-Employed account along with SMS alerts and exclusive updates.

Essentials

The Essentials account requires a minimum deposit of $10,000 and offers “Full risk management” along with the benefits of the Simple Start account. 

Plus

This account requires a minimum deposit of $25,000 and offers portfolio management along with the features of the previous accounts. 

Note that I don’t recommend any of these trading accounts. Even though they claim to offer various advantages, they seem like a cheap attempt by the broker to appear attractive to new traders. 

O-Markets Payment Methods and Charges

Transaction Methods

O-Markets doesn’t give you any information about its funding methods. This is another suspicious sign and strengthens my impression of them being a scam. 

However, even though brokers offer various payment methods, you should only fund your account through bank cards as they let you file a chargeback 540 days since the date of transaction. So if things go wrong, you can get your money back easily. You don’t get this advantage with other payment methods such as wire transfer and cryptocurrencies. 

Fees

O-Markets has kept all information about its fees hidden. In fact, you can’t access their legal documents too. They have kept them inaccessible to hide sensitive information which might prove them to be a scam. 

Usually when a broker hides information about its fees, it charges hidden fees and steals the funds present in its clients’ accounts. That’s why you should be wary of such brokers. 

Is O-Markets a Scam? Yes!

It’s clear by now that O-Markets is a scam. The forex sector has many kinds of scammers. Usually, the scammers in this field focus on attracting new and inexperienced traders to their platforms through fake claims and bonus offers. They get the user to sign up on their platform and accept their fishy terms and conditions. Such brokers hide their unfair conditions in the fine print and people usually ignore them while signing up.

Then, they either use hidden fees or make excuses to take away the deposited funds from their user’s trading accounts. Having a high minimum deposit ensures that they get a substantial amount to steal from every user.

The best way to combat such scams is to do thorough research before signing up on any new broker’s website. You should check the broker’s regulation, license, address, and its reputation online. Some brokers even spend money on fake reviews to create a fake positive reputation on the internet. 

O-Markets Review: Conclusion

O-Markets claims to be based in London, UK but doesn’t have a license from the British regulator, FCA. It’s an illegal operation and hides a lot of information from its clients. All of this indicates that O-Markets is a potential fraud and you should avoid them at all costs. 

Be sure to share this O-Markets review with others. The more people know about this scam, the better. 

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