Forex Brokers Based in South Africa

Fifty-seven of the forex and CFD brokers on our records give a South African registered address, and this page lists every one of them, ordered by overall score. One thing defines the list: where the company is incorporated. It is not a roll-call of every broker a South African can open an account with, and it is not the same as the set of firms holding an FSCA licence, because many of those keep their head office abroad.

Avior Capital Markets leads on 71.6, ahead of Duo Markets on 65.1 and the Finvasia-owned FXVIEW on 61.1. The median across all 57 is 41.1, and scores run down to 11, so this title spans a far wider band of quality than a shortlist would. The oldest name is not a modern brokerage at all: Standard Bank, on the register here since 1862, still carries an FSCA authorisation for the derivatives it deals, and only twelve of the 57 opened before 2010.

An FSCA licence and a local address are two different things

Fifty-two of the 57 hold a licence from the Financial Sector Conduct Authority, the body that supervises market conduct in South Africa and issues every provider an FSP number. The other five sit on the list by address alone: Cyber FX shows no licence on file, three dormant futures firms carry only a Comoros MISA registration, and Banxso appears under an offshore FSC licence. So a South African address tells you where the paperwork was filed, not that the FSCA stands behind the account.

The cautions attached to this population

Thirty-three of the 57 carry a status a trader should read before funding anything. Fifteen are marked as having exceeded the scope their licence permits, among them TD Markets and iFX Brokers; fourteen are logged as suspicious clones, including the second and third names on the list, FXVIEW and FXNovus; and four, such as Space Markets and Cyber FX, show no regulation at all. These are our own recorded labels, not accusations, but they are the reason a high score here is a starting point rather than a verdict.

Why the leverage figures run so high

South African rules do not cap retail leverage the way the UK or the EU do, and it shows. Nineteen of these firms advertise 1:1000 or more, and EMAR Markets lists 1:3000, while Avior, the highest-scored name on the page, holds its cap at 1:30. A very high figure usually means the account is booked through an offshore sister company rather than the FSCA-supervised entity, so the number and the licence do not always describe the same account.

Familiar names you will not find here

The large multinationals that market hardest to South African traders are missing on purpose. Most hold an FSCA branch licence but keep their head office in Cyprus, the United Kingdom or Australia, which puts them on our FSCA and FCA lists rather than this one. This page is the companies actually incorporated in South Africa, a smaller and, as the status column shows, more uneven group.

Before you treat any listing here as safe, a few checks specific to a domicile page:

• Match the FSP number. Look the firm up on the FSCA's own register and confirm its FSP number before depositing; an address is not an authorisation.
• Find out which entity holds your account. Several firms here route trades through an offshore sister in the Comoros, Seychelles or Cyprus that the FSCA licence may not cover.
• Read the leverage against the entity. A 1:1000 or 1:2000 offer rarely belongs to the locally supervised arm.
• Check the status label first. Thirty-three of these 57 carry a caution on our records, so open the individual page before you act on the score.

Everything above reflects the licences we hold on record today. Confirm any FSP number on the FSCA register before you deposit.