#1
Interactive Brokers Hong Kong Limited
RegulatedHong KongEst. 1996MISA
Regulation
License
Spread
73.5Score
One hundred and seventy-one brokers in the WIKILIX database hold at least one tier-4 licence, the weakest of the four regulatory tiers we track. Holding one does not place a broker at the bottom of the market, and it does not place it at the top. The tier describes a single licence, not the company behind it.
That gap is the first thing to understand. Interactive Brokers sits at the head of this list with a score of 72.5, and it holds eleven licences, among them the UK's FCA and Australia's ASIC. Its tier-4 entry is one line in a long register. At the other end, xChief holds a single Comoros MISA licence and nothing else, and CapPlace, scoring 4.0, is the same shape. A tier-4 licence is common to all three. What it buys the trader is not.
What a tier-4 licence is, and what it is not
Tier-4 authorities ask the least of the brokers they register. In practice that means light capital requirements and little ongoing supervision, with limited recourse if a firm fails or refuses a withdrawal. Two bodies issue almost every tier-4 licence in our data: the Comoros' MISA, recorded against 103 of these brokers, and Vanuatu's VFSC, recorded against 77, with a handful holding both. A licence from either lets a firm call itself "regulated" without submitting to the oversight the FCA or ASIC applies.
This is why the tier reads better as a floor than as a label. Eighty-nine of the 171 hold nothing beyond their tier-4 registration, and for them the tier is the whole story. It is a thin one. The other 82 hold at least one further licence, and for many that includes a stronger tier, so the tier-4 entry becomes a minor line rather than their only protection.
How the list reads
Scores run from 72.5 down to 4.0, and the median is 29.1, below the midpoint of that range. Clean records are the minority. Fifty-nine brokers carry our "regulation" status, while 110 carry a warning of some kind: 68 are marked offshore, 23 as operating without regulation, 13 as suspicious clones, five as having exceeded their licence and one, HTFX, as an outright scam despite a score of 62.9. That last case is the clearest argument against reading a score, or a licence, as a safety rating on its own.
| Broker | Score | Recorded status | Licences held |
|---|---|---|---|
| InteractiveBrokers | 72.5 | regulation | 11 |
| Hantec Bullion | 68.2 | regulation | 4 |
| FXGlobe | 65.0 | suspiciousClone | 5 |
| HTFX | 62.9 | scam | 5 |
| xChief | 32.4 | offshore | 1 |
| CapPlace | 4.0 | noRegulation | 1 |
Age varies as widely as everything else. The oldest firm here, Plotio Global Financial, opened in 1983, and 36 of the 171 were trading before 2010, though most are far younger and a cluster registered only in the past three years. Leverage tells its own story. Forty-seven brokers advertise a maximum of 1:1000 or more, and three, among them CapitalXtend and INGOT, reach 1:5000. Where a broker also answers to the FCA or ASIC, that ceiling drops hard, which is why a name such as Trading 212 shows 1:30 while the tier-4-only firms reach for four figures.
What this list does not tell you
It does not tell you which brokers accept clients from your country, and it says nothing about spreads or execution quality, neither of which we hold here. It is built from the licences recorded in our database as of today, so a firm that gains or loses a tier-4 licence moves on or off this list without anyone editing the page. Before depositing anywhere, confirm the licence on the issuing authority's own register, and read the broker's own terms for who it will actually onboard.
117brokers on this list
Researched & ranked by the Wikilix team
- #2
Hantec Bullion Investment Limited
RegulatedHong KongEst. 1990HKGX
RegulationLicenseSpread68.1Score - #3
FS International Limited
Suspicious CloneVanuatuEst. 2015CySEC
RegulationLicenseSpread67.0Score - #4
HTFX Limited
ScamUnited KingdomEst. 2018VFSC
RegulationLicenseSpread63.4Score - #5
VANTAGE GLOBAL PRIME PTY LTD
RegulatedAustraliaEst. 2012ASIC
RegulationLicenseSpread63.1Score - #6
Trading 212 UK Ltd
Suspicious CloneUnited KingdomEst. 2013ASIC
RegulationLicenseSpread62.2Score - #7
JFD Overseas Ltd
OffshoreVanuatuEst. 2011CySECRegulationLicenseSpread61.9Score - #8
Finateqs Corp
RegulatedBelizeEst. 2019FSC
RegulationLicenseSpread61.8Score - #9
QRS GLOBAL LLC
Suspicious CloneAustraliaEst. 2020FinCEN
RegulationLicenseSpread61.0Score - #10
CWG Markets Ltd
RegulatedUnited KingdomEst. 2014FCARegulationLicenseSpread60.8Score - #11
CFI International Ltd
OffshoreMauritiusEst. 2018FSA
RegulationLicenseSpread58.9Score - #12
DTT VAN LTD
RegulatedVanuatuEst. 2017VFSCRegulationLicenseSpread58.8Score
The tier is a floor, not a verdict. The safe way to use this page is to read a tier-4 licence as the least a broker can hold, then look at the rest of its record. A firm with only a MISA or VFSC registration is leaning on the thinnest oversight we track, while a firm that also holds an FCA or ASIC licence is answerable somewhere a withdrawal dispute can actually go.
To see the other end of the scale, the tier-1 rankings cover the highest-scoring brokers under authorities like the FCA and ASIC. The two bodies behind most of this list have pages of their own: the Comoros MISA register and Vanuatu's VFSC register each show who relies on that licence and little else. For a contrast in supervision, the FCA and FSCA lists collect brokers whose primary oversight sits onshore, the kind you can check yourself on the FCA register.
This page is generated from licence records rather than maintained by hand, so it updates as those records change and every count above moves with them. Confirm any licence on the issuing regulator's own register before you deposit, and check a broker's terms for whether it will open an account in your country, which no tier can tell you.
Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently asked questions
Answers from the Wikilix research team about this ranking.
Most Popular Questions
Because a broker follows the strictest regulator it answers to. The 47 brokers here advertising 1:1000 or more, up to 1:5000, are leaning on their tier-4 licence, which sets no hard cap. The ones showing 1:30, such as Trading 212, also hold an FCA or ASIC licence that limits retail leverage, and that stricter rule wins. The tier-4 entry alone would let them go far higher.
A tier-1 licence, from an authority like the UK FCA or Australia's ASIC, comes with strict capital rules and close supervision, with a real complaints process behind it. A tier-4 licence, from a body such as the Comoros' MISA, asks far less and gives a trader little to fall back on. Many brokers here hold both, which is why the leverage on offer often reveals which licence is really in charge.
Plotio Global Financial, a Hong Kong firm that opened in 1983 and holds licences across several tiers. It is the oldest of the 171, and 36 of them were trading before 2010. Age is not a status check, though: several long-running firms here still carry a warning label, so an opening year should be read alongside the recorded status rather than instead of it.
This list cannot tell you. It is built from the licences a broker holds and where it is headquartered, not from the countries it accepts clients in, which our data does not record. A broker can hold a tier-4 licence and still refuse or accept traders from any given country. Always read the broker's own terms and its onboarding rules before opening an account.
On its own, a tier-4 licence offers a trader little protection and little recourse, so it is not a safety mark. On this list, 110 of the 171 brokers carry a warning status, including 13 flagged as suspicious clones and one as a scam. Real safety comes from a broker's wider record and any stronger licences it holds, both of which this page lets you check per broker.
No. The tier describes one licence, not the company. Interactive Brokers appears on this list because it holds a tier-4 registration, yet it also holds ten other licences and scores 72.5. The weak cases are the 89 brokers here that hold nothing but a tier-4 licence, where that thin oversight is the only protection a trader has to fall back on.
Almost all of them come from two bodies: the Comoros' MISA, recorded against 103 of these brokers, and Vanuatu's VFSC, recorded against 77, with a handful holding both. Neither imposes the capital rules or ongoing supervision that a tier-1 regulator such as the FCA does, which is why a licence from either sits at the bottom of the tier scale rather than the top.
One hundred and seventy-one, as of today. They are the brokers holding at least one licence from a tier-4 authority, the weakest tier we track. Of those, 89 hold nothing else, while 82 hold at least one more licence. Only 59 carry a clean status record, and 110 carry a warning of some kind. The list is generated from licence data, so it moves as records change.