Frequently asked questions

We currently offer cash CFDs which do not have an expiry date. As CFDs are traded on margin, you will only pay or receive an overnight financing rate linked to the relevant benchmark rate for the particular currency in which your position is denominated. This means you can keep them running for as long as you choose.

If you are buying a currency or an instrument, you are considered in a ‘long’ position. If you are selling on the other hand, then you are in a ‘short’ position.

You can trade as low as 0.01 lot (or 1,000 units of base currency) on all our currency pairs. Please note: • 0.01 lot = 1,000 units of base currency. • 0.1 lot = 10,000 units of base currency. • 1 lot = 100,000 units of base currency.

Sometimes referred to as a rollover, 'Swap' is the financing (interest) component of your open CFD. It can be paid by you or paid to you, depending on the CFD you are trading.

Our swap rates are calculated automatically in the trading platform, however, for your information, swap rates may be calculated using the following formula: • Current long/short rate * number of lots = swap debit/credit in second currency. If you have any further questions regarding our swap rates, please contact us directly.

On Wednesday nights, overnight financing charges are tripled. This adjustment accounts for the weekend when no swap rates are applied because the market is closed. However, not all triple swaps are on Wednesday: • Only Forex is on Wednesday. • Stocks, Indices and Commodities are on Friday.

Overnight financing costs are applied during the New York close, which equates to 00:00 platform time.

When you open a CFD Position, you are required to provide a security deposit. We refer to this as ‘Margin’. Margin will be held by us until your CFD Position is closed. The value of the Margin required to open a CFD Position is set in accordance with the Leverage Ratio of your Trading Account, and/or the CFD that you trade. Margin is calculated as a percentage of the notional value of the CFD. Margin may be fixed to a percentage at the opening of your Position, or it may float in accordance with the movement of the CFD price. Example: • The leverage on your Trading Account is 1:30, which is expressed as a Margin Percentage of 3.33%. You decide to take a Position by buying 0.1 of a contract of AUD/USD. This is a notional value of $10,000 AUD. • The Margin required for this contract is equal to approx. $333.33 AUD (i.e. 3.33% of $10,000 AUD).

You are responsible for monitoring your trades. We do not offer guaranteed stop-losses. If your equity falls to 80% of the required margin, you are regarded as being on ‘margin call’, which means you may need to deposit funds or reduce your exposure. Once your account equity falls to or below 50%, we will liquidate your positions starting with those that are losing the most against the market. We strongly encourage that you have exit strategies and stop-loss orders set in place to help protect you against potential market movements. Stop-losses are not guaranteed and may be subject to slippage during volatile market conditions.

If you have no free margin, you will not be able to open any new positions and/or your positions will be stopped out.

You can apply online through our client portal by clicking 'Trade now'.

Yes we do! We want to provide you with the opportunity to become familiar with the trading environment and test our platform before you apply for a live account. Our demo account normally lasts for 30 days, but clients may opt-to apply for a non-expiry demo account by contacting us. You can open a demo account by clicking the link on-page.

‘Market gapping’ refers to the price movement of an asset, i.e. currencies, stock indices, commodities, etc. during a period where no trading has occurred. Gapping in the market is seen as the difference in the price of an asset between its closing price at the end of one trading period and its opening price at the next trading period; they typically occur overnight or over the weekend. On occasion, gaps can also occur over shorter time frames.

Simply go to the Market Watch area, right-click and choose Symbols. Then click on the properties for a particular trading symbol and it will give you all the details including the swap rates.

Our trading platforms are currently set to GMT+3. Trading begins at 00:00 platform time, with daily rollover occurring at the same time each day. This time cannot be changed on the platform. • Click 'Change your password'.

If you’ve lost or forgotten your trading account login password, you can simply reset it via the Client Portal: • Navigate to 'Trading Accounts' • Click on the three-dots button next to your trading account • Click 'Change your password'.

Our standard Demo accounts last for 30 days only. You won’t be able to access it once it expires. To get a new Demo account, please navigate to the 'Try free demo' button below.

If you wish to make changes or update the details on your trading account, you may request this by contacting us via our 'Contact' page.

If you have not yet funded your live account, you can apply to have the currency of your account changed. To do so please contact our Customer Support team via the 'Contact' page. If you have funded your account but have not yet traded, you may change your account currency with some potential costs and a time delay. Please note however that you may be subjected to bank transfer fees and the market foreign exchange rates as we put in the request to transfer from one currency account to another bank where the other currency accounts are held. Please contact us if you wish to put in this request. If you have already started trading on your account, unfortunately you will not be able to change the currency in your account. If you still wish to trade in another currency, the best option we recommend is to open an additional live trading account via the Client Portal.

We currently support the following major currencies: AUD, USD, GBP, NZD, SGD, JPY and EUR. You will be asked which currency you would like your Focus Markets trading account to be held in during your application. Note the currency you have selected is also the currency you will deposit funds in.

There is a maximum of five (5) trading accounts per entity. An entity is identified as either an individual trader, joint account traders, company or trust trader. For example, as an individual trader you can open up to a maximum of five trading accounts but if you wish to open a joint trading account between yourself and another trader, you will have the option of another additional five accounts under this entity title. Provided that all documentation has been presented and approved for each entity type, there is no limit to how many entities clients may wish to trade under. Under special considerations and approval by management, clients may be able to request beyond the five account limit.

It is completely free to open a live account with us. However, we do require a minimum deposit of $100 (account base currency) when you fund for the first time.

Our demo account takes less than a minute to set up whilst our live account application may take approximately 5-10 minutes to complete.

You will be asked to upload your identification documents during your live account application process online. If, for any reason, you cannot provide the documents during your application, you can also send the documents to us via email.

We do not charge any internal fees for deposits or withdrawals but be aware that the provider you use might charge you a transaction fee and/or international processing fee and/or other.

Most of our payment options are instant. If you have funded via credit card, funds will usually be available in your account within seconds of completing the transaction. If you have funded via bank transfer however, funds will need to clear before they appear in your trading account. This can take 1-3 working days, depending on your location.

No, you do not need to deposit right away. However, you will only be able to trade on the financial markets if you have funds in your account.

Every withdrawal is subjected to a review from our Finance team and that can take from 1-2 Business days. After the request has been completed, the funds will arrive as per the listed processing time.

If you want to withdraw funds from your account, please log into the client portal and make a withdrawal request. You must choose to withdraw you funds via the same method used to deposit.

In this case, your deposits will be converted to the base currency of your account by real-time foreign exchange rate determined by your financial institution.

No - we do not pay any interest on your funds.

You can do this through the Client Portal: • Log into your Client Portal. • Navigating to 'Trading Accounts'. • Click on the three-dots button next to your trading account. • Click 'Change your password'.

This error occurs when the server receives multiple requests for the same order/trade. Please restart your trading platform to resolve.

For Live accounts – This is either one of the following errors: incorrect login number or password. If you are still having issues after attempting to re-enter your login details, please contact us. For Demo Accounts – This means you’ve either entered the wrong login number or password, or your demo account has expired.

Yes, MT5 and cTrader allows multiple login simultaneously to the same account. You can log into your account from the platform’s desktop terminal on your PC and sign in using your mobile phone while you’re on-the-go.

For MetaTrader 5: • Go to Tools > History Center • Select the pair and the time frame you want to reset • Select ALL of the data and click Delete twice (to select all – click the first record, hold SHIFT and scroll all the way down to the bottom to select the last record while holding the SHIFT key) For cTrader: • Right-click on the chart you want to reset. • Click the Refresh field.

By default, you are unable to run more than one platform from the same place at the same time. If you wish to run two instances of the MetaTrader 5 platform on your PC, you will need to install a second instance of the platform but in different directories on your PC. When you are running the installer, there is a setting button on the same page of the licence agreement. Click on the button and rename the destination folder and continue. It will then install another copy of MetaTrader 5 on your computer. For cTrader, The Windows application has built-in functionality to run multiple instances simultaneously from a single installation.

If you would like to install or use your own custom indicator and Expert Advisor, you can do this on MetaTrader 5 by going to File > Open Data Folder and open MQL5 folder. There are experts and indicators folders within it and you will need to copy the .mq5 / .ex5 files into their respective folder. For cTrader, you can load custom indicators and Expert Advisors (cBots) via the cTrader Algo section of the desktop platform. To install, click .algo files, after which you can add them to your charts.

If you can’t find all the symbols that we offer in your MetaTrader 5 account’s Market Watch, they may just be hidden. Simply right-click anywhere on the Market Watch window and select Show All. For cTrader, navigate to the Market Watch panel > click on the symbol title > select All Symbols to view all available symbols.

MetaTrader 5 updates automatically when a new version is released. If updates fail, Windows restrictions may be the cause. To fix this, right-click the MT5 icon and select "Run as administrator." Reopening the platform should prompt the update. cTrader also updates automatically: • Desktop: Restart the application if prompted by a notification. • Web: You'll always be on the latest version. • Mobile: Update through your device's app store.