Vantage Review, Test & Rating in 2024

Before you register and start trading with Vantage, it is important to be aware of the positive and negative aspects of the broker's services.

Trading at Vantage is cheap since traders don't get levied with charges for most of the services the broker offers. For the most part, traders don't pay commissions, except for specific types of accounts. Then, there are no deposit, withdrawal, and inactivity fees.

The educational and research tools are aimed at boosting traders' profitability. The customer service is also responsive and available at almost all times of the day.

Although Vantage offers access to a lot of Forex pairs and shares CFDs, popular instruments such as cryptocurrencies and some exotic Forex pairs are absent. Then, it does not provide access to buying or investing in underlying assets such as shares and crypto tokens.

The fees and commissions charged on CFDs trading are a bit on the high side when compared to other brokers. Moreover, the broker does not protect the accounts of traders from falling into the negative territory, which implies that traders can end up owing the broker.

Available at Vantage FX is a suite of global markets and assets. Traders can speculate on a wide variety of Forex pairs, CFDs on shares and shares indices, and commodities. Those available instruments are

• Forex (+40 pairs)
• Indices (15)
• Energy
• Soft commodities (20)
• Precious metals (5), and
• US, UK, EU, and AU share CFDs (100 +)

Vantage utilises superior trading technology to offer traders ultra-fast trading execution speeds. As a result, traders do not experience any significant interruptions during trading sessions. A key feature of Vantage services is cheap and affordable trading. The spreads the broker charges across instruments are minimal, meaning that traders can get the best out of a profitable trade.

Then, the fees and commissions that traders are charged for executing trades and other related activities are negligible. Deposits and withdrawals related to the trading account do not attract any charges internally, which means traders get as much of their profits as possible. There are also no fees for long-term inactivity, so traders do not incur expenses when they are not trading.

How can you open an account at Vantage ?

The process of getting a trading account with Vantage is not complicated. By the company's own estimates, the process should not take more than 5 minutes. The specific steps you need to take go thus:

1. Go to the account opening portal and fill out the forms. (80% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider.)
2. First, you will enter key details including your email, nationality, residential address, and your identification number. You can select from any of national identity card, passport, or government-issued driver's license.

Vantage also requires your employment, financial details, and answers to some questions about your trading experience.

1. Then you are to configure your trading account by selecting your trading platform, account type, and the currency in which the account will be denominated.
2. Upon filing these details, you, however, have to undergo a Know Your Customer (KYC) process by uploading documents to show Proof of Address and Proof of Identity.

• Proof of Identity: For this, you need to submit an identity document issued by the government. You can select one of national identity card, passport, or driver's license.
• Proof of Address: This can be either your statement of account from your bank bearing your residential address, a utility bill, or a residential certificate.

Opening an account on Vantage is completely digitised and, as such, you can complete the entire process on any of your devices.

Upon completing the above, Vantage issues you a trading ID and password with which to log into your client portal, deposit funds, and start your trading. The minimum amount you can deposit into the trading account is $200.

Vantage clients get to trade from a broad range of trading platforms. These include:

• The Vantage mobile application available on Android and iOS.
• MetaTrader 4 & 5
• ProTrader
• WebTrader
• ZuluTrade
• DupliTrade
• MyFxBook Autotrade

Across these platforms, Vantage  provides quick market execution, quality charting and analysis tools, and the ability to enter limit and stop orders. While the MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 have the same offers in terms of account type, range of markets, platform access, leverage, and minimum trade size, they, however, provide 9 and 21 timeframes respectively.

Through ZuluTrade, DupliTrade, and MyFxBook Autotrade, Vantage also offers social trading via which traders can profit by copying the positions of more experienced investors.

Vantage offers traders two major types of accounts aimed at providing for the services of different classes of traders. These types of accounts are the Standard STP, RAW ECN, and PRO ECN.

Standard STP

This account is aimed mainly at beginner traders and features zero commissions and low spreads. Its key features include:

• Trading Platform: MetaTrader 4 and 5.
• Minimum Deposit: $200
• Minimum Trade Size: 0.01 Lot
• Maximum Leverage: 500:1.
• Spreads: Starting from 1.0 pip.
• Commissions: None

RAW ECN

The RAW ECN account focuses more on more experienced traders who are in need of greater market liquidity and minimal commissions. The key features you get with this account are outlined below:

• Trading Platform: MetaTrader 4 and 5.
• Minimum Deposit: $500
• Minimum Trade Size: From 0.01 Lot
• Maximum Leverage: 500:1.
• Spreads: Starting from 0.0 pips.
• Commissions: Starting from $3.0 per lot, per side.

PRO ECN

The best users of this account category are institutional traders and professional fund managers who require ultra-fast speed of trade execution. The services to look out for are:

• Trading Platform: MetaTrader 4 and 5.
• Minimum Deposit: $20,000
• Minimum Trade Size: From 0.01 Lot
• Maximum Leverage: 500:1.
• Spreads: Starting from 0.0 pips.
• Commissions: Starting from $2.00 per lot, per side.

Across these account types, traders can get to trade over 300 CFDs instruments including forex pairs, shares, equity indices, and commodities.

Vantage Demo Account

Vantage  offers traders a demo account that can give them access to the markets "in under 30 seconds." To start using the virtual account, clients have to sign up with their personal information including full names, country of residency, and contact details. Alternatively, prospective users can sign up with their social media accounts, choosing one of Facebook, Google+, or LinkedIn.

The demo account from Vantage enables traders to trade with real-life conditions, even though they are trading with unreal funds.  Traders have permanent access to the account as there are no time limits for its use. Traders can execute trades in the market for 24 hours, 5 days a week.

Vantage  makes it possible for traders to deposit and withdraw through a variety of channels. These channels include:

• Credit and Debit Cards processors: Including MasterCard, Visa, UnionPay, JCB,
• Bank and wire transfer both domestic and international.
• Electronic Wallets including Neteller, Skrill, AstroPay, and FasaPay.
• Other channels such as POLi, BPay, transfer from one broker to another and others.

Vantage  itself does not charge you any funds for deposits and withdrawals. However, any of the payment channels above may levy charges for making the transactions happen.

Note that Vantage  does not permit any third-party transactions. Whenever you carry out any deposit or withdrawal transactions, the account you use must be owned by you and be registered in the same name you used to open your Vantage account. Otherwise, Vantage  may stop the transactions from going through. The main purpose of this is to protect your funds.

In the case of bank payments, traders at Vantage can choose from around 8 currencies in which to carry out their transactions. This is slightly less than what you get at FP Markets, which offers up to 15 local currencies. However, it is much better than FXCM, which provides only 4 currency options.

The payment channels that will be available to you will depend on your location. You can check a list of these available options on your client portal. Then, there is generally a restriction on one-time deposits to a maximum of $10,000.

Do you have any complaints? Or do you just want to get in touch with the broker? You can do so via a dedicated phone number, email, or live chat. Vantage  provides quick, reachable, and helpful customer service. Traders can reach the customer support agents via a dedicated phone number, email, and live chat both on the website and mobile app. Most of these channels are available 24/7.

Vantage is licensed by top-tier financial regulators across three continents. These include the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority (CIMA), and the Vanuatu Financial Services Commission (VFSC).

Here are the multiple entities or subsidiaries under which Vantage operates depending on location:

• Vantage Global Prime LLP, a financial services company regulated and licensed by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) UK.
• Vantage Global Prime Pty Ltd, a financial services company licensed and regulated by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).
• Vantage International Group Limited, a financial services company regulated and overseen by the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority (CIMA).

Is your money safe at Vantage?

The funds that traders deposit into their trading accounts at Vantage are safe and secure. This is because of the preparations that the broker has made to ensure that the funds of traders are protected. These arrangements include the holding of clients’ funds in accounts that are separated from the broker's own funds.

The broker is regulated by at least two key tier-1 authorities such as FCA, ASIC, VFSC, and CIMA, who place a lot of emphasis on the insurance of clients' funds. Then, its banks with top, AAA-rated banks including National Australia Bank (NAB) and Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA).

However, note that most of the broker's regulators do not require insurance for the funds of the clients.

• FCA - €85,000 (UK)
• ASIC - No protection (Australia)
• CIMA - No protection (Cayman Islands)
• VFSC - No protection (Vanuatu)

Also, Vantage does not offer clients negative balance protection which implies that traders can easily lose more money than the balance they have in their trading accounts whenever they have losing trades. Instead, the broker immediately closes losing trades if it appears that they will lead to the trader losing not only all the funds in their account, but even end up owing the broker.

However, sometimes, depending on the situation, if contacted, Vantage can help a client restore their account to a neutral balance after which the client can redeposit funds and resume their trading. More importantly, to prevent the rare cases of accounts entering negative balance, the broker has put in place features such as margin and stop out.