DukasCopy Platform Review – Swiss Forex Giant Goes for Binary Options

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DukasCopy Binary Options Platform Review

DukasCopy is a well known and respected Swiss Forex Bank providing access to the foreign exchange markets for institutional and private investors alike. The bank has now launched an advanced new platform for trading binary options that integrates the best aspects of spot forex and binary. The platform pricing is based on the bid/ask spread as displayed in the forex market and not on a mid point derived from the spread as is used by 99% of the binary options industry. Not to worry though, the platform – although complex – is extremely easy to use, the options very easy to trade. There is no difference except in how prices are displayed. Instead of one price, the spot price offered by the broker, there is a separate price for calls and puts based on the spread.

 

 

Platform Functionality – 9/10 Great Platform

Platform Efficiency – 8/10

Ease of use – 8/10

Additional Information – 5/10

Assets And Expiry – 8/10

Trading Tools – 10/10

Available Options – 7/10

Prices and Rates – 10/10 Great

 

Why DukasCopy Doesn’t Suck

DukasCopy doesn’t suck because it is an awesome trading platform. At last a platform has been created for serious traders. It includes the best charts of any broker I have seen. The charts have historical data going back for years, can be displayed by monthly down to tick by tick data, can be displayed as line, bar or candle charts and come with some of the most commonly used technical analysis tools on the market. After that the trading platform is top notch with no wasted space. The pricing model is innovative and offers some of the highest standard payouts in the industry: 90%

 

 

Why DukasCopy Might Suck

DukasCopy might suck because the platform is still very new and therefore does have some limits. However, I think that in time these limits can be easily overcome. For one, the platform only offers high/low binary options. This isn’t a problem for me but it may be for other traders looking for touch or range binary. It also might suck because the asset list is pretty short. The platform supports only the major forex pairs at this time; good, great even, for forex traders but not so much for anyone else.

 

Update June 2016: Apart from the regular Call/Put binary options, clients now have the opportunity to trade Pair Binaries and Daily Stock Options. Next we will briefly describe each of them because they bring a new way of trading compared to the regular pairs and stock options.

 

  • Pair Binaries. Here the trader has to choose a stock and then compare it to the index it is a part of. For example, if you choose Bayer AG you will have to compare it against the DAX German Stock Index (because Bayer is part of DAX) and decide which one will perform better by the end of the day. The interesting thing is that both Bayer and DAX can drop by the end of the day but if your choice dropped less, you will still win the trade. Maybe it’s difficult to understand at first but once you open the platform it will all clear up.

 

dukascopy assets list

 

  • Daily Stock Options. These function just like regular Up/Down or Call/Put options but the underlying asset is stocks and the expiry duration can be only one: the end of the session. In other words, the trader has to decide if at the end of the session (at market close) the stock will be higher or lower than it was when it started. The major advantage is that Dukascopy offers more than a thousand stocks from all over the world; however, not all exchanges are open at the same time, thus not all assets are tradable 24 hours a day. Despite this, the stock asset pool is huge. Make sure you read our Dukascopy Full Review for more information. (link coming soon)

 

 

Platform Technology

The platform technology on this site may be the best on the market. It is by far the best and most serious looking of any I have traded so far. You can definitely tell that this platform was designed by serious forex brokers because it has many of the features you can find with a good forex broker. The first and most important advancement by far is the use of the bid/ask spread in the pricing model. They still apply a risk reducing “our rate” to the strike prices but instead of one price based on the mid point of the spread there are individual prices for calls and puts based on the spread. This means that when you are trading calls you are trading against the bid price and when you are trading puts you are trading against the ask price. This has some advantages and some disadvantages but I think that in the end the advantages will outweigh the disadvantages. One disadvantage is that with a bid/ask spread the spread can sometimes widen, and sometimes narrow, which could adversely affect a trade, especially a very short term 60 second trade. However, it’s far better knowing about this spread than being totally unaware of it (which is the case with regular binary options brokers).

 

The interface is quite good and leaves no wasted space. The first and most prominent feature is the chart. The chart fills most of the screen and is the most advanced chart provided by any binary options platform I have seen to date. The chart can be displayed in a wide range of styles. Data can be displayed in tics, bars or candles. The time frame can vary from one month, one week, one day, one hour and down to 1 minute and even one tick for super precise trading. Next to the chart we have a drop down list with 15 currency pairs and 9 CFDs; just below you will find 2 boxes where you can choose the expiry and the amount you want to invest.

 

dukascopy trade panel

 

The expiry can be set no further than the end of the day but the best thing is that you can chose one minute increments. In other words your option can expire in any minute you choose from current time until the end of the day.

 

Choosing trade size is done in a box just below and can be as little as $1, at least in the demo account. Payouts on the platform are up to 90% but you can customize your risk, meaning that you can choose a lower payout in exchange for a refund. The available ratios of Payout to Refund are (at the moment of writing) 90% – 0%; 85% – 5%; 80% – 10%; 75% – 15% and 70% – 20%.

 

At the bottom of the trade screen there are three small windows that list your open trades, your closed trades and any pending orders you have set. The only negative of this feature is that it doesn’t show the strike and expiry once the trade is closed. The best, most useful feature, I found on this platform is the Pending Orders page. On this page you can set up a trade to be triggered at some time in the future. With this feature traders can choose an asset, a trade size, a direction, a time down to the minute and even set a minimum return that must be met in order for the trade to execute. To switch to Pending Orders Mode, look above the Call and Put Buttons and move the slider to the desired mode:

 

dukascopy pending trade option

 

Special Features

This platform is a special feature. The charting is top notch for a binary options broker and includes drawing tools and technical indicators. The pending orders tool is the most useful thing in binary options since binary options. The bid/ask model is very unique and more closely resembles forex trading. The payouts are 90% or more on average. It is provided by a top Swiss forex bank.

 

Pros

  • Swiss Forex Bank
  • Charts
  • Pending Orders
  • Payouts
  • Highly Advanced Professional Platform
  • Bid/Ask Spread
  • Huge choice of stocks

 

Cons

  • Limited Assets
  • Limited Expiry
  • No US
  • Limited Option Type
  • High Minimum Deposit for non-European clients

 

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