Quite recently FreshForex surprised traders again by changing a lot in its image. Now the company is going to draw the eye of advanced traders. To do so, FreshForex had to overhaul many things, starting from appearance of the site, significant improvement of trading conditions, launch of new services, and finishing with... well, we will not speak of the conclusion. The company has a lot of plans which will soon be made a reality.
We learned about the company's fresh image first hand - our questions were answered by Pavel Chebotarev, General Director and Managing Partner of FreshForex.
Market Leader: Pavel, congratulations to you and your team on the launch of a new site. What are such significant changes in the company's image and operation related to?
Pavel Chebotarev: Thank you for the congratulations. Indeed, what has happened was not a mere redesign of the site. We have been working in the market since 2004 and quite a few traders have grown in our company over this time, walking the path from a beginner to a pro together with us. When traders' professionalism grows, so do their requirements to the broker. We strive to keep abreast of our clients so the changes we're speaking about now are a serious step to meet our traders halfway.
Market Leader: Let's start with the main thing - what has changed in your company's trading conditions?
Pavel Chebotarev: To start with, we managed to improve cooperation and optimize work with liquidity suppliers. This helped us make trading conditions even more attractive.
Both account types retain all their advantages. For example, the lowest market swaps and no fees whatsoever for trades. Both accounts are 'democratic' enough as we already cancelled a minimum amount requirement for Classic accounts. Now the time has come for professional accounts, MarketPro. Let's start with them.
Professional NDD MarketPro accounts are rather popular among traders for instant market execution (guaranteed 0.5-1.5 sec), higher precision of prices (5 decimal digits), no requotes, narrow dynamic spreads from 0.9 pips (by the way, they are limited by maximum values even at news time) and absolutely no fees (unlike NDD accounts offered by most rivals). The product of version 2.0 has become even more attractive: levels for pending orders have been cancelled, and no margin is required for locked trades. The minimum trade size is 0.01 lots (1000 of basic currency), the maximum size of one order is increased fivefold, to 100 lots (10 mln. of basic currency).
The traditional Classic account also had some transformations. It kept the customary Instant Execution mode, leverage up to 1:500, classical price precision (4 decimal digits). Apart from foreign currency pairs, these accounts offer CFDs for precious metals, stocks and futures. The main thing that changed in the new version is replacement of dynamic spreads with fixed ones (from 2 pips, they do not go up at news time). In addition, margin requirement for locked trades went down to 25% (per one trade) while the maximum volume of one order doubled to 20 lots (2 mln. of basic currency).
Market Leader: As we see, both products are rather balanced and cater for different tastes and preferences. New services should make your trading accounts even more attractive - Spread Rebates, Interest on Free Funds and First Funding Bonus. Please, describe them in more detail.
Pavel Chebotarev: Indeed, every trader, regardless of their account size, can use our new services which offer rather tangible advantages in trading. For example, the Spread Rebates can be linked to any account type and involves immediate crediting of a bonus for a traded volume. For each traded lot the trader gets a bonus to their trading account worth $4 for Classic accounts and $2 for Market Pro accounts. For example, you have made trades totally worth 5.75 lots during the week. Then, you get $23 to your Classic account or $11.5 to your MarketPro account. The bonus is credited to the trading account on a weekly basis and is available for trading or withdrawal without any limitations. According to our clients' feedback, this service was very welcome.
The Interest on Free Funds, on the other hand, involves a bonus for money not used in trading. The interest rate is 6% per annum for active Classic accounts and 8% for active MarketPro accounts. An active account means there is at least one trade closed during two months. The interest calculation is based on the average value of free funds for the current month and made at the end of each month. When credited to the account, these funds are also available for trading and withdrawal without any limitations. This service is automatically provided to all clients of the company and does not require to be additionally enabled.
Besides, when opening a trading account and funding it for the first time with at least $100, the trader additionally gets a gift from our company, +20% of bonus funds. The bonus amount cannot be withdrawn but it can be fully used in trading. This is a fair bonus, without recalculation of the stop-out level.
Market Leader: One of new things your company introduced was open access to statistics for indicators vital for traders. Why is the new section of the website so special?
Pavel Chebotarev: The Figures and Facts page offers each trader an opportunity to independently evaluate crucial trading indicators before a real account is opened: size and dynamics of spread change, order execution speed in MarketPro accounts, and the average time needed to withdraw money. All data are calculated automatically by our trading servers and shown on the website online.
Market Leader: The page has a very interesting figure - withdrawal of funds for the last 30 requests. Currently it is 4 minutes on an average. Does it mean traders can expect to withdraw their funds almost in no time with your company?
Pavel Chebotarev: Yes, indeed, based on our internal regulations, client withdrawal requests are processed within 10 minutes during the company's open hours. In fact, we manage to work faster, the only exception being bank transactions as their speed is something we cannot influence, unfortunately. Currently, we offer traders over 10 different funding and withdrawal methods - from the most democratic QIWI to bank wire in a foreign currency. We clearly understand the importance of financial services for traders and, therefore, intend to improve the quality of service in this area in the future, too.
Market Leader: Traders used to be able to evaluate trading conditions with the Test Access to Live Accounts service. Why did you decide to roll it back?
Pavel Chebotarev: In due time, Test Access really helped engage quite a few traders who selected our company after the test period and evaluation of all trading advantages. However, once the minimum amount requirement was cancelled and online statistics appeared on our website, this service proved unnecessary.
Market Leader: A new trading platform appeared on your website - FreshForex MT4 Trader in two versions - for operating systems Android and iOS. Introducing a terminal for mobile platforms is an attempt to follow the fashion or a response to your clients' real need? What are the prospects of development of mobile trading in Russia?
Pavel Chebotarev: The new terminal for popular mobile devices is a real need of our traders rather than an attempt to follow the fashion. Prospects of mobile trading can be estimated on the basis of dynamics of Smartphone sales and use of mobile internet. As far as I know, the growth in the number of mobile internet users exceeded 70% in 2010. The dynamics of downloads of the new terminal for iPhone and Android also suggests that our new platform will definitely find its user.
So, to summarize the above. FreshForex offered an interesting product the market needs - professional NDD accounts without a fee and minimum deposit requirements together with a fast and effective financial offer and a great client support service. This is the new corporate style of FreshForex. Now it's traders' turn.
