Finance Magnates sat down with Vince de Castro, Head of Marketing at Orbex, to discuss regulations and trader education.
Please tell us about yourself and how you reached your current role.
I moved to Cyprus from Toronto, Canada in 2010 and immediately starting working in the forex industry. I already had a technology and marketing background in my career so it was a natural fit to get involved in forex where there is such a focus on digital marketing and emerging technologies.
I recently joined Orbex as their Head of Marketing because they had put all the right pieces in place to be successful in this industry moving forward. Orbex’s business model is about providing the best trading conditions for its traders. They have a solid reputation in the industry so my job is simply about getting people’s attention and telling Orbex’s story.
Working at a CySEC regulated brokerage, what do you think about the new transparency requirements? How is your firm affected by them?
None of the new CySEC requirements came as a surprise to us. Our primary goal is the protection of traders, so the recent initiatives of CySEC to bring more security and transparency into industry should be well received.
Since 2010, Orbex has been very mindful about traders’ security. We have never offered deposit bonuses as it seriously heightens the risks and distracts clients from actual trading.
Now we are making another step forward: Orbex recently introduced the elimination of commissions on all account types, thereby simplifying the calculation of trading costs and becoming more transparent to traders.
As regulatory pressure mounts on FX brokers within the EU, is Orbex looking for new markets in which to expand?
While European and Middle-Eastern markets remain a priority, we seek to expand our business in Latin America and China. These areas have great economic potential, and it’s an opportunity for Orbex to develop different aspects of the business.
We are tailoring our services to specific market demands, and this strategy has worked well for us, bringing not just traders’ trust, but also a broad network of partners.
On the same note, does Orbex plan to diversify its offerings?
Orbex is always evolving its offering to meet the needs of all or our traders. Copy trading is something that newcomers express interest in. The concept of following an experienced person’s trades can be appealing so we integrated our platform with a leading copy trading platform so now our customers can follow traders or trading signals. In the near future, we will go live with a variety of stock CFDs available to trade within our platform allowing our traders to diversify their portfolio even further.
What do you think sets you apart from the competition?
We aim to address the needs of our customers beginning with customer support. We make a point to address all customer concerns and questions as soon as possible and leave no issue unsolved.
Another focal point is, certainly, education. You can’t a expect business to prosper if you don’t give back to your clients. We provide extensive training programs for new traders on our website. Our support team possess a solid understanding of the financial markets and they understand the common pain points of a trader. Having this experience allows them to be more helpful and design custom trading strategies for our clients.
And, finally, we are coming to the technological factor. We pride ourselves on our execution speed. Experienced traders understand how important the speed of the platform is and that’s why they trade with Orbex.
How do you view the current state of the industry?
I think we are going through a transition right now in the industry. The brokers who have built their businesses on the premise of providing solid trading conditions and reasonable trading costs are poised to capture more market share. Traders are becoming more educated in the market and are no longer attracted to brokers simply because they are offering a deposit bonus or some other trading credit that comes with all kinds of terms and conditions.
What new fields or opportunities do you see as growth potential in the market?
Well from a marketing perspective, I think over the next 2 years there will be shift as to what marketing channels will be effective in acquiring new traders. As millennials and Gen X become more prominent, it will be the brokers that can successfully get their attention that will succeed in acquiring and retaining loyal customers. This industry is notorious for not adapting quickly to new trends and so there is definitely an opportunity for the broker who can monetize things like story telling on social media and influencer marketing.
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