Risk disclosure

Leverage lets you control a position much larger than the money you post as margin. Profit and loss are calculated on the full notional value of the position, not on the margin. The consequence is arithmetic and unavoidable: a small adverse move in the underlying market produces a large percentage loss on your deposit.

A 0.2% move against a fully leveraged position is a routine intraday event in every market we quote — it is smaller than the average daily range of EURUSD, and an order of magnitude smaller than that of Bitcoin. High leverage is not a feature that improves your odds; it is a mechanism that shortens the time available for you to be right.

The ordinary outcome of retail CFD trading is the loss of the deposited capital. Losses can accumulate quickly, and a single position held through a fast-moving market can exhaust an account balance in minutes.

As a retail client you have negative balance protection: you cannot lose more than the equity in your account, and if a gap closes your positions below zero we write the deficit off rather than pursuing you for it. This protection limits your loss to your balance. It does not make that loss unlikely.

You must maintain sufficient equity to support your open positions at all times. If your margin level falls to the margin call level on your account we will notify you, but we are not obliged to do so and a notification may not reach you in time to act.

If your margin level reaches the stop-out level we will close your positions automatically, largest loss first, without further notice and regardless of whether you are logged in. Liquidation happens at the prevailing market price, which in a fast market may be materially worse than the stop-out level implies.

You cannot rely on being able to deposit additional funds in time to prevent a stop-out. Card and e-wallet deposits credit quickly, but not instantly, and bank wires take days.

Gapping

Markets do not move continuously. Prices gap over weekends, over scheduled data releases, at the open following a holiday, and in response to unexpected news. A gap can jump straight past your stop loss, in which case your position is closed at the first available price, not at the level you set. There is no upper bound on the size of a gap.

Slippage

Between submitting an order and our servers receiving it, the market may move. Your fill will reflect the price at the moment of receipt, which may be better or worse than the price you saw. We apply slippage symmetrically, but that does not make a bad fill in a fast market any less expensive.

Liquidity and spread widening

Spreads are variable. They widen in thin liquidity, at the daily rollover, around economic releases, and in stressed markets — sometimes by a multiple of the typical figure. A position that is marginally profitable at a normal spread can become unprofitable purely because the spread has widened, and a wider spread can itself trigger a stop loss or a stop-out.

Suspension of trading

Where an underlying market is halted, closed or disorderly, we may suspend trading in the related CFD. During a suspension you cannot open or close positions, but financing continues to accrue and your position remains exposed to the eventual reopening price.

Every position starts at a loss equal to the spread, and every position held overnight accrues financing. Neither cost depends on being right. Over a large number of trades, or over a long holding period, costs are a material and compounding drag on returns.

• A strategy that trades frequently must overcome the spread and commission on every round turn before it earns anything.
• A position held for months can accrue financing that exceeds the price move you were trading for, particularly on instruments with a large negative carry.
• Positions held over the Wednesday rollover are charged three nights of financing to cover the weekend value date.
• Where the instrument’s quote currency differs from your account currency, conversion costs apply to every realised amount.

A CFD is a bilateral contract with us. You are exposed to our ability to meet our obligations under it. Client money is held in segregated accounts with tier-1 institutions and is protected from our general creditors in an insolvency, but segregation is not a guarantee that you would recover the full amount.

Because we deal as principal, your loss on a contract may be our gain. We manage that conflict by hedging net exposure above defined thresholds, by remunerating dealing and sales staff on volume and service rather than on client losses, and by binding ourselves to a published order execution policy. You should nonetheless understand that the conflict exists and that it is inherent to the product, not specific to us.

Trading electronically exposes you to the failure of hardware, software and connectivity — yours, ours, and that of the networks in between. An outage may prevent you from opening or closing a position at the moment you most want to.

• Server-side stops, take profits and trailing stops continue to be evaluated by our risk process even if your device is offline. Client-side alerts do not.
• A price you see on a stale or disconnected screen is not tradable. The platform marks delayed prices as indicative — treat them as such.
• Automated strategies can compound an error at machine speed. Test them on a demo account, and set hard position and loss limits.
• Keep an alternative route to us — the dealing desk telephone line — for use when you cannot reach the platform.

Crypto CFDs carry all of the risks above in a more extreme form. The underlying assets are highly volatile, trade continuously including at weekends when liquidity is thinnest, are not backed by any central bank or issuer, and are subject to abrupt regulatory intervention in individual jurisdictions.

Double-digit percentage moves within a single day are ordinary. Leverage on crypto CFDs is capped substantially below that available on major currency pairs for exactly this reason, and even at that lower leverage a position can be liquidated by a routine move. Do not assume a weekend position is safe because your bank is closed.

During account opening we assess whether trading CFDs is appropriate for you, based on your knowledge and experience. If we conclude that it is not, we will tell you. That assessment is a regulatory minimum, not an endorsement — it does not mean the product is suitable for your circumstances, and we do not assess your financial situation, objectives or risk tolerance.

We provide an execution-only service. Nothing we publish — market commentary, economic calendars, chart studies, educational material or anything said by our staff — is investment advice or a personal recommendation. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future results, and no strategy, indicator or signal removes the risk described in this document.

Taxation of trading gains depends on your individual circumstances and jurisdiction, and can change. We do not provide tax advice and we do not withhold tax on your behalf. You are responsible for declaring and paying any tax due.

By opening an account and trading with us you confirm that you have read and understood this notice, that you accept the risks it describes, that you are trading with money you can afford to lose entirely, and that you have taken independent advice where you considered it necessary.

If any part of this document is unclear, contact compliance@apex.markets before you deposit. We would rather answer the question than have you find out the answer in the market.