FX week in review: XTB and Dukascopy results, Singapore ad rules, exec moves at TopFX, Equiti, BDSwiss

Gerald Segal 0 Comments April 30, 2023

We received financial results updates this past week from a number of known names in the Retail FX and CFDs business, including Poland’s #1 broker XTB and #2 Swiss broker Dukascopy. The results seem to confirm a theme we’ve written a lot about lately – while it has been a very good time for companies in “the business”, it is still somewhat a haves and have-nots type market.

There was also some key regulatory news, with Singapore regulator MAS tightening the rules around advertising financial products to retail clients.

And, as we’ve seen a lot lately, quite a number of executive moves involving companies such as Equiti Capital, TopFX, Scope Markets, XS.com, BDSwiss, and more – and it was all reported exclusively or first at FNG!

Some of the most read and commented-on FX industry news stories to appear over the past seven days on FNG included:

XTB shares rise 13% to new all time high after reporting Q1-2023 results. Shares of leading Poland based multi-asset broker XTB SA (WSE:XTB) traded up by 13% on Thursday, after XTB reported its summary Q1-2023 financial results following the close of markets late Wednesday. XTB shares hit an all-time high of zł 41.12 during trading Thursday, also representing the first time that XTB shares have crossed the zł 40 line. As recently as September 2022 XTB shares were under zł 20 a share. The shares closed Thursday at zł 39.94 – a new all-time closing high for the stock – giving XTB a market capitalization of zł 4.69 billion, or USD $1.13 billion.

Dukascopy sees Revenues down 14%, Profits off 27% in 2H-2022. Following a stellar first half of 2022, Switzerland based Retail FX and CFDs broker Dukascopy saw activity cool off somewhat in the second half of the year with both Revenues and Profits well below 1H-2022 levels. Dukascopy posted Revenues of CHF 12.4 million (USD $13.9 million) in 2H-2022, down 14% from CHF 14.4 million in the first 6 months of 2022. Net Profit in 2H-2022 came in at CHF 2.8 million, down 27% from CHF 3.9 million in 1H-2022. Dukascopy did shrink its employee base somewhat in 2022, at 72 versus 83 as at year-end 2021.

MAS proposes new rules for marketing of financial products. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) today outlined proposals to enhance safeguards for prospecting and marketing of financial products. The enhancements seek to raise industry standards by requiring financial institutions to put in place additional controls when engaging in prospecting and marketing activities through both physical and digital means. MAS proposes to augment existing safeguards and introduce new measures to strengthen market conduct.

Finery Markets launches FM Liquidity Match crypto OTC-as-a-service. Limassol, Cyprus based institutional crypto solutions provider Finery Markets has announced the launch of FM Liquidity Match, what the company calls the first-ever electronic OTC-as-a-service for digital assets. Floating Point Group will become its first user. FM Liquidity Match is a ready-to-deploy trading solution with a proprietary matching engine that enables market players to launch a fully electronic OTC trading business and manage client relations throughout the entire trade cycle.