The Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA) today published the latest complaints statistics, revealing the names of the companies that got most complaints during the period from July 1, 2020 to December 31, 2020.

FX News Group explored the data included in the so-called Datacube and found out that IC Markets, Plus500 and IG Markets got most complaints among derivatives dealers in the second half of 2020. International Capital Markets Pty Ltd, trading as IC Markets or ICM, was targeted in 72 complaints in the six-month period, whereas Plus500 Pty Ltd got 50 complaints. AFCA received 26 complaints about IG Markets Limited.

Looking at FX dealers stats, let’s note that Union Standard International Group (USGFX, currently in liquidation) tops the complaints list. AFCA received 108 complaints about this entity in the second half of 2020.

According to the latest AFCA Annual Review, between 1 July 2019 and 30 June 2020 AFCA received 80,546 complaints from consumers and small businesses, which is a 14% increase in the monthly average compared to the last financial year. A majority of complaints (58%) lodged with AFCA in this period related to banking and finance, followed by general insurance (24%), superannuation (9%), investments and advice (6%) and life insurance (2%).

Investments and advice saw an increase of 22% in the average number of complaints received each month during the 2019–20 financial year, receiving a total of 4,615 complaints. This year, these complaints made up 6% of the total complaints received by AFCA.

Forex was the product at the core of most of the complaints in the Investments and advice category. AFCA received a total of 759 complaints about FX in 2019/20.