AvaTrade

Licences from the Central Bank of Ireland, ASIC, Japan’s Financial Services Agency, the ADGM FSRA, CySEC and Kenya’s Capital Markets Authority were confirmed on the regulators’ registers. AvaTrade’s main international site is run from the British Virgin Islands, and the company named in its international client agreement is listed by the BVI regulator as cancelled.

• StrengthAVA Trade EU Limited is authorised by the Central Bank of Ireland as a MiFID investment firm (C53877), and Ava Capital Markets Australia Pty Ltd has held AFSL 406684 since 9 November 2011.
• StrengthAva Trade Japan K.K. is registered with Japan’s Financial Services Agency as a financial instruments business operator (Kanto Local Finance Bureau No. 1662), and Ava Trade Middle East Limited has been authorised by the ADGM FSRA since 6 February 2020 (FSP 190018).
• StrengthAva Trade Kenya Limited holds licence 262 from Kenya’s Capital Markets Authority as a non-dealing online foreign exchange broker, and D.T. Direct Investment Hub Ltd, the group’s DupliTrade company, holds CySEC licence 347/17 for order transmission, portfolio management and investment advice.
• MediumThe avatrade.com site is operated by Ava Trade Markets Ltd, which the BVI Financial Services Commission lists as currently regulated for dealing as principal and arranging deals. Clients of the BVI company are outside the main retail protection regimes.
• MediumAvaTrade’s international client agreement, effective 3 February 2026, is a contract with AvaTrade Limited and states that Ava Trade Ltd is licensed by the BVI Financial Services Commission. The Commission’s register lists both of Ava Trade Ltd.’s investment business licences as cancelled; it does not give the date or reason, and we found no BVI enforcement action against the group.
• ObservationThe FSCA licence of Ava Capital Markets (Pty) Ltd and the Israel Securities Authority licence of ATrade Ltd are taken from AvaTrade’s disclosures and were not checked on those registers.

The group is privately held and does not disclose its owners. GLEIF records show Ava Trade Ltd, a British Virgin Islands company owned by natural persons who are not named, as parent of the main operating companies. We did not find audited group accounts in public sources.

• ObservationGLEIF lists Ava Trade Ltd (British Virgin Islands) as the direct and ultimate parent of AVA Trade EU Limited, Ava Trade Markets Ltd., Ava Trade Middle East Limited and Ava Capital Markets Australia Pty Ltd, and reports that Ava Trade Ltd is owned by natural persons.
• LowAvaTrade’s website names Ava Trade Markets Ltd as its BVI-licensed company, while its international client agreement names AvaTrade Limited as the counterparty, so it is not clear from public documents which BVI company international clients contract with.
• ObservationJefferies Financial Group’s quarterly report on Form 10-Q, filed with the SEC on 9 October 2026, states that after 31 August 2026 its subsidiary Stratos Group International, LLC entered into a definitive agreement with AvaTrade Markets Ltd. to sell substantially all of its assets and business operations, with the acquired assets expected to be migrated over the following 120 days. The filing does not say which AvaTrade company that is.

AVA Trade EU Limited is a member of Ireland’s Investor Compensation Company and offers negative balance protection. International clients contract with a BVI company, which has no compensation scheme, and we found no negative balance protection commitment in its client agreement.

• StrengthAvaTrade’s EU client asset document states that client assets are held separately from the firm’s own assets and that retail clients are covered by the Investor Compensation Company for 90% of money lost, up to €20,000. Its EU client agreement provides negative balance protection.
• MediumClients of AvaTrade’s BVI company fall outside any investor compensation scheme, and its international client agreement contains no negative balance protection commitment for CFD trading.

Not assessed in a desk audit. Spreads, slippage and fill quality can only be measured with live accounts.

In 2024 Japan’s regulator ordered Ava Trade Japan to overhaul its governance after finding that stress tests had been run on falsified client data, with the involvement of the parent company’s chief compliance officer. In 2019 Ava Trade Ltd paid a penalty and disgorgement under a settlement with the Ontario Securities Commission. A 2014 Irish settlement is older than eight years and is recorded but not scored.

• HighOn 14 May 2024 the Kanto Local Finance Bureau issued a business improvement order against Ava Trade Japan K.K., following a recommendation from the Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission. It found that, to avoid worsening stress-test results, the company’s president asked the parent company’s chief compliance officer to falsify the client data used, and that on at least 13 month-end dates from May 2021 to March 2023 stress tests were run after deleting the data of several of the largest clients. From May to August 2023, on the president’s instruction, the head of internal audit ran stress tests on at least 24 days after deleting part of the client data. It found that correct results were not reported and that governance and internal checks, including at the parent company, were not functioning. The bureau noted that the company met its statutory capital requirement. On 30 September 2024 the Financial Futures Association of Japan fined the company ¥7 million for the same conduct.
• MediumOn 24 July 2019 the Ontario Securities Commission approved a settlement under which Ava Trade Ltd agreed that between January 2015 and August 2018 it had engaged in unregistered trading and illegal distributions by opening about 1,400 CFD trading accounts for Ontario residents. It paid an administrative penalty of CAD 550,000, disgorged CAD 3.7 million and paid CAD 25,000 in costs.
• ObservationOn 4 March 2014 the Central Bank of Ireland reprimanded Ava Capital Markets Limited, now AVA Trade EU Limited, and fined it €165,000 for transaction reporting failures between 2010 and 2011. The decision is more than eight years old, so it is recorded here but not scored.
• ObservationThe Reserve Bank of India includes Ava Trade on its Alert List of entities not authorised to deal in forex in India. Under our methodology this is recorded but not scored.
• ObservationAvaTrade’s international client agreement allows it to credit bonus amounts to client accounts. Such terms are lawful in its licensing jurisdiction, so under our methodology they are recorded but not scored.

Not assessed in a desk audit. Uptime, incident history and security controls require evidence from the firm or live monitoring.

No Great Place to Work certification and no documented community programme were found in public sources.

• ObservationNo Great Place to Work certification or community programme was found in public sources. AvaTrade’s Red Bull Racing sponsorship is commercial and is not counted.