Well, I guess this is as good a place to start for me as any here on this forum.
To the OP: I too have walked the same road over the years. Starting out with FXCM, I learned the hard way that not all Forex Brokers are the same - in fact, I learned that most all Forex Brokers are scam artists of the highest (or, lowest - depending on perspective) order. So, I dumped FXCM.
What did I do next? I did some homework, or so I "thought."
I looked at the landscape of Forex "intermediaries," a firm that could carry my "retail trade" to the so-called "real Interbank Market" (what a joke - I was delusional back then) and came across little outfits like Oanda, CMS, GFT, and the list is endless, literally. Completely frustrated at the total lack of clarity within the business itself (I used to trade Equity Derivatives - Options), I thought to myself; 'Self, wouldn't be a great idea of some of the larger Banks got involved in the Forex business!' Just like that, in they came. CitiFx, dbFX, just to name two. I was very happy!
So, I went to the dbFX website, read it thoroughly and then downloaded their "trading platform." Lo and behold, I was hit smack in the face with an unbelievable reality! The were using something that looked very much like the old FXCM retail platform that I knew and "loved" so well. So, I contacted dbFX directly and asked some pointed questions. I asked them if they were using a White Label version of the FXCM platform? They said to my amazement, Yes! My stomach sank. I could not believe that a reputable "Bank" like db, would climb in bed with a poor outfit like FXCM.
So, I dug a little deeper, having background in technology and all. I asked whether or not dbFX was using FXCM as an ASP. They said, Nooooo! We provide our own "liquidity and price feed." Knowing a little about how the technology works in the back-office, I said; "But, my question is whether or not they are your ASP source for delivery of services to your traders/customers?" I was told by the dbFX "Technical Support Representative" (another joke) that they did not have that "information available at this time." RED FLAG number one, went up in my mind right then.
So, I probed just a little bit deeper, ya know, knowing just a bit about how this technology works. I then said; "Ok, help me out here cause I really don't understand this 'technology' all that well. If I were to deposit fund with your Bank and began trading the market through your trading platform, when I logged into my account, would I be logging in through an FXCM Server or through a dedicated on-site dbFX Server?" I was told; "You would be logging into a dbFX Server, Sir." I said, "ok" and then went away for a while.
I began using the dbFX demo and took my initial $50,000.00 demo money up to a nice $190,000.00 in about 2 weeks. Not bad, but not all that good either. Well, today (22 January 2010), I had two Entry Order trades that I entered the night before. One net approximately $16,000 and the other net approximately $22,000.00, for a nice daily net/net of $38,000.00 to close out a very yeoman's kind of week for me.
Well, having my dbFX trading platform still open from the night before (21 January 2010), I could see both positions Closed in the Closed Window at the bottom of the application, but I saw no price action. Well, I went over to my InterbankFX data-feed and noticed that that market was running as usual at about 9:30am. By 9:50am that same morning, I tried to click on my dbFX platform and got a dialog box telling me that I was not logged on. I thought to myself; 'Self, that's odd.' So, I did what any normal human being would do, I attempted to log back into my dbFX trading platform and lo and behold I was hit with a dialog box that told me Trading Hours Must Be Over, etc.
Well, at the very top of the dialog box guess what else I saw? I saw these words: CANNOT CONNECT TO
HTTP://DBFX.FXCMCORPORATE.COM.
Well, completely confused by now, I called up my chat window immediately for some answers through my "dbFX" trading platform. I was told by dbFX that they had a "Technology Licensing Agreement" with FXCM. Well, technology licensing could mean just about anything, so I asked whether that was Software only, Hardware only, or both. I was told FLAT OUT: "Software only." So, I drilled the question home by asking: "When I connect to my dbFX account in my dbFX trading platform, am I in anyway connecting through an FXCM Server?" I was told FLAT OUT: "No. You connect to dbFX."
So, the next time somebody tells you that dbFX uses different connectivity, different servers, different hardware or even different software and different buildings (physical office space), you can politely inform them otherwise.
Bottom line: dbFX had a wonderful opportunity to get it right and they blew it. If it were not for this Server Failure today, I would have continued to think that my actual connectivity was being handled by one of their physical servers. The truth is far from that. When you log on to your dbFX account, you do indeed log into a dbFX database containing your account. But, rest assured that your account is merely being Segmented and Partitioned on an FXCM server.
And, that is the plain truth about dbFX's relationship with FXCM. If they had not lied about using FXCM as more than merely a White Label, then that would be a horse of another color. But, they insisted that they were not using FXCM as an ASP, which I now know to be untrue. It is the closest thing to an ASP Model that I can imagine and that means that FXCM has IT control over the dbFX machine and that is definitely NOT what I want. I want nothing at all - EVER - to do with FXCM.
Huge mistake on the part of dbFX, IMO.
