My review of ProRealTime Trading limited-risk CFDs, with IG

The ProRealTime Trading limited-risk CFD account, now called the “IG account sponsored by ProRealTime”, brings together in a single account two things you used to pay for separately: the ProRealTime platform in its most complete version, Premium, and brokerage from IG, the specialist in limited-risk CFDs. Every position carries a guaranteed stop. In my view, it is the best way in for anyone starting out with a small account.

What is the ProRealTime Trading limited-risk CFD account?

ProRealTime is the platform: the charts, the order book, order entry, automated trading. IG is the broker: it holds your account and acts as counterparty to your positions. The account is opened with IG, in agreement with ProRealTime, and you trade from the ProRealTime interface.

Each does what it knows best. For the platform, you deal with ProRealTime’s own team, based in Paris and answering you in English, as well as several other languages, with a dedicated account manager and help with programming your systems. For the account and order execution, you deal with IG, around the clock, Monday to Friday.

You will find thousands of underlying markets: indices, European, US and Asian shares, forex, commodities, metals, bonds. Long or short, on most markets.

The guaranteed stop, the real reason to choose this account

On a limited-risk account, every position must carry a guaranteed stop. Guaranteed means it is filled at the exact level you chose, even if the market jumps right over it: a gap at the open, a central bank announcement, a Monday morning that looks nothing like Friday evening. Slippage is gone. The maximum loss on each position is known before you enter it.

This stop has a price, but you only pay it if it is hit. It is one of the few insurance policies whose premium is due only when you make a claim.

Above all, it has a virtue that is hard to appreciate at first: it enforces discipline. You cannot open a position without it, and you cannot remove it in the hope that the market will come back. You can, however, move it closer to the price to protect a gain. Many an unrecoverable loss began the same way: with a stop pulled “just this once”. Here, the question does not arise.

Why the Premium version changes your day-to-day

With this account, you get the Premium version of ProRealTime, the one you pay for monthly elsewhere. What sets it apart from the Complete version does not show on day one. It shows on day one hundred.

On top of that comes priority support: your programming questions go to the front of the queue, and you get early access to new features.

What the account costs

The Premium platform is free every month in which you trade enough. In other months, you pay for access. The active trader therefore does not pay for the platform; the patient trader pays for it in the months when the market had nothing to offer. The exact threshold and price are on the ProRealTime website.

Otherwise, you get the same spreads as any other IG client, and mini contracts so you can trade small while you learn. Holding a position overnight generally incurs funding charges: this is an account built for intraday trading, not for savings.

Who this account is for, and who it is not for

It is for you if you are starting out with a small account, if you want to know your maximum loss before every trade, and if you want to trade indices, shares and forex from a single account, with a real platform.

It is less suited in three cases. If you scalp with very tight stops: the guaranteed stop must be placed at a minimum distance from the price, set by IG for each market, and it may be wider than the one you would have chosen. If you hold positions for weeks: funding charges start to bite. And if you want to trade real Futures, the ones listed in Chicago or Frankfurt: with limited-risk CFDs, your counterparty is IG, not the exchange. For that, there is ProRealTime Trading Futures with Interactive Brokers.

That is, incidentally, the road I took myself. I opened my account with IG in September 2011, before moving it over to ProRealTime Trading for the Premium version. Today, I trade only one market, the Nasdaq future, with Interactive Brokers. The limited-risk account is not a second-class account: it is where you learn without going broke.

Open a ProRealTime limited-risk CFD account in 3 steps

1. Start with the demoFree and with no time limit on the Web and Mobile versions, with a virtual portfolio and live prices.
2. Open the accountYou apply online. The account is opened with IG, in agreement with ProRealTime; the minimum deposit depends on your country.
3. Get to grips with the platformWith my complete ProRealTime course, free of charge, and my Charts & Workspaces.

Is ProRealTime with IG safe?

The account is held by IG, a broker authorized and regulated by the financial authorities, owned by IG Group, which is listed on the London Stock Exchange. The IG entity that takes you on depends on your country of residence.

Retail client money is held in accounts segregated from IG’s own, spread across several banks, and IG never uses it for its own hedging. The deposit guarantee and investor compensation that apply are those of that entity. ProRealTime, for its part, is a French investment firm, authorized by the Autorité de contrôle prudentiel et de résolution and supervised by the Autorité des marchés financiers, France’s financial markets regulator.

Who is advising you

I am Benoist Rousseau, an active trader since 1994 and a member of the CME and the CBOT, the Chicago exchanges, where I hold my seats in my own name. I have been trading on ProRealTime for more than ten years. This page says what I think of it; the terms themselves come from the ProRealTime website. To compare the three brokers at a glance: opening a ProRealTime account, which broker to choose.