GKFX.com Review

Pro's,
Consistently tight spreads even throughout the night so EA friendly.
E-mails answered quickly.

The couple of times there has been a problem with the platform they will never admit it is their fault.
Paul is very arrogant and dismissive as are some of the smaller fish workling there.

If it was not for the good points I would have withdrawn my funds already but I keep my EA's running there for now and if they try and cheat me I will close the account.

Much better companies out there if you want an STP broker, unfortunately SLM have the monopoly on Spreadbetting with MT4 at the moment.

I agree with previous posters so far. SLM have come up with the best thing since sliced bread for spread bettors in the uk, in the form of an MT4 platform for spread betting.

However it is flaky and has failed completely twice since I have used it live (3 months). I still use them with small stakes, but every morning I still get errors connecting. They insist it is an EA at fault, but that doesn't explain why people trading manually have the same problems. I have worked in IT for over 30 years and I can smell BS from a mile away when it comes to making excuses for faulty software.

I have some patience with them as they are new, and I think could be promising, so continue with small amounts of money, but I have to agree their PR is apalling. They seem to be abrupt to the point of rudeness.

My summary:

NOT TRUSTWORTHY & UNRELIABLE.


My experience:

Although, initially, the customer service appeared informative, this soon deteriorated when I began to have problems. The MT4 platform froze, trades, using a reliable, proven EA, were executed late or not at all; candles appeared to open late.

I tried my best to remain calm, interested and non-blaming and initially got responses that appeared helpful from Paul, a director. However, his advice to re-install the platform and check the EA was not at fault, was weak. When I reported that these, obvious, measures had not improved things I did not even get a response.

There is more..... but what is the point in going on? IF YOU ARE NOT 100% HAPPY, CONFIDENT AND TRUSTING OF YOUR BROKER.....GET RID! There are enough risks in forex without paying people to help you lose.

I have closed my accounts with SLM and recommend that others do the same.

There is a bad smell emanating from this broker.... Stay clear.

Two Stars from me: (FPA definition: Bad - Performance is significantly below expectations. Major problems encountered) because although there was no problem withdrawing my small investment and they honoured their cash-loss-refund. I think there is something underhand going on with them and crucially, they have done nothing to allay my fears.

This afternoon (Friday, May 20) at 17:55 hrs UK I lost connection with the SmartLiveMarkets servers. I called them thinking it maybe a problem on my PC and was told their systems had crashed. Their web site also went down. I asked if senior management was aware of this catastrophe and was told they had gone home.

Fortunately, this occurred when hopefully most clients would have already closed their positions and, of course, it was still possible to close positions by phone. As I write this 45 minutes later their systems are still down, which is surely indicative of a lack of redundancy in their systems.

I shall be closing my account, which is a shame because this is the only spread betting company I've found that offers the MT4 platform.

I echo Podberry's experience. SLM's greatest asset is the fact that they are (currently) the only UK Spreadbetting firm that offers the MT4 platform. As so many EA's are built for MT4 they have a significant captive market in the UK.

I have traded for two months with SLM and in the first month their charts froze during a key trading time. This caused me and many others to lose money. I later established that I was the first of many to complain and they offered me a refund provided I didn't mention it to anyone else! I now realise that this was because many, many others were to get nothing!

The mantra since then within SLM is, if you use and EA it's your fault not theirs. Ironic as the only reason most traders come to them in the first place is to use EAs!

In the second month I and 16 others (that I know of) started getting slow execution of orders. Typically 68 seconds late, this lasted 8 days before I left them but I believe it is still an ongoing problem. Again at key trading times, this delay was unacceptable. Also inexcusable considering I was using a very reputable VPS just around the corner from SLM! After many calls during the first problem day I was left in no doubt that I was in a 'them and us' relationship with SLM. I have kept a series of emails from Paul at SLM that were frankly rude and at no point entertained the idea that SLM could possibly be at fault. This despite the fact that many of us were using the same EA at the same time with other brokers without difficulty?

SLM are in total denial of any blame despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. I have stopped trading with them because of their defensive/aggressive manner to customer services. I have also heard that if you are successful with them they put you into a different pool and work harder to ensure that your wins are limited. I do not however have first hand experience of this. In summary I was left in no doubt that customers are a real inconvenience to Paul at SLM, shame really when he works as Director of Trading!

SLM has had a few issues of late with regards to their platform taking over a minute to execute trades, Their customer service is shocking to say the least, the director of trading (Paul) is the main instigator blaming everything else but their platform and server.