Oanda Reviews

I've been using OANDA for a few months now, I design my own fintech, I recently started forward testing an EA I built, I have preset take profit and stop loss that are exactly 1:1 RRR, I have photographs that the OANDA platform isn't immediately honoring orders that cross the TP, I'm disappointed that an order would not be closed immediately!

It's true I'm an amateur, I know I don't know everything, I would like to learn more about the ins and outs of the industry before I start blaming the broker, it doesn't add up in my head that I have to cross the spread going into the trade, and then I have to cross the spread again going out of the trade, I can be disappointed in lack of transparency of MT4.

I would recommend caution using Oanda as broker. I have been with them a little over a year. Over the last two month I have had problems such as connection issues when I try to close trades, and most recently I had a trade go in the opposite direction on a long candel and it resulted in a SL rather than a TP. Very strange and still I have not been able to get an explanation from them though I assume broker intervention. I really wanted to stay with Oanda, but now I am looking for a new broker. I am just glad that I found out before I invested more money into an account with them.

-15-20 pip spread at news time -Disconnections during news time -Poor customer service -They generally hat news traders This broker is a news trader’s ENEMY stay away

I have been using OANDA Platform for Demo account for around 2 months as I am a new entrant to this field. I was surprised to see that even during weekends, OANDA was accepting trades (of course the spread was running over 10 pips. Since I have demo account I wanted to test each and everything before I run in to a live real account. Can any one tell me if a broker takes your trade during weekends (Markets Closed), how does the broker fill it in for their safety? Is this a good sign of a broker or a bad sign?

Felipe
i have been trading live with Oanda for more than a year, and you are talking absolute crap, why not be honest with yourself and tell the truth, you don't know how to trade? i have never seen anything like you have described happen on this platform, very honest company and if i could rate them higher i would.

I just started with Oanda a month ago, so far I'm happy with acc management. will update.

They have introduced MT4 client support in their practice trial platform. That is good news.

Was going to open an account with them (just to see how they compare to other brokers I use) and I could not believe all the personal information they required even for a demo. My employer and other information they required was, guite frankly in my personal opinion, absolutely none of their business. Sorry Oanda.You lost a potential client right off the bat! Never had to asnwer so many questions with ANY other broker I've ever had in 19 years!

Wanted to update my previous review, my bank got the funds back from the recall request and they stated: The account it was returned from is the OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control) holdover. They did not provide any detail on why your transaction would have been held due to OFAC reasons.

Jul 2, 2017 - 2 Stars First off let me start off by saying that i've been with Oanda for about a month now and until these problems with the wire transfer started I was semi-satisfied with their product. I didn't like the fact that fxtrade both windows and android had freezing/performance issues. The windows version is fine as long as you don't open several charts at once. PTMC works with Oanda so thats what ive been using. Anyway back to the main issue...

Around the middle of June I found out that I can get the perks of Oanda Premium if I deposited a total of 20,000 and they told me the benefits of Oanda Premium will stay even if I withdrawal money out and my balance is less than 20,000. Oanda premium gets me a slightly lower spread and a few other perks. I decided I was going to obtain premium status and on 6/20/2017 I wired 14.000 USD to Oanda.

On 6/21/2017 9:16am my bank received a service message from HSBC (the bank Oanda uses) stating: FUNDS HELD BY OUR COMPLIANCE DEPT, NEED INFO and it proceeded to ask for my full name, dob, nationality, citizenship, country of residence, full residential address, detailed purpose of payment. An hour later my bank responded with the requested information.

On 6/23 my money still wasn't in my Oanda account and I reached out to them and if I recall correctly was told to have my bank check the status of it. On 6/23/2017 my bank told me that they would send a message requesting a status update. No response from their bank.

On 6/28 Oanda responses to me that they cant expedire a transaction under review by the banks but it doesnt actually say that they communicated with their bank HSBC about it. I enter the live chat and they can't confirm for certain that my money is being held by HSBCs compliance department. My bank has still received no response from HSBC. I call HSBC directly (worst bank I have ever dealt with in my life) and they can't give me any information but they didn't act like it was unusual and each time they put me on hold to contact their wiring dept it took forever so they must get a lot of issues. They insisted oanda contact them which ive already requested oanda to do and insisted my bank contact them and i explained they already sent messages but have received no response. HSBC later tells me to have my bank call them. I forgot to mention I have also requested twice now for Oanda to do a conference call with me and their bank so we can get this straightened out but they won't do it.

On 6/30 my bank calls them and they refuse to provide any information. I call HSBC again explain the situation and this time they claim they can't find the wire in their system but the rep viola may have just been trying to get me off the phone since she was tired of being on hold for so long with their wiring department. Oanda later sends me an email stating "Our partner bank, HSBC confirmed with us on June 28, 2017 that they are working with your bank on fulfilling requirements." and I responded that my bank hasnt received a single message since the initial information request (the one for my name, date of birth, citizenship, etc) then they responded they will follow up with HSBC again.

I decide that i'm going to file a police report so I request documentation from my bank showing all the transmissions and when I receive them there is no communication after the response with my information. So I have documentation of the 6/21/17 response to the compliance department but nothing after that until 6/28 where we requested a recall. I call my bank back and they claim that the pages must have stuck together when fed into the scanner and that they would send me the status requests via email. I never got that email so its possible my bank never requested a status request but i'm going to look into that further on monday. If my bank really didn't transmit a status request then i'll give HSBC a little more time before filing the police report.

I do not appreciate the lack of effort Oanda has put in to resolving this situation. I understand that my 14,000 USD probably means very little to Oanda and that calling HSBC is a nightmare they probably don't want to deal with it but this is the bank they chose to do business with. Oanda has also refused to provide copies of the email communications between them and their bank HSBC.

Oanda if you are reading this I recommend you setup that conference call so you can get off the hook for my money missing. If you prove to me that HSBC is the problem (which I already suspect) i'll limit posting this review (well obviously a summary as this is too long) to just a few sites. If not then lets just say no human is going to be able to reply to all of them.

I think the way trade executed by Oanda,maybe it is a MM broker.

If you thinking to try to find an ecn broker, you dreamin' !

I would like to update my review. After many complaints to Oanda they finally emailed me back and said they are very aware of their platform problems. They said a new updated version is coming out. I don't know if it already has been updated but ever since Jan 1st. 2009 I have not had one single problem. Like I said earlier great broker and lightning fast executions but when platform would freeze you could lose a ton of money since you won't be able to close out. Customer service still sucks but all around broker is great as long as platform keeps working.

They are the best! I mean, THE BEST!
I don't know why some people tried to put them down, but so far I've been in the FOREX (4years) and tried many brokers, still can't find one as good as OANDA.

They offer you flexibility, where you can position sized exactly to your risk profile.

They withdraw your money fast, super fast compared to others.

The server never go down- in my experience.

They offer great low spread.

They are fair and transparent.

Customer service is so helpful and friendly.

IMHO, you can't expect more.

I have been with Oanda now for 8 maybe 9 years.I always found them the best of the lot.
About 4 yrs ago they switched to "dynamic spreads" which was and never has been great for the end user.
Still I struck with them.
Just to add, if I am honest, I have lost far much money with them than I ever made, but that was completely my fault and not theirs.
I am now in a personal situation whereas I must gather together all my resources to care for someone.
I have asked to withdraw my balance with Oanda , a little over 3000 euros, and they are now making it difficult.
They say I can only withdraw to a bank account that is now closed.
They have a strange policy of amounts/methods that depict how much and where you can withdraw to.
The account I am asking to withdraw to by bank transfer has been used to fund the account and is in my name and address.
I will update this review, if and when I receive my money.

Yes, I agree ... Oanda is really bad borkerage ..If you want to lose your money , Plz go to oanda As soon as possible...Well , Before i opened position when news release , They changed spread from 2 pips to 10 pips...with 10 pips spread , i thought it was Ok..then I entered the market...but infact one second later ..they changeed spead one more time to become : 30 pips!!! ..So I could not cancel my order right at that time ( how you can cancel order when news release because you 'll be very busy to concentrate news, market.. at that time ) ...the result i lost 1200$..They should tell traders to know that how many pips spread they 'll change before ....My conclusion that..they work for their profit...dont dream to make money from Oanda...They are so dirty

I am trying out their demo account at the moment. not live. So far it's been doing very well. I got to agree with some other reviews on the connectivity to the platform. I spend more of my time trading on my Iphone. Other than that, all else is good.

Looking forward to try out their live accounts soon

I have been using oanda but after a year i switched to pepperstone and i never look back. Why? Because if the tight spread, better swap rate, high leverage and hedging at the same platform. My capital gain is at faster rate compared to oanda account.

https://pepperstone.com/?a_aid=Mikey2808

I have traded live over one year with them now, fantastic instant fills, and closing trades, transfering of funds no problems whatsoever, i will never use any other broker

oanda.com is a subsidiary of Olsen and Associates. Olsen and Associates is an investmnet firm in Switzerland. They are very well regarded in the financial community. You will find many grateful comments in Economics studies regarding Olsen and Associates for supplying currency price data for the study.

You can do no better than oanda (O and A, if you can't tell). They even pay you daily interest on your account balance. They have exemplary software and staff. They are great.

I am not an employee of oanda.com, nor associated with them in any way. I am simply aware of them and know that they are not scammers or anything vaguely close to it. Olsen and Associates makes a great deal of money every year from fx trading and does not need to rip people off.

Good luck and good trading.

I am still researching FX trading and I have come across a lot of comments about OANDA's spread around news time. I wonder if most comments were made by people who already started trading, how could they not know the following, and question if OANDA was conducting shady transaction? They are market maker and dealer desk, it is in their business nature, and for that matter, all of the dealer desk brokers, to conduct in the following way to make profit or protect them from high risks. I think that if we know the rules OANDA and other dealer-desk brokers play by, then it is up to us to decide if we can win by the rules of the game.

"Liquidity providers give retail dealers spreads that change constantly throughout the day, even numerous times per minute. In order for a broker to receive variable spreads from a bank, but pass through fixed spreads to clients, there are two common practices retail dealing desk can employ.

A. Shading: This occurs when the broker offers a fixed spread that is lopsided to one side of the market. Let's say that the broker sees prices on EUR/USD at 1.3250 bid and 1.3251 ask. If the broker offers a fixed spread, then his rate should be 1.3249 by 1.3252 as he marks up the spread 1 pip on each side to collect his transaction cost. The client in this example trades on a fixed spread of 3 pips.
However, if the broker is heavy with buy orders, he may be worried about taking on more buy orders as that will add to his risk exposure. Remember dealing desks end up having to bunch orders as there rarely are the same amount of buyers and sellers in frequency and quantity throughout the day. In this case the broker's book is tilted. The broker may then choose to shade the market to the sell side by offering a rate of 1.3250 by 1.3253. In this scenario, the spread is still fixed at 3 pips, but traders trying to buy are now paying an extra pip to get into the market.
B. Re-quoting trades: Because the dealing desk broker accepts all orders, there are times when he needs to re-quote trades. (See point 2 from No Dealing Desk.)
The above listed practices are just a couple of examples dealing desk brokers use to manage their risk. In contrast, a No Dealing Desk broker will pass on variable spreads so that traders can trade without a conflict of interest. A No Dealing Desk broker will just mark up the variable spread received from the banks by 1 pip on each side. There are times that fixed spreads look very attractive as compared to variable spreads."

I called the sales dept. and waited 10 mins, then the (end of call) auto survey came in and disconnected me. I guess they don't want the sale. Then I called again, and finally got through.

On the 2nd call, I was educated by a sales rep from Oanda, he gave me an example: that if you open a premium account the spread will be reduced by 0.2, and Margin level is 50% close out.

So for a $20,000 deposit, in my opinion, it's not worth it when other brokers are providing the same spread or less.

Eight days and no withdrawal funds! WORST forex broker yet. Will look for Ninja platform broker, mt4-5 is trash and is offered to brokers with "a secret plugin" to SCALP their clients.

FXCM refunded my money withing HOURS! (THX thieves).

I've been with Oanda for 3 months, and I have no complaints. Orders are executed quickly with no slippage, and I don't have disconnection problems. I don't find that the spreads change wildly, only from .9 to maybe 2.5 or 3 during slow volume for eurusd. I love trading from the charts, and even modifying orders, TP and stops all from the chart. As for indicators, they have all I need. For a while I thought they didn't have fib. extensions, but I figured out how to do them quickly and easily by moving the retracement lines. Perhaps the biggest advantage is their lot size. I can trade any amount; I'm not limited to any fixed lot size: fantastic!
The big annoyance is that they don't have weekly and monthly charts, nor do they have direct hedging, although you can hedge by using a sub account.
Overall I'm quite happy with Oanda.

I signed upwith Oanda about a month ago and all I did until now is the FXGame which works very well. I hope the real trading platform works as well as the game or at least 60-70%.
I read some of the reviews posted here and someone was saying that, soonest you start making a lot of money they are going to close your account. My question is: how much money are we talking about? What amount of money you make in any given day or week would be a lot of money?
I would appreciate a reply to my question.
I will start trading live in a couple of days and I will post a review in a few weeks or a month.

I'm a newbie, and have opened a demo account with Oanda. I have found their email tech and chat tech service excellent. Their demo has not time limits, and one can buy currency pairs by single unit lots, and trade in increments of $1. Their fxTrade platform has instant execution, reputed to be much faster that MT4's.

I made a demo account to try them because I liked the ideea to have lower spreads ( during the news seems they r BIG ) and also for allowing to bet smaller quantities.

- But i was disspointed big way : My SL wasn't taken , even on demo account so what to dare to xpect from a real account ...SL not taken is not acceptable in no way !!! IS this possible in 21 century ??
- Oh and charting is veeery poor, no templates
- h I should not forget this : a LOT of dissconnections..

...BYE BYE Oanda

Absolutely terrible. I am unable to get them to send my funds back. I have 3 weeks and hours on the phone with them, DO NOT USE OANADA!! Still today they have no idea where they sent the money. Just a big run around.

I moved to Oanda from another broker. I think there customer service needs to better because one time I had a platform issue, I could not talk to them. I dont think they are ECN. That would be good. I use their web account for trading Forex, it blocks time intervals at times . Their dashboard for account is good. Their order processing is also fine , and it is easy to use. I am checking some of their deals lately, if I like them and some tech issues get resolved , I may continue with them.

Overall, I would have to say that I give this broker a 5 star rating. Never had an issue with my trades, deposits or withdraws. I would however without any question give them a 1 star rating on their customer service. The absolute worst experience ever!. It has now been 2 hours, and I am still on hold trying to get into contact with a representative.

I will review 2 parts
Platform: Good
Many disconnects during news or when the market is extremely active. No trailing stops and other stuff that has been recently posted here.

Support and Forum: Shameful

I am a daily member of the Oanda trader's forum. Yesterday, one of the forum's most respected pros that goes by the name of Happy Trader was banned by Oanda following his posting Turkey's surprise decision to cut the interest rate. Many traders like myself are carry traders and we appreciated HT's posting. In fact, HT announced it 1 hour before bloomberg and 4 hours before Oanda's own news service. I think many traders took advantage of this quick flash to liquidate their Turkey positions before the markets reacted. Within an hour of posting this Oanda banned HT from their forum citing that he had used unacceptable language on the forum. The debate headted when HT's wife came online to defend her husband. She posted links to forum pages that included far worse language as well as pornographic images. Oanda replied that the forum was owned by them, not Happy Trader. It has caused me to wonder about Oanda's motives.
Happy Trader if you read this, Merry Christmas.

The 5 Star rating is for HAPPY TRADER, NOT YOU OANDA. Shame on you Oanda!

PS. Don't take my word for it. Visit Oanda's forum before they delete his thread.

I have posted the scam activity with proof about OANDA here. But till now no posted in this thread. This shows How legitimate FPA is.

Review Moderation Team Note: Your review is proof that you don't bother to read the instructions. Reviews can take up to 5 business days to appear. Your prior review was left 2 days ago and had not been processed yet.

Now that we are checking it, the prior review had no real content of its own, just a link to an external blog. External links may be used to support a review, not to be the main portion of a review.

Anyone clicking "Contact Us" and selecting General Questions will see a link titled "Hey Dude, Where's my review?" That link explains why many reviews are not approved. It also explains what information to send to the FPA if a review is not approved.

I do agree for most trader that input there review regarding to the broker Oanda.com
Its true they do steal your money. It happened to me twice on a positions of $1.00 lot and suddenly became $0.90. Not sure what happened there. I wonder how did that possible happened when i have over $4k in account. Other thing that happened to my account as well. I have position that I been holding for more than 10 days. Each day they do charge swap fee. I do understand that every broker do charge swap fee. While I have that account floating. On the friday before week end My position that I been holding and being charge for swap fee every single day. I know that in the following week EU will finally bull. Then i received an email stating. " Due to my account fall into NFA" been holding for 3 consecutive days they have to close positions.
And I know I would of made money and got out of my loosing trade on the opening market day. Sad part is I also made a deposit before market close just in case. But their spread sudden increase before market end then close my position and took my money from account. SMH.. Im not sure if others experience it as well.
Its not the first time that ever happened to me.....

Oanda is a scam for news trading. 25 pip spread on the GBP for Retail Sales today.

25 pip spread during the UK retail sales announcement. Unbelievable. It used to be my favorite, I'm closing my account.

DO NOT. I REPEAT DO NOT JOIN THIS BROKER!!! YES. AS A U.S RESIDENT, OUR OPTIONS ARE LIMITED AS TO WHO WE CAN USE A BROKER FIRM, BUT IF YOUR
INTENT IS TO USE THIS BROKER THINKING YOU ARE GOING TO MAKE MONEY IN THE LONG RUN, YOU ARE IN FOR A RUDE AWAKENING!!! THIS BROKER DOES NOT
WANT YOU TO WIN!!! WHEN YOU WIN THEY LOOSE. WHEN YOU LOOSE THEY WIN. NOW THEY WILL TELL YOU THAT ALTHOUGH THEY ARE A DEALER DESK, THEY DO NOT
HAVE CONFLICT OF INTEREST WITH THEIR CLIENTS, THAT IS A TOTAL LIE. THEY WANT YOU TO LOOSE ALL YOUR MONEY. ESPECIALLY IF YOU ARE ON THE RIGHT
SIDE OF THE TRADE. THEY WILL FREEZE YOUR ACCOUNT WHERE YOU WOULD THINK IT WAS YOUR INTERNET CONNECTION ONLY WHEN YOU LOOK AT OTHER MT4 PLATOFRM FROM OTHER FX BROKERS AND REALIZE THAT THEIR PLATFORM SEEMS TO BE WORKING FINE, BUT OANDA/ATC IS DOWN. WHY? BECAUSE THEY DON'T WANT YOU TO PLACE MORE TRADES TO MAKE MORE MONEY AS THEY SEE YOU ARE ON THE RIGHT SIDE. HOWEVER, IF YOU ARE THE WRONG SIDE, THEY WON'T FREEZE YOUR ACCOUNT.

THEY WILL ALLOW YOU TO PLACE MORE BETS BECAUSE YOU ARE ON THE WRONG SIDE.
FOREX IS HARD AS IT IS, BUT MY ADVICE TO ANYONE LOOKING TO USE OANDA OR ATC AS A BROKER, HOLD ON TO YOUR MONEY.
PLEASE. HERE IS THE TACTIC THEY WILL USE. IF THEY SEE THAT YOU ARE ON THE RIGHT SIDE, THEY WILL LIMIT THE AMOUNT OF MONEY YOU CAN
BET ON A TRADE. BUT WHEN YOU ARE THE WRONG SIDE, THEY WILL ALLOW YOU TO USE MORE TO BET. I'M TELLING YOU. STAY AWAY FROM OANDA/ATC.
THEY DON'T HAVE YOUR BEST INTEREST AT HEART. THEY ARE AGAINST YOU!!! THEY WANT YOU TO LOOSE. THAT IS HOW THEY MAKE MONEY.

NOW THE 3 DAY MARGIN RULE. THIS IS ANOTHER WAY THEY MAKE MONEY. THE BIG BOYS WHO TRADE THE FX MARKET ARE IN COLLABORATION
WITH OTHER BROKERS THAT USE THE BULLSHIT 3 DAY MARGIN RULE IN MY OPINION. THIS IS NOT A FACT, BUT JUST MY OPINION. SO THE BIG BOYS WHO TRADE FX WILL STALL THE MARKET REALIZING THAT PEOPLE ARE ABOUT TO HIT MARGIN CALL DUE TO THE THREE DAY RULE SO THEY WILL KEEP THE MARKET FROM MOVING IN YOUR DIRECTION UNTIL AFTER 3:45PM EST.
i'VE SEEN IT TOO MANY TIMES. SO FOR US IN HE U.S, OUR OPTION IS VERY LIMITED. MY ADVISE IS TO FIND ANOTHER BROKER OUTSIDE THE U.S.
AND LEAVE THIS BUCKETSHOP BROKERS LIKE OANDA/ATC ALONE. BUT MANY WILL NOT LISTEN UNTIL THEY'VE BEEN BURNED. I'M SPREADING THE WORD SO THAT OTHERS WON'T MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE i MADE. OANDA IS A CROOKED BROKER. THEY DON'T HAVE YOUR BEST INTEREST AT HEART. THEY WANT YOU TO LOOSE YOUR MONEY.
THEY WILL FREEZE YOUR ACCOUNTS CONSTANTLY WHEN THEY SEE YOU ARE WINNING. WHEN YOU ARE THE WRONG SIDE, THEY WILL NOT FREEZE YOUR ACCOUNT. THEY WILL ALLOW YOU TO PLACE AS MANY BETS AS YOU COULD. STAY AWAY. DO NOT SAY I DIDN'T WANT YOU!!!

Oanda used to be good, but now the spreads on EVERY news release are widened to 15-20pips on majors. SL order are dangerous and TP order will not be filled due to spreads at news times, and more frequent disconnections. Oanda doesn't care anyone except itself and becomes the biggest SCAM!!! I have to switch my broker now.

HORRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE. Waited over a month just to open a live account...There JAVA web based platform sucks a**. Its horrible....DO NOT get an account here. Go somewhere else.

Simple and short, when someone raises the spread the last 3 seconds before a news release to 15-18 pips and keeps it there for 3-7 minutes they don't care if they lose customers. So many people [thousands] are coming into the forex market every month Oanda knows that the customers they lose will be replaced by their marketing.

Oanda has variable spreads and they will spike for numerous reasons. The maximum spread on their pairs is from 30 to 60 pips and it will be reached quite often. It will be reached on several news releases and even for news that is for a different market. For instance, the Non-Farm Payroll data or the Pending Home Sales data in the U.S. will cause pairs like the AUD/CHF or the GBP/NZD to spike to their maximum value. This makes Oanda completely unreliable because you never know when a spread spike is going to happen and take your positions out for a grotesquely expensive spread. You're not going to follow the news schedule for every markets and wonder if it will affect your position in another one. Moreover, their spread are going to oscillate around a certain average but they easily double for a fraction of a second for no apparent reason. Interestingly, when the price comes close to your stops but there was still enough room (considering the average spread) for it to not be triggered, the spread is magically going to increase and take you out. With other brokers you might have an order that comes to a single pip or being executed but with Oanda you can forget about that. It seems like they have a piece of code in their system that increases the spread when there are orders sitting around. Market regulators aren't going to start inspecting their code. Of course, they always say that it is due to market conditions and liquidity but it is often not. Sometimes there is barely any movement following a certain news release but the spread will still spike for a fraction of a second. It would be understandable if there was indeed increased activity, volatility, lots of transactions. If their spread increased and was larger than usual for a certain amount of time in these conditions it would be legitimate. But, quite often, there is nothing at all and still you get these spikes. Moreover, it is only for a fraction of a second so it is more of a system technicality than anything related to the markets. I find this completely dishonest. I have closed my account and opened another one with FXCM where the spreads are stable and never get to those ridiculously exaggerated values of 30 pips or more that Oanda will use to steal your money.

Oanda went from the Best to Worst. They are fine if you are a long term trader, so is about any broker. I trade many different styles, when it comes to trading news events, they are the worst. They start at a 2 or 3 pip spread about 10 minutes before a news event. A few minutes before they raise the spread to 10 pips and just a few seconds before the release, they jump it to a 15 pip spread. What's worse is they keep the spread wide for 4 or 5 minutes, robbing people of any profits they potentially may have had. I compared them side by side with several other brokers, recorded the spreads during the news release and they were the absolute worst of all. I use to love Oanda and found out they are in this business for Oanda, not for their customers. If the Forex was regulated, they would be out of business for abusing their customers. They are truly a bucket shop.

Have been completely satisfied with oanda up until 3 weeks ago when they started to increase spreads widely during news time. Happened more than one time that an order of mine got filled and stopped out because of a 15 pip spread in eurusd. I don't like it anymore!

a 20-30 pip spread on news events is something i can live with...completly shutting down their platform is unscrupulous...this just happened to me on the farm reports and it was a full 20 minutes later before the platform came back on line...if i had placed an order previous to the shutdown i could have lost hundreds of dollars...i have no trust or confidence in them at this point and would suggest that anyone who trades the news look elsewhere for a broker...felix, how can you give this company 5 stars?

The absolute worst ever in the history of the fx trading game. The WORST EVER. EVER, IN HISTORY.

I tried to get an fx account with OANDA Canada. This turned into nothing but harassment of me by a bunch of retarded c***. They are so stupid and useless it is absolutely beyond belief.

After reading an email by them yesterday, I went into a rage state and almost started yelling. Why? Again they needed documents "confirmed." There is nothing to confirm. There is just a bunch of f***ing retards going over things they don't understand.

The c*** there are the only people that I have come across in my entire life that I actually see as retarded and insane.

I just sent these stupid, useless, deranged imbeciles an email telling them to stick their account up their a**. I will be making a complaint to Canada's federal justice department about the "account opening".

Don't ever get an account with OANDA Canada. You will be subjected to a never-ending barrage of utterly bogus requests for more information, and I do mean utterly and totally bogus.

THE ABSOLUTE WORST C*** IN THE HISTORY OF FX TRADING. UTTERLY USELESS, FEEBLE, RETARDED, INSANE DOORKNOBS, EVERY ONE OF THEM.

KEEP THE HELL AWAY FROM THE WORST COMPANY IN THE HISTORY OF FX TRADING.

They used to be good, but are now they are bad like any other. They are widening spreads (today they widened the EUR/USD spread to 12 pips, I have never seen that, and on a not so important news like existing home sales, imagine NFP, the most was 10, the other pairs are much worst, from 15 to 20 pips) also it has crashed repeatedly and it has been dead slow on various transactions. This is unacceptable - stay away from Oanda!

I have been using Oanda for about 1 year now. they were never perfoect but they met my needs. however, in the last month they have changed the way thy do business, they never honor stop losses or limit orders anymore they told me "they give what the market offers you". offcourse you can expect that from an ECN not from a bucket shop like Oanda. I decided enough is enough , they made enough money from me and I am closing my accounts. good bye Oanda ,keep up the lies about transperancy and all that crap.
they do not deserve even 1 star.

I have an account with oanda and I notice that when you trade using any of the charts they provide, your orders are entered into the market without the price even actually touching your entry level. Even when there is no big market activity. Then you lose soon after. When you complain to them they say, oh it's the min/max charts that show the true range of the market and the price did hit your entry. But no other firms show that price movement. Oanda has a hidden market beyond what they display to customers and they slowly chip away at your account until there is nothing left. Avoid Oanda at all cost or it will COST YOU MONEY!

Spreads are a BIG problem at the moment. Used to love Oanda but not anymore. Stay away.

Their own made spikes makes huge spreads which hit your stop loss no matter where u put it regardless what market is doing. The good think... no restriction or limits for opening an acount and size trade.

P.S. I guess "every bit helps" is their motto.

I though Oanda would be the savior...after demo trading for over 1 month, I had no losing news trades, and even with my Trade The News news service (which is probably a full second behind Reuters and Bloomberg), I never had a problem getting in on the bottom third of a spike. I can even go back into my demo platform results and prove this. Fast forward to my REAL account with them for the last month. All of a sudden, I'm buying the tops of spikes and selling on the bottoms of spikes, whereas before I was getting in the first third of the spike with no problem. Also, their spreads have widened by at least 5 pips over what they were during my demo. The GBP/USD, which was 10 pips a month ago, is now 15 pips. One time the USD/CAD spread actually widened to 17 pips upon the release of a report!!! The bottom line is this: as news traders, we used to need a mere 30-pip spike to make a good chunk of change. However, if you now have 15-pip spreads and delayed entries, a 30-pip spike may mean that you'll break even, unless you have Reuters or Bloomberg to give you that added advantage, but even then, does it really matter how fast you get the news if your order ends up delayed? Finally, let me share with you a story that further proves my point. One time during a trade I hit the 'buy' when I should have hit 'sell'. In the confusion, I KNOW I was a good second or two slower on the draw than I otherwise would have been. Not only did Oanda fill that order (a sell order), they actually filled me in at the BOTTOM of a spike that then went 50 pips against me. Had I clicked the 'buy' button instead, I have no doubt I would have been filled at the top of the spike. The only reason I don't rate them a "scam" is because, despite their faults, they're the best of the worst. Sad, isn't it?

I switched to Oanda because my old broker, FxSolutions wouldn't fill my orders during news releases. Then, Felix stupidly talked to Oanda's CEO and the spread has been widening ever since, making it not worthwhile to trade the news any more. Thanks Felix

2006-09-18 update I had a take profit/limit filled last week. Then I got an email from Oanda that they had bad data. They cancelled the trade and took away my profit. Yesterday, I had a limit order with a 90 pip stop. They basically filled the order at the 90 pip stop. They said it was volatile trading. This was filled on open on Sunday (not a news release). I have had just terrible fills with them. I like their normal, non-news spreads, but their spread are so ridiculous that it is a huge risk leaving ANY limit order with Oanda, because they are likely to widen the spread to 20 pips, then give you a bad fill. I'm looking for a new broker...

1) Oanda's spread for Cable are simply getting ridiculous during news release, varying from 15~20 pips! I notice the huge 15 pips increase even 5 mins before the news was to be release. After which it could vary from 6~10 pips for another hour. 2) Their live server's connection seems to be highly unstable. Over the last 2 weeks there are a few occurrence where I cannot connect to the live server. It was mentioned in earlier post by other users as well. This is getting highly frustrating!