AGORA direct™ - First Quant GmbH Reviews 39

I would recommend this broker without the shadow of a doubt. Why? Because these people are humane. You see, I’m from Argentina, a broken country —if we speak in economic terms only— like most latin-american countries. I was in need of another source of income, so I thought that I could try investing in the stock market. But, as most of you may know, when you operate from a broker that is located in the US or UK, you fall under the pattern day trader rule, which complicates things when you are just a beginner. I didn’t have 25K USD either, which is the limit above which you can start day trading.

So, I started researching again, and came to know that accounts located in Europe, Ireland or Singapore, do not fall under the PDT rule. Then, I gently asked my broker, IBKR US, if I could open an account with any of their subsidiaries in Europe, but they denied the possibility straight away. I was pretty disappointed, until I found the Introducing Brokers thing. What is it? Brokers that have a partnership with IBKR, while being independent firms. Some of them are located in other parts of the world. I search for a good while, and came to find Agora Direct.

In Agora Direct they allowed me to open an account in IBKR IE under Irish regulation, thus avoinding the PDT rule. I was pretty happy, but there was a problem. Even though they have the most accesible fees that any broker in Europe has (you can see a comparison chart on their website) still —as a person dealing with a southamerican economy, earning a southamerican salary— I couldn’t afford to start trading with those fees. So I tried delinking from them, but it is not allowed. I didn’t know how to procced, but being rushed by necessity, I came out with a desperate idea that would probably not work: I could try asking them for a year of reduced fees. It was a crazy idea, so I had to try it.

I was just waiting for what would be the usual response you would get from any other broker, a cold rejection, like I had experienced before. But what did I get? They not only helped me with my issue, but they also said: «you should have told us from the beggining» — I was speechless. Afterwards, with every other issue that came along, they were diligent, and really kind, almost warm sometimes. Denying the cold German stereotype, in terms of treatment, but not in terms of efficiency.

So when you read in their website this sentence: «there is commitment to the principles of honesty, truthfulness and unconditional reliability» and a focus on «appreciation of clients», you should know that it is not just words, they mean it, they walk their talk... Not only in what regards the kindness of their treatment, but also in concrete actions, like the one I just told.

Of course, there were times when I got scared about the security of the funds I deposited in this broker, specially when you read reviews like the one on wikifx, which speaks of a regulatory status of "suspected clone". So I started researching again, and let me tell you this: you probably wont find a broker with better credentials. They work with Interactive Brokers (founded in 1978, and online since 1993), so your funds are covered by their insurance, which ammounts to 85k GBP (FSCS — IBKR UK) or 500k USD (with a cash sublimit of $250,000 — SIPC — IBKR LLC). But appart from that, Agora Direct is registered in the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority of Germany, BaFin under the legal name «First Quant GmbH» as you can see in the BaFin website, or in the legal-notes page of Agora's website.

They started their brokerage services as far back as 1885, under the banker Oskar Petersohn, they are direct descendants of his family. And they started their online brokerage in 2001.

I have nothing left to say, just recommend their services.

A reasonably good brokerage - until problems come along. Recently blocked without any reason or change from all and any trades - could not place any orders for 1.5weeks now, the broker is nonresponsive via email/messages and on telephone keeps assuring that 'hopefully tomorrow it will be over' while keeping me in the dark about both the cause nor any solution to the problem. A third party (IBKR) is blamed, and that party blames agora back. Apparently this might have to do either with an account migration due to brexit, a problem that is neither new (brexit was a possibility and contingency issue that should have been fully sorted for years!!) nor should be a problem at all since I had already arranged all necessary paperwork months ago - or (according to IBKR) it might have to do with this being a Swiss brokerage not being able to deal with in the EU anymore for whatever reason ... Does not make sense/ sounds confusing? Who knows?! Definitely not the customer. Apparently this seems to be a broader and known issue by now, which makes the absence of solutions worse. No ones feels responsible, no one takes steps for a solution, and customer service sounds patronising and annoyed that I ask them why I cannot trade anything. I cannot even convert my currency back from foreign to base currency for withdrawal. Pressure test not passed, will move to another brokerage, and will need to find another way to get my money out.