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March 26, 2013

The Future of Mobile Foreign Exchange Trading



OANDA Corporation is a financial services provider of currency conversion, online retail foreign exchange (forex) trading, online foreign currency transfers, and forex information. It is one of the non-bank Futures Commission Merchants (FCMs) specialized in spot forex trading. OANDA is a registered FCM with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and a member of the National Futures Association (NFA).

In 2012, OANDA was named "Best Forex Provider" by the Financial Times (News - Alert) and by Investors Chronicle. It was also named "Best FX Broker" by Forex Magnates and was recognized by Investment Trends Singapore as providing best value for money and highest overall client satisfaction. OANDA was also the first online provider of comprehensive currency exchange information. Today, the company's OANDA Rate data are the benchmark rates for corporations, auditing firms, and global banks.

They continue to move forward. Today, March 26, 2013, OANDA held a press conference in New York City. I was at the event and met with several people from OANDA. They announced a significant update to their OANDA fxTrade mobile applications for Android (News - Alert) devices, iPhones and iPads.

According to a statement, “OANDA's fxTrade mobile app allows users to quickly monitor forex market activity as well as manage positions, control risk, and monitor account status and profitability while on the go. The free app's intuitive design makes the most of native iPhone (News - Alert), iPad, and Android capabilities to provide features that traders need to stay on top of the fast-moving forex market.”

I am not a finance person, but Kevin Everets, senior mobile developer for OANDA walked me through the app. In effect what they have done is take the desktop application, in which you conduct trades as well as see real-time data, and port it over to a mobile device. On the iPad, you can see the same information and execute the same trades that you were only able to do on your desktop.

The version that runs on an Android smartphone or iPhone is only limited in the fact that the screen sized does not give you the same amount of real estate as an iPad does. The screens are more limited in size, but not in power. Even using your smartphone you can still conduct the same trades or view the same information.

Trevor Young, the director of product management at OANDA, says, "We are excited to finally bring robust desktop trading functionality to the smartphone. In the past three years our clients have progressed from merely checking positions and prices with our mobile app to using it to plan and execute trades. As mobile continues to evolve as the go-to computing platform, OANDA will be at the forefront of mobile trading technology design with our commitment to provide the types of trading experiences our customers expect from a trusted forex innovator."

Trevor was also nice enough to walk me through some of the key features which include:

Advanced charting functionality that allows users to overlay various technical indicators for enhanced price-data analysis

Customizable charts in a greater range of intervals (ranging from 5 seconds to 1 day)

Full visibility into price action from a single screen, with continuous display of current prices even when manipulating chart parameters

A sleek user interface that allows easier chart navigation, one-handed chart manipulation, scrolling trade history and pinch-to-zoom capabilities

Streaming news feeds from top providers such as Dow Jones, Thomson Reuters (News - Alert), 4Cast, and UBS Analysis (iPhone and Android only)

Push notifications for limit orders, stop loss and take profit actions, margin notifications, and price alerts (price-alert notifications are not available on iPad)

Currently, the app is only designed for Android devices, iPhone and iPads. The process was in beta testing for about nine months. While there are no current plans to develop a BlackBerry or Windows Phone (News - Alert) version, Trevor said that they are not opposed to the idea if there is enough interest from either group.

In this, “I need to be connected everywhere, all the time” generation, with OANDA’s fxTrade mobile app, you can now follow your fx trading anywhere that you are. All of the information that you receive is in real-time as are all of your transactions. The app has been very popular in the UK, Singapore, Japan and Canada.




Edited by Brooke Neuman
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