Capital Market Services LLC began operating on the Forex market in 1999.

Residence, Regulation, and Company Management Structure

CMS is incorporated in the USA and is a member of NFA, registered in CFTC. The registration # is indicated. The company does not have a public front-office – client service is, surprisingly one of “non-contact.” Only a postal address is given on the site. The managers of company are not mentioned; an underlying structure is not marked.

Company's Market Position

Defining whether Capital Market Services is an ECN or market-maker, using the information on site is impossible. Banks-partners (liquidity suppliers) are not stated.

CMS provides accounts ruled by the clients or their trustees. Accounts can be denominated in any of 7 trading currencies.

Types of Services Offered

CMS trades in 7 basic currency pairs (to USD) and their cross-courses, other financial instruments are not available. Information concerning term-of-trades is placed compactly on the site. The size of standard lots are not obviously stated, thus it is only possible to deduct (from context) that a standard lot is equal 100000 units of leading (trading) currency. Mini-lots are also supported (10000). The general volume of trade is limited to 99 lots.

Margin Requirements

The size of credit leverage is set from 400:1 to 40:1; clients have 3 variants of choice. The general policy of company consists in reduction of size of credit leverage as far as the size of the opened position increases. Credit leverage does not change, relative to time, of accomplishing a transaction or its duration.

Supporting margin is determined from the size of the general volume of the opened position; in accordance with the requirements set on the size of credit leverage.

Trade cost

Spreads for different currency pairs differentiate; the table of sizes of spreads is shown on the page of term-of-trades. On the site there is no information about the changing size of spreads, depending on the volume of position, time of day and other terms.

The reimbursement of spread points (to 2 pt.) is used as bonus for the volume of trade. From the context of site is not clear, whether a broker retains size of spread as unchanging or assumes it's expansion at certain market situations.

The option of a “Trader's Range” actually extends spread in limits stated to the trader. The transfer of the opened positions, to the next day, is made along the lines of the traditional rules of SWAP; but the sizes of payments are not indicated on the site. Other dues and payments are also not indicated/seemingly absent.

Trading a currency pair is quoted by a “streaming” method, with confirmation of transaction by the client.

The relations of the company and client are validated by the proper agreements. A trading account can be opened over the Internet, but money, on an account, will be accepted only after registration of the agreement/contract. The personal being of the client, in the company for registration of the agreement, is not assumed.

Traders Support

The site is fully translated into several languages.
CMS offers the demo-accounts for an unlimited period of time.
There is a page for beginners on the site, containing short, basic, information, about the Forex market and a general explanation about trading principles.

There is a calendar of important events on the site, but there is no news. Daily, expert, reviews, containing the retelling of basic economic events and signals of a certain trading system are published. Fundamental and technical analysis is absent. On-line news is translated on an auction platform. Interactive support of clients is executed through traditional methods of an on-line-form on the site, e-mail, telephone, and traditional mail.

The Trading platform

A trading platform is installed as an appendix under OS Windows 2000 or Windows XP. The platform is powerful enough, and executes basic, informative, services (translation of quotations, exposure/execution of orders, showing of the state of positions and account), graphic and technical analysis.

Advantages

• The company is regulated CFTC and is a member of NFA.
• CMS trades in the most liquid currencies and their cross-courses and supports both standard and mini lots. A broker provides adjusting of size of credit leverage – limiting the risks to clients.
• Trade costs are minimum, and spreads are small and unchangeable during the trading process.
• There are a few channels of interactive support for clients, there is analytical support.
• The site is done simply and comfortably – finding the necessary information is easy. There is very detailed FAQ.

Disadvantages

• The address of the office and directors/managers of the company is not mentioned anywhere.
• The place of the company in the market is not stated. It's not clear how positions of clients hatch to the market, key contractors are not adopted.
• The section of site “for novices” contains general phrases, and it is impossible to learn how to trade, it is even difficult to understand what Forex is.
• The page of “Term-of-trade” is too short, and some important details have to be searched for “between lines” even in the FAQ.
• A credit leverage given by default is abundantly great (400:1), while passing to the client the variant, with an acceptable risk requires a direct appeal to the company.
• Analytical support leaves much to be desired. A professional, fundamental, and technical analysis is absent.