Over 20 retail customers of Saxo Bank have enlisted a Danish law firm to look into whether there are grounds for a legal challenge on the bank following the losses incurred over the SNB cap removal event.
Both Danish and foreign traders are part of the action and the firm, Andersen Partners, think they have a case
"It is the opinion of Andersen Partners, that the investors have suffered extraordinary losses as a result of Saxo Bank's handling of their investments," the firm says.
Another group of 50 UK spread betting customers are going to petition the FCA for an investigation into current practices in the industry. An open letter has been sent to the director of supervision and authorisations, Tracey McDermott, at the FCA, Chancellor George Osborne and MP Andrew Tyrie. Mr Tyrie also heads up the UK Treasury Select Committee and they will have Carney & Co up before them tomorrow. It's probably very unlikely that anything will be mentioned during the meeting but there's a very slim chance so we'll keep our ears open.
The bulk of the customers signing the petition so far have been IG and Saxo customers who suffered substantial losses
So far complaints to brokers have been palmed off onto the financial ombudsman and complaints have been highlighting part of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive;
"Under MiFID guidelines, best execution is not sitting there while you aggregate to get your best position," explains one source. "It's looking after each customer and trading the position as quickly as possible and at the best price, which hasn't happened in this case."
ForexLive has also heard reports that retail broker ETX has been asking customers of negative balances to repay the money, which they will then post as credit to the clients account. The money will then have to be traded in specified trade sizes for 90 days before the client can then withdraw any money. In many cases this has meant traders would have to trade in far bigger sizes than they would normally. That's hardly sensible for trying to instill proper money management methods and looks only to be a cheap play at getting the negative balances paid back. They are also masking the deal under a welcome bonus.
Retail traders are not willing to give up the bone on all this yet and the actions of any legal challenges could have far reaching effects across the industry, and hopefully for the best of us all.