IC Markets Spreads, Fees, and Commissions

IC Markets is a multi-licensed online broker with a strong forex offering encompassing over 60 currency pairs. But does it offer a favorable trading environment and competitive pricing? We provide an objective answer to this question in the following article. Our reviewers tested IC Markets with live accounts to gain an unbiased perspective on its pricing structure, commissions, and spreads.

Trading costs are a vital aspect to consider when assessing an online broker as they have a direct impact on customers’ profitability. A broker’s fees additionally indicate which trading strategies it embraces and which ones it discourages. Our extensive breakdown will enable you to draw meaningful comparisons and determine whether IC Markets offers better value than its closest competitors.

IC Markets Trading Costs

Our comprehensive research revealed that IC Markets has a comparatively competitive fee structure characterized by low spreads and industry-standard commissions. The broker offers variable rather than fixed spreads, sourcing its prices from over 50 liquidity providers. Onboarding customers can choose from commission-free Standard and commission-based Raw Spread Accounts for cTrader and MetaTrader. Let’s look closely at the trading fees associated with each account type.

Forex Trading Costs for Standard Accounts

Standard Accounts are suitable for beginner traders looking to keep things simple. There is no need to calculate commissions before placing orders as all related expenses are included in the spreads. Spreads are variable and fluctuate constantly depending on market conditions. Standard Accounts have markups of 0.80 pips for major currency pairs and 1 pip for metals, minor and exotic pairs. The markups are added to the raw spreads IC Markets receives from its liquidity providers.

The lowest spreads customers can hope for start from 0.80 pips for majors and 1 pip for minors and exotics. Spreads for EUR/USD average approximately 0.86 pips, costing $8.60 per standard lot and $0.09 per micro lot in either direction of the trade.

A round-turn trade in the pair will cost you a total of $17.20 per standard lot and $0.17 per micro lot assuming the opening and closing prices are the same. The average costs per standard lot are even lower for other major pairs like USD/JPY and AUD/USD where a single complete trade will cost you $6.57 and $6.90, respectively.

*The values correspond to the average spread costs per side on Standard Accounts.

**Spread expenses are rounded to the second decimal place for simplicity purposes.

Forex Trading Costs for Raw Accounts (MetaTrader)

Our tests indicated MetaTrader Raw Accounts at IC Markets offer some of the most competitive trading conditions around. Minimum spreads start from zero pips, with round-turn commissions of $7 per standard lot, $0.70 per mini lot, and $0.07 per micro lot. Respectively, customers pay $3.50 per side when trading one standard lot in forex and metals. As shown in the table below, commission rates vary depending on the base currency of your account.

**Round-turn commissions for micro lots are rounded to the second decimal place.

IC Markets has its MT4/MT5 servers located in New York’s Equinix NY4 data center, which significantly reduces latency during order execution. Spreads average 0.06 pips for EUR/USD, with a standard fixed commission of $3.50 per side for USD-denominated accounts. Spread expenses for the pair amount to $0.60, bringing your total costs to $4.10 per side per standard lot ($8.20 in total).

One micro lot in the popular currency pair will cost you around 4 cents in total. These charges are more than twice as low compared to Standard Accounts where a standard lot in EUR/USD costs $8.60 with the 0.8-pip spread markup. This renders MetaTrader Raw Spread Accounts ideal for customers engaging in high-frequency trading, including scalpers, day traders, and traders using expert advisors to automate their orders.

*The commission per side per micro lot is $0.035 (3.50 / 100).

**The total average costs from spreads and commissions are rounded to the second decimal place. The values correspond to USD-denominated accounts

Forex Trading Costs for Raw Spread Accounts (cTrader)

Raw Spread Accounts for cTrader also offer spreads from zero pips with slightly lower commissions. Customers using the US dollar as their base account currency pay commissions of $3 per side and $6 in total for every 100,000 units they trade. The commission structure differs for cTrader because the $3 commission listed in US dollars is converted to clients’ base account currencies at the current spot prices.

To elaborate with an example, suppose you open a position of one standard lot in GBP/USD at current spot rates of 1.2500. To calculate your commission, you must first multiply your contract size by the opening price to see how many dollars you need for the purchase. Assuming you trade in standard lots, you will need £100,000 x 1.2500 = $125,000.

You multiply this amount by the cTrader commission in US dollars, divided by the contract size. Your cTrader commission will be $125,000 x ($3 / 100,000) = $3.75 at this opening price. If you exit the trade at a closing price of 1.2600, your commission will amount to (£100,000 x 1.2600) x ($3 / 100,000) = $3.78. You will pay $7.53 round-turn per standard lot.

IC Markets Overnight Funding Costs

Customers should not underestimate overnight funding costs as the latter can considerably impact their long-term profitability, even more so for high-frequency traders. Overnight funding fees, also known as swap rates, are deducted when holding leveraged positions overnight, with IC Markets charging triple rates on Wednesdays. Forex positions held on Wednesdays and Thursdays incur triple swaps to account for the two-day settlement period for spot contracts.

Swap rates depend on whether your position is long or short, although certain currency pairs can have negative or positive swaps in both directions of the trade. Current swaps at IC Markets are automatically converted into the base currencies of client accounts. The table below contains the long and short swaps when holding one standard lot of the most popular currency pairs at IC Markets.

*Swaps are presented in points when holding 1 standard lot in the respective forex pair.

Swaps fluctuate proportionately to the overnight interest rate differentials between the two currencies comprising the corresponding forex pair. Here is an example with EUR/GBP demonstrating how to calculate your swap-related fees on overnight positions at IC Markets. The broker provides the following formula for this purpose.

SF = LV x SR x NN where

• SF stands for swap fees.
• LV is your trading volume in lots.
• SR is the listed long (buy) or short (sell) swap rate.
• NN represents the number of nights you hold your position open.

The formula works when swap rates are listed in points rather than percentages. The latest swap rate for long positions in EUR/GBP listed in MT4/MT5 is -4.78. Holding 2 lots in the pair for three consecutive nights will set you back 2 x (-4.78) x 3 = $28.68. The swap rate for short positions is 1.06. You will have your account credited with 2 x 1.06 x 3 = $6.36 in this case. We recommend you take advantage of the IC Market All-in-One Calculator to work out your swap expenses quickly.

Swap-Free Trading Costs at IC Markets

Customers looking to avoid interest rate adjustments on their overnight positions can trade swap-free via Standard and Raw Spread accounts. The swap-free version of these account types offers a more limited range of around 90 tradable instruments two-thirds of which are currency pairs. Rather than paying or receiving interest in the form of swaps, traders incur fixed administrative fees deducted from their balance daily after a 5-day grace period.

The XNG/USD pair is the only exception to the above rule as it has no grace period. The administrative charges vary across different currency pairs as shown in the table. Holding one standard lot in EUR/USD will cost you $3 per night, which is considerably less compared to most rival brokers where the fees for this pair average $10 per night. If your position remains open for 3 days after the 5-day period, you will pay holding fees of $9.

IC Markets Non-Trading Costs

Non-trading costs may result from other account-related transactions like withdrawals, deposits, currency conversion, inactivity, and subscribing to premium services like VPS hosting. While less common, these fees may still lead to additional expenses that impact a trader’s bottom line. IC Markets does not impose additional charges for deposits. If you deposit the required minimum of $200, the broker will credit exactly $200 to your live balance.

Withdrawals are also free of charge at IC Markets, although payment processors and banking institutions may impose internal fees on your transactions. The broker imposes a $10 fee on accounts that have remained inactive for 6 or more months. Opening and maintaining an active account at IC Markets is free.

Registered customers can participate in copy trading via the cTrader platform. The broker has also developed a proprietary social trading platform in partnership with Pelican Trading. Copiers pay performance fees of up to 50% on their profitable trades. The percentages vary based on the signal provider. A subscription fee is deducted from copiers’ balance at the beginning of each month but the exact amount is not clearly stated by IC Markets.

Forex traders seeking enhanced stability and improved execution speeds can subscribe to the broker’s VPS hosting services. This is an option for clients onboarding under the global entity regulated in the Seychelles. IC Markets provides the service in partnership with New York City Servers and ForexVPS.net.

Customers with significant monthly trading volumes are eligible for sponsored VPS hosting from ForexVPS.net and enjoy a $35 discount when trading over 15 lots per month. New York City Servers provides three subscription plans, with monthly fees of $25 for Basic VPS, $40 for Standard VPS, and $60 for Professional VPS. The company offers regular discounts on VPS renting, allowing subscribers to reduce their expenses by up to 50%.

Closing Thoughts on IC Markets Fees

After comprehensive testing and research, we established that IC Markets offers superior trading conditions, largely resulting from its exceptionally narrow spreads. Commissions on Raw Spread accounts largely coincide with those charged by most other brokers. We strongly recommend opening a Raw Spread account as it offers better value and lower overall expenses despite the commissions.

Trading one standard lot in major forex pairs like EUR/USD is more than two times cheaper compared to Standard spread-based accounts. The broker has no fees on deposits and withdrawals but additional expenses may result from inactivity, copy trading performance fees, and VPS hosting. We advise you to carefully consider the potential non-trading charges before registering with IC Markets. BestBrokers provides more thorough information in our full IC Markets review available here.