OANDA US Review [2024] | Forex Broker | Fees, Pros, Cons

In this review, we’re examining OANDA, a United States operations-focused foreign exchange (Forex) broker and trading platform featuring Forex and cryptocurrencies, as well as a range of products designed for business clients.

Specifically, we’ll analyze what OANDA is, how it works, what its uses are, and who can benefit from it in the US market. In addition, we’ll also give you some tips on how to start using the platform and share some of its pros and cons.

What Is OANDA?

OANDA (short for Olsen & Associates) is a United States-focused, globally recognized financial technology and services company providing clients with online Forex trading, currency data analytics, and global mass payment solutions. Moreover, it features a number of comprehensive trading tools that contribute to the accessibility of the platform.

OANDA was founded in 1996 by the computer scientist Dr. Michael Stumm and the economist Dr. Richard Olsen, with the vision, to quote the company itself, of “driving the future of currency data solutions and trading technology.”

The company covered a lot of ground in the late ‘90s. Just one year after its inception, its first data feed went live, and OANDA became the first company to share exchange rate information online for free. In ‘98, several tax authorities leading audit firms started subscribing to some of OANDA’s corporate solutions. Just a year later, the company partnered with NOKIA to launch the first Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) in the world.

In 2001, OANDA launched its online trading platform, enabling Forex investors to trade with as little as $1. The platform grew to allow users to automate their trading and hedging strategies in the following couple of years. By 2011, the company had released its iOS and Android trading apps and established a global presence, opening a European office in London and launching OANDA Japan.

Today, OANDA ranks among the world’s major fintech companies, allowing clients to trade various financial instruments, streamline their global financial transactions, and conduct market analytics.

Trade Forex and Crypto with Ease

• Trade 68 Forex and 8 cryptocurrency pairs

• Enjoy no minimum deposits and no deposit fees

• Explore 2,000+ indicators and develop your own trading strategy

• Over 20 years of experience and insight in the market

Get Started

OANDA Corporation is regulated by the CFTC/NFA. OANDA is a member Firm of the NFA (Member ID: 0325821). CFDs are not available to residents in the United States.

OANDA CORPORATION IS A MEMBER OF NFA AND IS SUBJECT TO NFA'S REGULATORY OVERSIGHT AND EXAMINATIONS. HOWEVER, YOU SHOULD BE AWARE THAT NFA DOES NOT HAVE REGULATORY OVERSIGHT AUTHORITY OVER UNDERLYING OR SPOT VIRTUAL CURRENCY PRODUCTS OR TRANSACTIONS OR VIRTUAL CURRENCY EXCHANGES, CUSTODIANS OR MARKETS

Trading in digital assets, including cryptocurrencies, is especially risky and is only for individuals with a high risk tolerance and the financial ability to sustain losses. OANDA Corporation is not party to any transactions in digital assets and does not custody digital assets on your behalf. All digital asset transactions occur on the Paxos Trust Company exchange. Any positions in digital assets are custodied solely with Paxos and held in an account in your name outside of OANDA Corporation. Digital assets held with Paxos are not protected by SIPC. Paxos is not an NFA member and is not subject to the NFA’s regulatory oversight and examinations.

Leveraged trading in foreign currency contracts or other off-exchange products on margin carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for everyone. We advise you to carefully consider whether trading is appropriate for you in light of your personal circumstances. You may lose more than you invest. Information on this website is general in nature. We recommend that you seek independent financial advice and ensure you fully understand the risks involved before trading. Trading through an online platform carries additional risks.

How Does OANDA Work?

OANDA allows Us individuals and businesses to trade Forex on a user-friendly trading platform that provides traders with access to real-time market data, charting tools, technical analysis indicators, etc. Moreover, it offers APIs for clients developing third-party trading apps.

The platform operates on a market-maker model. That is, it acts as a counterparty to customer accounts. It takes into account pricings from multiple liquidity providers (such as banks, hedge funds, etc.) to offer users competitive bid/ask spreads. The pricing is transparent, and the platform displays both the buy and sell prices.

Traders can also leverage up to 50:1 and thus amplify their trading positions. In addition, since high leverages make investments riskier, OANDA provides risk management tools and functions, although US clients are exempt from some of them, such as stop-loss orders.

Those who can benefit from the platform in the US market include:

1. New and seasoned individual traders;
2. Business clients;
3. Fintech developers.

Products and Services Offered by OANDA

OANDA offers users several tools and services to trade, analyze the Forex market, convert currencies, and transfer money globally. The five main services on the platform are:

1. A proprietary trading platform (OANDA Trade);
2. MetaTrader 4 (MT4);
3. A mobile app;
4. Technical analysis tool;
5. Currency converter.

1. OANDA Trade

The company’s in-house trading platform, OANDA Trade, was specifically designed to provide clients with a user-friendly Forex exchange. It’s got an intuitive and customizable interface, an economic calendar, trade history reports, real-time quotes, and some risk-management tools. The platform also supports spot trading in 10 cryptocurrencies for retail traders — e.g., Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Ether (ETH), and Litecoin (LTC) — in pairs with the US dollar through its crypto service partner, Paxos.

Users can access OANDA Trade from mobile and desktop platforms.

2. The OANDA MT4

OANDA’s MT4 platform combines MT4 charting and analysis features with pricing functionalities. On the platform, users can:

• Trade 68 currency pairs;
• Explore over 2,000 free indicators and develop their own automated trading strategies;
• Create unique trading algorithms and analysis tools;
• Analyze intraday market developments;
• Gain insight into current market trends via the built-in chart pattern recognition system;
• Get an overview of support and resistance levels to spot trading opportunities.

Users can access MT4 in the browser or via an app (available on both desktop and mobile).

3. The App

4. Technical Analysis Tools

The OANDA trading platform features a number of technical analysis tools based on the Autochartist web-based technical analysis application. These tools can help users:

• Examine and study intraday market developments;
• Receive custom market reports;
• Analyze charts and receive notifications on desired patterns, i.e., trading opportunities;
• Review historical data to make predictions on success probability;
• Analyse asset volatility.

5. Currency Converter

OANDA’s Currency Converter is a tool that lets users check the latest average bid/ask rates for foreign exchange and convert various major world currencies. The tool has access to real-time FX rates, so it’s fairly accurate. Also, it’s available both on desktop and on mobile as an iOS and Android app.

OANDA Fees

Registering at OANDA is free, and there are no minimum deposits required to do it.

If you start trading, however, it is important to note that OANDA charges users with an open position on their account at the end of each trading day (i.e., 5 pm Eastern Time). The fee will reflect the cost of position funding in relation to the margin utilized.

The fee amount is specific to each individual position. It can be applied as either a charge or a credit, depending on whether the user is going for a long or short position.

Further, there are no deposit fees, no matter the deposit method. The only potential charges will be those set by the user’s bank. The same goes for withdrawals done by credit or debit (Visa or Mastercard) card. Withdrawals by bank wire transfer, however, do require a fee ($20 per transaction). Moreover, the user may be charged an additional amount by their payment processor.

Trade Forex and Crypto with Ease

• Trade 68 Forex and 8 cryptocurrency pairs

• Enjoy no minimum deposits and no deposit fees

• Explore 2,000+ indicators and develop your own trading strategy

• Over 20 years of experience and insight in the market

Get Started

OANDA Corporation is regulated by the CFTC/NFA. OANDA is a member Firm of the NFA (Member ID: 0325821). CFDs are not available to residents in the United States.

OANDA CORPORATION IS A MEMBER OF NFA AND IS SUBJECT TO NFA'S REGULATORY OVERSIGHT AND EXAMINATIONS. HOWEVER, YOU SHOULD BE AWARE THAT NFA DOES NOT HAVE REGULATORY OVERSIGHT AUTHORITY OVER UNDERLYING OR SPOT VIRTUAL CURRENCY PRODUCTS OR TRANSACTIONS OR VIRTUAL CURRENCY EXCHANGES, CUSTODIANS OR MARKETS

Trading in digital assets, including cryptocurrencies, is especially risky and is only for individuals with a high risk tolerance and the financial ability to sustain losses. OANDA Corporation is not party to any transactions in digital assets and does not custody digital assets on your behalf. All digital asset transactions occur on the Paxos Trust Company exchange. Any positions in digital assets are custodied solely with Paxos and held in an account in your name outside of OANDA Corporation. Digital assets held with Paxos are not protected by SIPC. Paxos is not an NFA member and is not subject to the NFA’s regulatory oversight and examinations.

Leveraged trading in foreign currency contracts or other off-exchange products on margin carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for everyone. We advise you to carefully consider whether trading is appropriate for you in light of your personal circumstances. You may lose more than you invest. Information on this website is general in nature. We recommend that you seek independent financial advice and ensure you fully understand the risks involved before trading. Trading through an online platform carries additional risks.

How to Get Started — Making an OANDA Account

The registration process at OANDA is thorough. Thus, the user will have to provide all the necessary information before they are able to explore all the features the platform has to offer. To get on board with the platform, follow these three steps:

Step 1 — Getting Started

For the purposes of this review, we’ll be registering using the desktop version of the website. To get started, head over to the official OANDA webpage and click on the Start Trading button in the upper right corner (as shown below):

Step 2 — Confirming Your Place of Residence

Before you can start registering, you’ll have to confirm your country of residence. The website will detect your location automatically, and US citizens can simply select the Yes option and click on the Confirm and continue button to proceed, as shown below:

Step 3 — Providing Your Personal Details

Next, you’ll have to provide your personal information, such as full name, date of birth, email, and mobile phone number. In addition, you’ll have to submit proof of citizenship, confirm your address, supply employment information, and go through a proof of identity process.

Once you’ve provided the website with all the info, you’ll have to wait for the account to be approved before you can start trading and using other features of the website.

With the account approved, you’ll receive an email with MT4 login details and a link you can follow to set a new password for your actual OANDA account. Individual user accounts are typically subject to a strict lifetime deposit cap of US$9,000 (or currency equivalent). To remove this cap, you will have to submit relevant documentation on your account platform

Why OANDA?

OANDA is one of the oldest platforms in the sector, with almost three decades of online presence. During this period, the company has managed to build a solid brand and amass a user base of tens of thousands of people, even winning the Most Popular Broker award at the 2022 TradingView Broker Awards.

Further, the platform supports:

• A good range of financial instruments, including some cryptocurrencies, all of which can be traded on OANDA’s proprietary trading platform, which features a user-friendly interface and a wide range of analytical tools meant to facilitate and automatize the trading process;
• Application programming interfaces (APIs) that allow developers to customize and integrate their own trading apps with the first-party OANDA trading platform. This leads to easier algorithmic trading, meaning traders can automate their strategies;
• Market analysis tools, news updates, and economic indicators to foster a more informed trading environment;
• Flexible position sizes, even in micro-lots suitable for beginners or those with limited capital.

Is OANDA Safe?

Yes, OANDA is a relatively safe platform. It has built a solid reputation over the years, and it is regulated by a number of regulatory bodies, including the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the National Futures Association (NFA).

However, as mentioned, some things like stop losses, negative balance protection, and hedging are not guaranteed. All users, however, have the option to activate two-factor authentication (2FA) and biometric logins on their accounts to safeguard their data.

OANDA US Pros and Cons

Pros

• No minimum deposits;
• Low Forex fees;
• Offers multiple top-notch products that fit individual investors and businesses;
• A lot of available base currencies (USD, EUR, HKD, SGD,CAD, AUD, JPY, CHF, GBP);
• It has a mobile app;
• NFA-regulated;
• Features a comprehensive set of trading and analytics tools;
• Has a good selection of platform tutorials.

Cons

• Customer service can be slow and is not available 24/7;
• No negative balance protection;
• Stop losses are not guaranteed globally;
• The registration process could take several days;
• It supports only 10 cryptocurrencies for retail traders;
• CFDs, commodities, bullions, and indices are not available.

Trade Forex and Crypto with Ease

• Trade 68 Forex and 8 cryptocurrency pairs

• Enjoy no minimum deposits and no deposit fees

• Explore 2,000+ indicators and develop your own trading strategy

• Over 20 years of experience and insight in the market

Get Started

OANDA Corporation is regulated by the CFTC/NFA. OANDA is a member Firm of the NFA (Member ID: 0325821). CFDs are not available to residents in the United States.

OANDA CORPORATION IS A MEMBER OF NFA AND IS SUBJECT TO NFA'S REGULATORY OVERSIGHT AND EXAMINATIONS. HOWEVER, YOU SHOULD BE AWARE THAT NFA DOES NOT HAVE REGULATORY OVERSIGHT AUTHORITY OVER UNDERLYING OR SPOT VIRTUAL CURRENCY PRODUCTS OR TRANSACTIONS OR VIRTUAL CURRENCY EXCHANGES, CUSTODIANS OR MARKETS

Trading in digital assets, including cryptocurrencies, is especially risky and is only for individuals with a high risk tolerance and the financial ability to sustain losses. OANDA Corporation is not party to any transactions in digital assets and does not custody digital assets on your behalf. All digital asset transactions occur on the Paxos Trust Company exchange. Any positions in digital assets are custodied solely with Paxos and held in an account in your name outside of OANDA Corporation. Digital assets held with Paxos are not protected by SIPC. Paxos is not an NFA member and is not subject to the NFA’s regulatory oversight and examinations.

Leveraged trading in foreign currency contracts or other off-exchange products on margin carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for everyone. We advise you to carefully consider whether trading is appropriate for you in light of your personal circumstances. You may lose more than you invest. Information on this website is general in nature. We recommend that you seek independent financial advice and ensure you fully understand the risks involved before trading. Trading through an online platform carries additional risks.

OANDA Customer Support and Community Platforms

All necessary information in regard to OANDA and its financial services is available on the company’s official website and a number of social media pages where clients can find regular updates and news about the firm and the Forex trading market, as well as occasional instructional posts and snippets that will help users engage with the platform.

OANDA platforms include:

Website: https://www.oanda.com/en-us/

Blog: https://blog.oanda.com

Support email: [email protected]

Social media channels

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@oanda

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/oanda/mycompany

Twitter: https://twitter.com/OANDA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/oanda/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OANDAfx/

Final Thoughts

OANDA is one of the veterans on the market, with almost thirty years of solid online presence, a number of high-caliber partners, and tens of thousands of registered members using its services daily.

For some, such a track record is enough to inspire trust and warrant a registration; for others, it might not be enough to compensate for some of the shortcomings of the platform.

Nonetheless, OANDA’s commitment to diversifying its list of tools and services, its insistence on transparency, and its educational approach to marketing its features to traders of all experience levels have much to commend, and so does the number of licenses it holds.

Risk Disclosure and Disclaimer: The information provided in this review should not be regarded as investment advice. When investing, your capital is at risk.

Frequently Asked Questions About OANDA