In a letter to client, Alpari UK has informed them that starting February 10th, they will no longer be offering binary options trading to clients as they stated, “We have taken the strategic decision to stop offering binary options due to regulatory considerations.”
In the letter, Alpari didn’t provide any additional information as to what the regulator considerations are, and as of publishing time, requests for comment from the broker by FortuneZ were yet to be answered.
The news comes as a bit of a surprise, as the broker only launched the product in September of last year using technology from binary options provider, SpotOption. In terms of UK regulation, binary options fall under ESMA guidelines as a financial product and are available to market to EU and UK customers with a FCA or similar EU financial license.
Among UK firms providing binary options trading, publicly traded IG Markets as well as GAIN Capital’s recent acquisition, GFT UK, both offer binaries to their customers. For Alpari, it’s not a complete exit from binary options as they will continue to offer the product in their RU unit.
