There's no cost when opening a live spread betting or CFD trading account. You can also view prices and use tools such as charts, Reuters news or Morningstar quantitative equity reports, free of charge. However, you will need to deposit funds in your account to place a trade.

You can spread bet from £0.30/point on EUR/USD, GBP/USD, USD/JPY and AUD/USD, and £0.40/point on EUR/GBP. You can see the minimum trade size for all instruments on the platform, in 'Product overview', under 'Betting and Position Limits'.

There are a number of costs to consider when spread betting and CFD trading, including spread costs, holding costs (for trades held overnight which is essentially a fee for the funds you borrow to cover the leveraged portion of the trade), rollover costs for expired forward trades, and guaranteed stop-loss order charges (if you use this risk-management tool).

Yes, CMC Markets UK plc (registration number 173730) and CMC Spreadbet plc (registration number 170627) are fully authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the UK. Retail client money is held in segregated client bank accounts and money held on behalf of clients is distributed across a range of major banks, which are regularly assessed against our risk criteria.

Yes, your eligible deposits with CMC Markets are protected up to a total of £85,000 by the Financial Services Compensations Scheme (FSCS), the UK's deposit guarantee scheme. If CMC Markets ever went into liquidation, retail clients would have their share of segregated money returned, minus the administrators' costs in handling and distributing these funds. Any shortfall of funds up to £85,000 may be compensated under the FSCS.

As a CMC Markets client, your money is always held separately from CMC Markets' own funds, so that under property, trust and insolvency law, your money is protected. Therefore your money is unavailable to general creditors of CMC Markets, if CMC Markets is unable to meet its liabilities when they fall due.

Our automated pricing engine collates and checks thousands of prices per second, streamed from our liquidity providers. The most representative price is then used to create the quotes on our platform. Our pricing on forex aims to mirror the underlying market. Learn more

Our income comes primarily from our spreads, while other fees, such as overnight holding costs, make a minor contribution to overall revenue.

We never aim to profit from our clients' losses. Our aim is to build long-term relationships by providing the best possible trading experience through our technology and customer service.

FX trading, also known as foreign exchange trading, or forex trading, is the exchange of different currencies on a decentralised global market. It's one of the largest and most liquid financial markets in the world. Forex trading involves the simultaneous buying and selling of the world's currencies on this market. Learn more

When trading forex, you speculate on whether the price of one currency will rise or fall against another. For example, if you believe that the value of the British pound will rise, relative to the value of the US dollar, you would go ahead and trade the GBP/USD pair.

To help you understand how forex trading works, view our CFD examples, which takes you through both buying and selling scenarios. See forex examples

Forex margin rates are usually expressed as a percentage, with forex margin requirements typically starting at around 3.3% in the UK for major foreign exchange currency pairs. Your FX broker's margin requirement shows you the leverage you can use when trading forex with that broker. Learn more

One of the advantages of spread betting and trading CFDs is that you only need to deposit a percentage of the full value of your position to open a trade, known as trading on leverage. Remember, trading on leverage can also amplify losses, so it's important to manage your risk.

Spread betting allows you to trade tax-free on a wide range of financial markets 24 hours a day, from Sunday nights through to Friday nights. Trade on your phone, tablet, PC or Mac on a wide range of instruments using leverage. Tax treatment depends on individual circumstances and can change or may differ in a jurisdiction other than the UK.