iOption Review
| Broker | iOption |
|---|---|
| US Traders Accepted | |
| Company Name | iOption Group Ltd. |
| Headquarters | British Virgin Islands and Cyprus |
| Regulation | No |
| Bonus Type | Match bonus |
| Bonus Size | $5,000 |
| Max Payout | 75% |
| Out-of-Money Reward | 10% |
| Trading Platform | SpotOption |
| Deposit Options | Credit/debit cards, CashU, Skrill |
| Deposit Currencies | EUR, USD, or South African Rand |
| Minimum Deposit | $200 |
| Minimum Trade | $5 |
| Maximum Trade | $5,000 |
| Online Since | 2010 |
| Trading Instruments | Currencies, commodities, stocks and indices |
| Number of Trading Instruments | 130 |
| Binary Option Types | High/Low, One Touch, Option Builder, 60 Seconds |
| Customer Support Types | Phone (there are numbers in numerous countries), live chat, email, ticketing system |
| Education Offered | Basic how-to pages, Glossary, FAQ, video library, eBook, demo, knowledge library (pretty good resource), online classes |
| Tools Offered | Economic calendar, global market hours, alerts and signals (for VIP clients), account management |
| Commission | $25 fee for wire transfers, only for amounts under $250. One free withdrawal per month. After that, you're charged $20 or EUR 25 for every withdrawal in that month. |
| Awards | Best Binary Options Broker of 2011 by FXEmpire |
| Languages | English, Spanish, French, German, Arabic, Portuguese, Italian, Turkish, Romanian, Danish |
| Demo Account | Trial Account allows you to trade for five days and keep any profits you make; should you lose your money, you will be given $150 back. |
Out of Business
iOption went out of business in late 2013. The company is no longer operating. The review presented below is our old review and is no longer valid.
Old Review
iOption is one of those brokers that appears to be worthy of a closer look, but it’s also a mixed bag since there isn’t a lot of information available about it right now. Presumably this is because iOption hasn’t been around all that long, having opened its doors in 2010. iOption is run by iOption Group Ltd., a company with headquarters in both Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands. Their website is available in a number of languages and they do allow US traders. While we didn’t find any specific references to USA customers, we had no problem registering from that country. While the lack of information is a drawback, we were impressed with the sheer volume of resources on the website.
Getting Started with iOption
It takes just several minutes to register with iOption; you can deposit your funds using credit card, CashU, or wire transfer. The minimum deposit is 250 USD, EUR, or South American Rand. There is no demo account, but there is a trial account that allows you to trade with some “insurance” for five days. You can keep any money you win during those five days, but if you lose, you are allowed to get $150 (or equivalent) back. This isn’t genuine risk-free trading, but it’s better than nothing. We still advise that you look for a way to demo test before you go live with real money.
iOption uses the popular SpotOption trading platform, which means the interface will be familiar to many traders. There is a mobile system available you can use on Android and some other mobile devices. That’s a nice plus. We were unable to find minimum and maximum trade sizes on the site, but will update this review once we hear back from customer service. There are a ton of different trading instruments available; we counted around 130, including stocks, indices, commodities, and currencies.
There are several different ways you can trade binary options on the website, including High/Low, One Touch, Option Builder, and 60 Seconds. Option Builder allows you to specify your own expiry time, and is a great way to gain more control over your trading. Additionally, iOption allows you to use early closure, rollover, and other tools to save money and get more out of your winning trades. All in all it’s pretty comprehensive. It’d be nice if Boundary trades were also included, but the selection isn’t bad at all.
Customer Service and Trading Resources
We weren’t too impressed with the customer service situation at first, being as we contacted live chat on a weekday during normal business hours and received no reply. But we have no need to condemn them, since they do seem to have a better system set up than many other brokers, just judging from all the channels they offer for communication. There are numerous phone numbers available for different countries, and there is also a ticketing system in place for queries sent via web form. The company has won an award from FXEmpire. We emailed them a few questions which we couldn’t find answers to on their site and heard back within 24 hours.
Trading resources was the area where we were really impressed with iOption. There is a whole plethora of resources, some of them basic, some really great and in-depth. At the bottom of the page you’ll find links to educational resources such as a glossary, FAQ, basic-how to pages, a video library, a free eBook, online classes, and a knowledge library. The knowledge library by itself offers far more than any other site we’ve reviewed to date. The articles are actually lengthy, detailed, and informative. If you aren’t very familiar with binary options, you’ll at least have a good beginning framework of understanding if you work your way through all these resources. You’ll want to build on what you learned, and you’ll still need to come up with a trading method, but it’s a great way to jump in and learn. The resources are comprehensive enough to give you an idea of what you need to learn to become successful.
You’ll see when you sign up that there are several different account tiers. If you deposit $500 you get the benefits which come with the Starter Account. The next tier up is the Trader Account ($2,000), and after that there’s the VIP Account for $5,000. Match bonuses of up to $1,000 per promotion are offered, and you also get other benefits the more you pay. All three of these accounts include account managers, and you receive one-on-one training monthly at the Trader level, and unlimited training at the VIP level. Other tools including daily and weekly asset in review reports, market alerts and webinars are included as well. If you get a VIP account, you also receive dedicated customer support from a specialist.
Conclusion
Here are the cons of iOption. Firstly, there isn’t a whole lot of information available on this company. We found no third party reviews at all; as far as we can tell, ours will be the first. We didn’t find customer ratings, either. More information on the broker would be necessary for us to give them a full recommendation. We were also dismayed at the live chat failure, though we were impressed with the prompt response to our email. A lot of brokers never answer our emails. iOption did it within 24 hours.
There are a lot of reasons that iOption intrigues us and should probably intrigue you. iOption’s site is still lacking some information, but it’s easy to navigate, and their platform looks excellent. The trading resources are extensive and that alone is a reason for us to take this broker seriously. If you have any more information about iOption, please feel free to share it with us. We recommend checking them out in the meantime. Get in touch with customer service and see if you can hunt down any more information on this broker before you sign up for an account. You can benefit from their educational resources right now, however—check out the knowledge library and start reading up. The knowledge will come in handy wherever you decide to trade.