Been thinking about this after seeing so many broker debates in this forum —
everyone throws around “regulated” like it’s one single thing, but there’s
actually a pretty big gap between different regulators.
Curious how many of you actually go check the license number yourself vs
just trusting the logo on the homepage?
For what it’s worth, here’s what I’ve learned digging into this over time:
- FCA (UK) brokers have a searchable FRN (Firm Reference Number)
- ASIC (Australia) brokers have an AFSL number
- CFTC/NFA (US) brokers have an NFA ID you can check on NFA BASIC
- MAS (Singapore) brokers have a CMS Licence
The part that surprised me most: apparently some scam sites have literally
copied a real broker’s license number onto a fake look-alike website. So
even a “matching” license number isn’t proof by itself — you also need to
check that the legal entity name and domain match what’s on the actual
regulator’s register.
Anyone here actually had a case where they checked and found a mismatch?
Or is everyone just trusting the broker’s own claims on this?
