CTOption
Closed!
  • CTOption

  • Regulated:  No
Broker Name: CTOption
Platform: PandaTS
Founded: 2010
Bonus: 300%
Return/Refund: 70-80%/0-15%
No. Of Assets: 100+
Regulated: No
Demo Account: Yes
Minimum Deposit: 250
US Traders: Accepted
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CTOption Review

by Martin Kay

CTOption is owned and managed by InfiniCore Ltd. The Jaycees Building, Stoney Ground, Kingstown, Saint Vincent and The Grenadines but they are currently not regulated. Their phone is +4721954405 and contact e-mail is [email protected].

Clearing services are managed by InfiniCore Ltd. England, 2 Woodberry Grove, Finchley, London, N120DR, England. According to their Terms and Conditions, the CTOption website is also managed by Ninety Nine Research Assets Ltd, an active but dormant virtual office registered in: Anguilla, the Mason Complex, 2nd floor, company number is 08940282. This company is not licensed either and is warned against in Anguilla where it is registered, find out more below under “regulator announcements”.

CTOption clearing is also managed by Ninety Nine Research Assets Ltd, England, Ilford, Essex. The brokerage is still not regulated by a major authority, so they either gave up on their efforts or they couldn’t meet the standards.

 

Is CTOption A Scam?

CTOption is operating like a scam according to all the complaints we have found. In addition, there are a few major downsides which affects CTOption’s credibility. To start off “softly”: Some may say that the bonus terms are a scam but what bonus isn’t a scam? You have to read the terms and understand what you are getting in to and I never recommend getting into a bonus. You might want to go through Terms and Conditions before you decide to take a bonus, unless you want to might become another victim of your own will. Another thing that really bothers me personally and other traders is the 5% rules regarding position size. In case a trader wants to open position equals to 5% or more of their overall balance, they should notify their account manager BEFORE trading, else the trade will be canceled, even in the event of winning. That really sucks, and raising some questions regarding CTOption reliability.

Update September 2016: The 5% rule is still in place according to their Live Chat support. Overall not much has changed for this brokerage in terms of what they offer but the clients’ opinion about them has certainly degraded.

And moving on to what really hurts their credibility: More and more scam reports have appeared in the last period and people complain about account managers trading without their consent and losing their money. According to some, the traders featured in the Replicator software are actually the broker’s people, not real clients. Upon further investigation in 2017, we found many more complaints regarding depleted accounts once clients requested for withdrawals and this is a big sign that CTOption is a scam broker. Find out more under “Complaints”. Another big sign of scam was exposed when we looked under “Who referred you to use” in the live chat. Apparently, CTOption is working together with all sorts of “get-rich-quick” scams such as: FastCashbiz, Code Fibo (exposed in our scam watch), Profit Maximizer (reviewed and exposed by us), Quantum code (warned against by NSSC in Canda), Cash loophole, Push money (reviewed and exposed by us) and many more already exposed scams!

 

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Editor’s Note – Why CTOption DOESN’T Suck in 50 Words?

CTOption is based on PandaTS, a leading provider of software and platform solutions for Forex and other types of financial institutions.

 

Why does CTOption Suck

They suck because you will mostly find negative comments and tons of complaints about this broker and the experiences and stories are similar and they involve CTOption’s account managers and their notorious ‘Replicator’.

 

 

Should I Open an Account with CTOption?

You should probably avoid this broker. They are already warned against for un-authorized activities by many authorities worldwide and some stories told by many of their former and current clients suggests they have no intention to simply process your withdrawals.

The platform itself is good and well equipped. Trades execute very quickly but moving from one screen to the next, or switching from high/low to touch trading has a bit of lag. The platform supports high/low, range, touch and Hyper Trading. Hyper Trading is their name for 60 second trading and other super short term expiry. CTOption may have the broadest offering in this class including 30 seconds, 60 seconds, 2 minutes, 5 minutes and 10 minutes expiry. Aside from those the other options are mostly restricted to intraday expiry’s that will vary from asset to asset. The asset list itself is also pretty good. The only thing I really see missing are the Asian indices. They have the EU and US, they need the Asian. CTOption has more than 2 dozen forex pairs with four of them based on Bitcoin including BIT/USD, BIT/EUR, BIT/JPY and BIT/GBP.  There are 4 commodities including gold and oil and a basketful of international mega corp stocks. The minimum position is as low as $5.

Another great disadvantage and threat is their Binary Replicator which is used by their account managers to deplete trader’s accounts. As if that wasn’t enough, you will be charged a dormant account fee of 10% of your balance per month (at least 50$/€/£) if you have been inactive for two months without prior notice! In conclusion, CTOption will do everything to make sure you lose your deposit.

 
 

CTOption Complaints

More and more complaints pop up across the internet, ranging from price manipulation to failure to withdraw and to account managers trading without client’s consent. These complaints can be easily found on the main online forums, including ours, in the dedicated thread: CTOption Live Discussion.

Update January 2017: The complaints have multiplied since we last checked and the stories now line up: Replicator complaints, not honoring withdrawals, asking for “dormant” payment and generally very bad vibes.

 

CTOption Regulatory Announcements and Warnings

01.11.2016: FCA, the UK financial conduct authority warned against CTOption that appears to be operating without their authorization. Furthermore, the FCA mentions on their website that CTOption is falsely claiming that their payment services are authorized and regulated by the FCA.

26.10.2016: Anguilla’s FSC (where the company operating CTOption is registered at besides their UK virtual office), issued an Investor Alert warning against CTOption and the firm that is currently managing the brokerage.

11.4.16: The Italian Consob’s blacklist added InfiniCore/CTOption.

17.3.2016: British Columbia Securities Commission BCSC warns against CTOption which is not licensed to operate in BC.

13.5.2015: French AMF adds CToption to their blacklist of unauthorized websites.

 

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CTOption Bonus

Bonuses are always a point of contention between the brokers, reviewers and traders. I don’t like them and the CTOption bonus is no different. In fact, it may be one of the worst, or at least the hardest to understand, bonus policy I have seen. In the terms they state that unless “agreed upon” no “non-deposited funds” are available to be withdrawn. However, there are sign up bonuses that can be up to or over 100% of your initial deposit. Bonuses under 100% have 30X time trade volume on deposit plus bonus, bonuses over 100% of your deposit come with a 50X trade minimum. Regardless, I would normally speak directly with my account manager to be sure I am perfectly clear on the terms but since CTOption can change their terms and fees as desired I think it’s best to simply avoid bonuses.

Update September 2016: According to their Terms and Conditions, bonuses of 300% and above (!!!) will require a trading volume of 70 times the bonus amount before a withdrawal can be made. Keep in mind that the total trading volume will be reset to zero if you are granted another bonus.

Latest findings from 2017: Upon accepting a bonus, you may not withdraw your own money unless you first trade a volume of 1x the deposited funds + the bonus and wait 3 months! Remember that the dormant fee is 50 currency units. So, in case you deposit, take a bonus and realize you don’t want to trade with CTOption or you just don’t know how to trade you will have to wait 3 months which makes your account dormant and you will be charged the 10% fee and then a withdrawal fee of 50 which means you have already lost at least 100 or much more. To make matters worse, only specific investment sizes are accepted as trading volume and there is a time limit. As mentioned earlier, the bonus terms are probably the worse we have witnessed in this industry and the most complicated.

 

CTOption Withdrawals

CTOption withdrawals are a little bit complicated if not outright impossible most of the times. First, Min withdrawal is about $100. Second, In order to make a withdrawal you must fill out, print and sign the withdrawal request and then scan/email it to their financial department. According the company’s officials, withdrawal should take approx. 24 hours after sending paperwork, depending on the method. They highly recommend using a single source such as a single bank account, credit card or eWallet in order for easiest withdrawals and compliance with AML laws. Ewallets have the quickest withdrawal; they will clear to your account in under 2 hours once processed (2-3 days max for others). However, judging from what we learned above, a withdrawal from CTOption might be as hard as getting blood from stone. Because CTOption can at any time, change (read raise) your fees as they please or simply view your account as “unqualified”.

Update September 2016: The minimum withdrawal is now 100 account units. The processing fee goes up to 50 account units and we strongly recommend reading their full Withdrawal Policy because they charge all sorts of fees and you should be familiar with them.

 
 

CTOption Ratings

User Friendliness 17/20

CTOption is a user friendly platform. The layout is intuitive; the trading screens are easy to understand. There are also no downloads required. The broker also includes lots of educational and analytical material including articles, ebooks, and daily updates but to gain access to most of them you need to open an account first.

 

Assets/Expiry 17/20

CTOption has a very very good asset list with over 100 assets. It is not the best and has some limitations but still very good. The list is Forex heavy but that is no surprise as most binary traders come from the Forex world. All the major indices, commodities and stocks are present except for those from the Asian markets. Expiry is OK. I say OK because it is good for day traders and super short term traders but not so much for longer term traders. Since it’s Binary after all… short terms are great.

Update September 2016: Long Term binaries are now available but not for all assets. Anyway, it’s an improvement from the previous setup.

 

Commissions, Support, Effective Returns 14/20

After opening my demo account I tried to use the live chat to answer a simple question and got nothing after the hello. Maybe they care more about registered users who actually deposited… Anyway, returns are average for the industry in the 70-80% range, including 0-15% out of money refund.

Update 2017: Fees are not limited to withdrawals and are a bit excessive. Amounts up to 100 might not be subjected to fees for the first withdrawal but after that, a $50 or higher will apply. We strongly recommend you check out their fee structure in their Terms and Conditions. In addition, the fees can be changed for specific accounts at any time without further notice and you may be charged a dormant account fee of 10% or higher after 3 months of inactivity.

 

Deposits, Payments, Bonuses 15/20

Update September 2016: The minimum deposit is now 250 account units (USD/EUR/GBP) and the minimum withdrawal is 100 account units. The turnover can go as high as 70 times for bonuses above 300%. Overall, the bonus terms and the entire terms and conditions are a big mess and hugely unfavorable for traders. Withdrawals are often not being processed and in the meanwhile, accounts are being depleted using account managers or the “Replicator”.

 

Broker Extra’s 12/20

There is the Replicator and trading signals but since you are in a conflict of interest with the broker it’s best to avoid them.

 

 

CTOption Overall Ratings = 75/100

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