News · Analysis
Retail CFD Volume Shifts Away From FX, FM Intelligence Finds
Currency pairs made up 13.7% of the volume retail brokers reported in the second quarter of 2026, down from 26.8% a year earlier, according to FM Intelligence, the data arm of Finance Magnates. Monthly FX volume across the brokers it tracks fell to $4.2 trillion from $6.4 trillion, while non-FX CFD volume — index, commodity, equity and crypto contracts — rose to $26.3 trillion from $17.4 trillion. The industry's overall volume grew only because the non-FX increase outpaced the FX decline, and the five largest brokers, which now hold 41.8% of the volume FM Intelligence attributes to named firms, generated just 4.0% of their own volume in currencies.
Retail CFD brokers have long marketed themselves as forex specialists, but the volume they report increasingly says otherwise. According to FM Intelligence, the analysis unit of Finance Magnates, currency pairs accounted for 13.7% of the volume reported by tracked brokers in the second quarter of 2026, down from 26.8% a year earlier — a fall the firm set out in a report covered by Finance Magnates' Damian Chmiel.
What happened
FM Intelligence said monthly FX volume across the brokers it tracks fell to $4.2 trillion from $6.4 trillion over the year to Q2 2026. Over the same period, volume in index, commodity, equity and crypto CFDs rose to $26.3 trillion from $17.4 trillion, the firm's full analysis showed. Because the increase in non-FX volume outran the decline in FX, the industry's combined total still grew. FM Intelligence also reported that the five largest brokers by tracked volume — EC Markets, TMGM, IC Markets, IG Group and JustMarkets — now hold 41.8% of the volume attributed to the 51 to 52 named firms it follows, up from a share that had been broadly stable at 38.4% at the end of 2021 and 38.2% at the end of 2025, according to an earlier FM Intelligence report cited in the piece. FX made up 4.0% of the top five's combined volume in the quarter, against 10.9% a year earlier, and three of the five route all their reported volume through MetaTrader, per the same analysis.
Why it matters
The concentration figure did not rise because the largest brokers grew. FM Intelligence's July ranking put the industry-wide decline at 9.3% between the first and second quarters of 2026, and the median named broker lost 12.6% of its volume in the same period, with 47 of the 51 brokers present in both quarters reporting lower monthly volume, the firm said. Two names accounted for the gap between the industry-wide figure and the broader downturn: EC Markets added 23.6% and TMGM held its volume steady, while the remaining 49 named brokers fell by a larger amount together, according to FM Intelligence. Arkadiusz Jóźwiak, editor-in-chief at Comparic.pl, told Finance Magnates that the shift reflects where retail money has actually been moving. "The moves that pull retail money in over the past year have been in metals, equities and crypto, not in currency pairs," he said. That reframes what "forex brokers" have become: firms whose volume, revenue and rankings are now shaped mainly by instruments outside currencies.
What it means for traders
For traders assessing a broker's positioning, FM Intelligence's figures suggest that a firm's historical reputation as an FX specialist may say little about where its current flow, liquidity depth or execution focus actually sits. A broker whose FX share has fallen to single digits, as with the top five collectively, is likely to be allocating more of its technology, pricing and risk management attention to index, commodity, equity and crypto CFDs. That does not itself indicate better or worse execution in any asset class — FM Intelligence's data covers reported volume from named brokers only, not the full retail market — but it is a reasonable prompt to check which instruments a broker is actually built around before assuming FX specialism. Readers comparing brokers more broadly can see our World FX Awards winners for related context, and our methodology page sets out how such comparisons are typically constructed.
What to watch
The next test is whether the concentration trend FM Intelligence describes continues into subsequent quarters, and whether the median broker's 12.6% quarterly decline proves a one-off or a pattern. Also worth tracking is whether EC Markets' 23.6% gain and TMGM's flat volume — the two outliers that offset a wider industry contraction — persist, since FM Intelligence's own figures show the other 49 named brokers moving in the opposite direction. As FX's share of retail CFD volume continues to be reported quarterly, further falls or a stabilisation around current levels would both be informative about whether the shift toward metals, equities and crypto reflects a lasting change in retail appetite or a temporary rotation.
FAQ
What did FM Intelligence report? That currency pairs fell to 13.7% of the volume reported by tracked retail brokers in Q2 2026, down from 26.8% a year earlier, while non-FX CFD volume rose to $26.3 trillion from $17.4 trillion.
Does this mean the retail CFD industry is shrinking? No. FM Intelligence's data shows total industry volume grew because the rise in non-FX volume outpaced the fall in FX volume, even as the median named broker lost volume quarter on quarter.
Which brokers hold the largest share of tracked volume? EC Markets, TMGM, IC Markets, IG Group and JustMarkets together held 41.8% of the volume FM Intelligence attributes to named firms in Q2 2026, according to the report.