Best forex brokers for beginners in Lebanon in 2021

To help you find the best forex brokers for beginners in Lebanon in 2021, we went ahead and did the research for you. First, we selected 93 quality online brokers, then we checked and compared fees, currency pairs, charting tools and educational materials. We dug deep, so you won't have to. And now, without further ado...

Our top 5 picks for the best forex brokers for beginners in Lebanon in 2021:

1. Saxo Bank is the winner, the best forex broker for beginners in Lebanon in 2021. Great trading platform. Outstanding research. Broad product portfolio.
2. Interactive Brokers takes second place. Low trading fees. Wide range of products. Many great research tools.
3. IG rounds out the top three. First-class web trading platform. Superb educational tools. Great deposit and withdrawal options.
4. ActivTrades is ranked fourth. Low trading fees. Excellent account opening. Free deposit and withdrawal.
5. AvaTrade just made it on the list, taking the number five spot. Easy and fast account opening. Free deposit and withdrawal options. Great research tools.

What makes a top forex broker for beginners? First of all, fair forex fees. They should also offer a lot of currency pairs and a great platform with advanced charting. Educational tools to help you start investing also matter.

These features may sound obvious and easy to list, but they're hard to figure out. We test brokers based on close to 500 criteria, using real accounts and real money. We know what we are talking about.

If you are a beginner, be careful with forex trading. Forex products are complex and very risky, therefore not suitable for everyone. You can easily lose all your invested money. If you don't have a clue how forex trading works, start with our forex trading 101.

Not sure which broker to choose? For a tailored recommendation, check out our broker finder tool. Just enter the name of your country and it will show you only the relevant brokers. Want more details? Compare brokers with the help of this detailed comparison table.

Want to see the overall rank of brokers for this topic, not just the country specific one? Head to this link here.

And now, let's see the top forex brokers in 2021 for Lebanese citizens one by one, starting with the winner, Saxo Bank.

Saxo Bank, a Danish investment bank founded in 1992, provides online trading and investment services. The company is regulated by several financial authorities globally, including the Danish Financial Services Agency (FSA) and the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). 

Saxo Bank is a global service provider and its subsidiaries are present in the form of separate legal entities in different regions of the world. The services offered by the various entities may differ slightly, especially with respect to fees and product portfolios. In this review, we tested Saxo Bank UK.

Saxo Bank is considered safe because it has a long track record, a banking background and is regulated by top-tier financial authorities.

Recommended for investors and traders looking for a great trading platform and solid research

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#1 Saxo Bank
Fees

Saxo Bank has low fees when it comes to buying and selling currency pairs.

To have a clear picture of forex fees, we calculated a forex benchmark fee for major currency pairs. This catch-all benchmark includes commissions, spreads and financing costs for all brokers.

All spreads, commissions and financing rates for opening a position, holding for a week, and closing.

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#1 Saxo Bank
Markets and products

Saxo Bank gives access to 182 currency pairs.

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#1 Saxo Bank
Customer service

4.0

Saxo's customer service is available in many languages, with phone and email support that work well despite small issues. Downsides include the lack of live chat and 24/7 availability.

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#1 Saxo Bank
Research

5.0

Saxo Bank's research is great, including well-developed tools for both fundamental and technical analysis. Clients have recommendations, detailed fundamental data and user-friendly interactive charting at their disposal.

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#1 Saxo Bank
Account opening

2.5

Saxo's account opening is fully digital, user-friendly and available in most countries. On the other hand, the minimum deposit is high in certain countries and account verification can take longer.

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#1 Saxo Bank
Verdict

Saxo Bank is a great broker, providing a complex and good service.

It offers a user-friendly and well-designed trading platform, backed by great research. The product portfolio covers all asset types and many international markets.

It has some drawbacks though. The fees for bonds, options and futures are high. There is also a high minimum deposit for certain countries. Lastly, there is no live chat or 24/7 customer support.

In general, Saxo Bank is one of the best online brokerage companies out there. By opening an account, you will get a broad, well-developed service constantly adapted to the needs of clients.

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Interactive Brokers review summary

Interactive Brokers was founded in 1978 and is one of the biggest US-based discount brokers. The broker is regulated by several financial authorities globally, including top-tier ones like the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

As it has licenses from multiple top-tier regulators, Interactive Brokers is considered safe. Having a long track record and publicly disclosed financials while being listed on a stock exchange are also great signs for its safety.

Our overall Interactive Brokers rating

Compare this broker to the best Interactive Brokers alternative here.

Recommended for traders looking for low fees and a professional trading environment

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#2 Interactive Brokers
Fees

Interactive Brokers has average fees when it comes to buying and selling currency pairs.

To have a clear picture of forex fees, we calculated a forex benchmark fee for major currency pairs. This catch-all benchmark includes commissions, spreads and financing costs for all brokers.

All spreads, commissions and financing rates for opening a position, holding for a week, and closing.

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#2 Interactive Brokers
Markets and products

Interactive Brokers gives access to 105 currency pairs.

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#2 Interactive Brokers
Customer service

3.4

Interactive Brokers's customer service could be better. You can contact them via phone, email, live chat and an automated 'iBot', and receive mostly relevant answers. However, waiting times can be long and most options are not available 24/7.

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#2 Interactive Brokers
Research

4.3

Interactive Brokers has almost limitless research possibilities, but the user interface is overly complicated, hard to follow and not very well designed.

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#2 Interactive Brokers
Account opening

3.4

IB's account opening process is fully digital and the required minimum deposit is low. On the negative side, the process is complicated, and account verification takes relatively long.

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#2 Interactive Brokers
Verdict

Interactive Brokers is one of the biggest US-based discount brokers, regulated by several top-tier regulators globally. We recommend this broker mainly for advanced traders.

On the plus side, IB has low fees, a vast range of available markets and products, and diverse research tools. 

There are some drawbacks, though: we weren't satisfied with the level of customer service and the account opening process is complicated. The desktop platform is complex and hard to get a handle on, especially for beginners.

If you have experience navigating complex platforms and enjoy transparent, low-cost trading, Interactive Brokers could be a great fit for you.

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IG was established in the UK in 1974 and is one of the biggest CFD brokers in the world. It is regulated by several bodies globally, including top-tier regulators like the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and Germany's Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin). IG Group is listed on the London Stock Exchange.

IG is considered safe because it is listed on a stock exchange, discloses its financials and is overseen by top-tier regulators.

Disclaimer: CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 70% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money. CFDs are not provided for US clients. Forex trading involves risk. Losses can exceed deposits.

Recommended for traders of any experience level looking for an easy-to-use trading platform

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70% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#3 IG
Fees

IG has high fees when it comes to buying and selling currency pairs.

To have a clear picture of forex fees, we calculated a forex benchmark fee for major currency pairs. This catch-all benchmark includes commissions, spreads and financing costs for all brokers.

All spreads, commissions and financing rates for opening a position, holding for a week, and closing.

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70% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#3 IG
Markets and products

IG gives access to 205 currency pairs.

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70% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#3 IG
Customer service

3.6

IG provides close to 24/7 customer support that gives relevant answers. However, email answers and phone can be slow, while live chat is offline most of the time.

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70% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#3 IG
Research

3.5

IG offers user-friendly research tools. Its news flow and charting tools are great. On the other hand, fundamental data is not available.

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70% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#3 IG
Account opening

4.4

IG's account opening is seamless and fully digital. There is no minimum deposit for bank transfers and a low, $/€300 minimum deposit for credit/debit cards and PayPal. On the other hand, account verification takes around 3 business days, which is slower than at some other brokers.

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70% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#3 IG
Verdict

IG is one of the biggest and most reliable CFD brokers. It is regulated by several financial authorities around the world. IG Group is listed on the London Stock Exchange.

IG has one of the best web trading platforms BrokerChooser has tested. The deposit and withdrawal conditions are great. You can also expand your knowledge with great educational materials.

On the other hand, there are some drawbacks. The forex and stock CFD fees are high and the product portfolio in most countries is limited to forex, CFDs and options. Customer support could be better.

Feel free to test IG's first-class trading platform, since there is no minimum funding amount for bank transfers and you can also easily open a demo account. 

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70% of retail CFD accounts lose money

ActivTrades is a global forex broker founded in 2001. It is regulated by the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Securities Commission of the Bahamas (SCB). 

ActivTrades is considered safe because it has a long track record and it is regulated by the FCA, a top-tier financial authority.

Disclaimer: CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 60% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Recommended for forex and cfd traders looking for low fees and great deposit/withdrawal conditions

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60% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#4 ActivTrades
Fees

ActivTrades has low fees when it comes to buying and selling currency pairs.

To have a clear picture of forex fees, we calculated a forex benchmark fee for major currency pairs. This catch-all benchmark includes commissions, spreads and financing costs for all brokers.

All spreads, commissions and financing rates for opening a position, holding for a week, and closing.

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60% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#4 ActivTrades
Markets and products

ActivTrades gives access to 48 currency pairs.

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60% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#4 ActivTrades
Customer service

4.5

ActivTrades offers several customer service channels and we found the live chat to be the fastest and most relevant. Emails are typically answered within 24 hours and the answers were relevant. The only thing we missed is the 24/7 availability.

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60% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#4 ActivTrades
Research

3.0

ActivTrades' selection of research tools is average, but the tools are user-friendly. Charting and other technical tools, like APIs, are great. On the flip side, there are no trading ideas, fundamental data, and news.

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60% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#4 ActivTrades
Account opening

5.0

Account opening at ActivTrades is seamless and fully digital, taking just a few minutes to complete and verified within one business day.

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60% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#4 ActivTrades
Verdict

All in all, ActivTrades is a good CFD/forex broker.

ActivTrades has low trading fees. The account opening is excellent and the deposits and withdrawals are free.

On the downside, its product portfolio is limited to just a few products, as it offers mainly CFDs and forex instruments. Research tools are basic, and there are no trading ideas or fundamental data. There is an inactivity fee.

As trading fees are low and your account will be ready quickly, we encourage you to try ActivTrades.

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60% of retail CFD accounts lose money

AvaTrade is a global CFD and forex broker founded in 2006. It is regulated by several financial authorities, such as the Central Bank of Ireland.

Disclaimer: CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 71% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Recommended for forex and cfd traders looking for an option to use metatrader platforms

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71% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#5 AvaTrade
Fees

AvaTrade has average fees when it comes to buying and selling currency pairs.

To have a clear picture of forex fees, we calculated a forex benchmark fee for major currency pairs. This catch-all benchmark includes commissions, spreads and financing costs for all brokers.

All spreads, commissions and financing rates for opening a position, holding for a week, and closing.

Visit broker More
71% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#5 AvaTrade
Markets and products

AvaTrade gives access to 55 currency pairs.

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71% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#5 AvaTrade
Customer service

4.5

AvaTrade has great customer support, giving fast and relevant answers in many local languages. On the negative side, support is not available 24/7, only 24/5.

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71% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#5 AvaTrade
Research

4.6

AvaTrade has user-friendly research tools, from trading ideas to an upgraded newsfeed. The only thing we missed was fundamental data on stocks.

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71% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#5 AvaTrade
Account opening

5.0

Account opening at AvaTrade is seamless and fully digital. You can start trading literally in minutes.

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71% of retail CFD accounts lose money

#5 AvaTrade
Verdict

AvaTrade is regulated by several authorities globally, including the top-tier Central Bank of Ireland and the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), therefore it is considered safe.

We liked the seamless and hassle-free account opening. You can use a lot of deposit and withdrawal options, all free of charge. We also liked that you can use many user-friendly tools for research.

AvaTrade has some drawbacks though. The product range is limited to forex, CFDs, and cryptos, and there is a high fee charged for inactivity. Lastly, there are better alternatives if forex trading fees are your main concern.

As there is only a small minimum deposit, and your account will be ready for trading quickly, feel free to try AvaTrade.

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71% of retail CFD accounts lose money

Forex trading has become really popular over the last decade. Looking at important criteria like fees will help you find the forex broker most suitable for you.

At BrokerChooser, we test online brokers based on close to 500 criteria, using a real account and real money.

The most important factors to consider when selecting the top forex brokers are the fees of forex trading. Besides trading fees, you should also look at the range and quality of educational tools and the number of available currency pairs. Also make sure if the broker provides great research and advanced charting functions.

Fees, fees, fees. We bet this is always on your mind when you're looking for the best forex broker. It can be complicated. Let's see how we sorted it out.

It is not easy to compare forex broker fees, but we are here to help. Forex brokers can charge commissions, spreads and financing fees.

When it comes to commissions, there are two different fee structures forex brokers normally use:

1. All trading fees are included in the spread except the financing rate. Basically, think of it as the broker giving you a wider spread than it gets from the market.
2. You get the market spread, but you pay a commission based on the traded amount. This model is usually used by ECN brokers.

The second version is more transparent, but this doesn't always mean it's more expensive.

When you trade forex on leverage and hold your position overnight, a fee will be charged. This is called financing cost. Financing costs change daily, and can add up if you hold your positions for a longer period.

To make your life easier, we calculated what your overall fee would be if you took a $20,000 position, held it for a week then closed it. We used a 30:1 leverage, the maximum available leverage for major currency pairs at many brokers.

Forex trading looks simple, but it comes with serious risks. Before trading, try to understand the basics and ask yourself: is this for me?

Understanding the forex market

Forex, FX, foreign exchange or currency market: you have probably already heard one of these expressions. They all mean the same: a market where you can exchange currencies or bet on the price movement of currency pairs.

The forex market has several outlets, from currency exchange booths on the street to the currency trading desks of big banks.

For a non-professional trader like you, the easiest and safest way to trade forex is by opening an account at a reliable online broker.

The vast majority of currency transactions are conducted on OTC (over-the-counter) markets. An OTC market is a non-regulated market, where you have to assess for yourself how safe your counterparty is. When you travel abroad to an exotic country and you need to exchange some money, you would probably go to a bank branch rather than changing money on the street, right? This is how you minimize your counterparty risk. You have to do the same when you select your online broker for trading forex. You should always choose a reliable broker.

Forex trading is tempting for the following reasons:

• everybody has an opinion on where currencies are going

• at first sight, the forex market is relatively easy to understand compared with other markets, like the stock market

• by using leverage, traders can easily trade with a 100 times more money than what they actually have on their trading account and thus magnify profits (or losses!)

• the market is open 24 hours a day, 5 days a week

• it is the most liquid market in the world, meaning there are lots of transactions every second and you don't have to worry about finding a partner to trade with

Although it looks easy, trading forex can be risky if you don't know what you're doing. By using high leverage carelessly, you can easily lose all your money within a couple of seconds. So you better start off slow, learn and open a demo account first. If you want to learn more, check out our article about the best free trading apps.

Forex market trading hours

The forex market is open from 11:00 PM Sunday until 11:00 PM Friday, London time.

Trading activity is usually at its highest when London and New York are both open.

It is important to note that there is a difference between currency conversion and forex trading.

The end result of a conversion is basically changing one currency into another. Imagine that you receive your salary in euros (EUR), but you want to spend it in British pounds (GBP). In this case, you exchange euros to pounds.

When you trade currency pairs there is no physical conversion. Imagine that you have an online broker account in US dollars and you want to bet on the price movements in EURUSD. In this case, you never convert your dollars to euros. If your bet was correct, the profit from your trade will be booked to your account in US dollars. If you were wrong, the loss will be deducted from your account in dollars as well.

Breaking down forex trading jargon

When you trade forex, you bet on the price change of a currency pair, for example, the EURUSD.

First of all, you need to understand what bid and ask prices mean. Let's take the EURUSD again as an example. The 'bid' is the price at which you can sell the EURUSD, or in other words to go short in it. If the price goes lower, you will generate a profit. The 'ask' price is the opposite. If you want to bet on the price moving up, you can open a trade at the 'ask' price. The mid-price is usually halfway between the two, but this is just a theoretical price that is not used for trading.

The actual bid and ask prices together are called the quote.

A long position is when you bet on the price moving up, while a short position is when you profit from the price going down.

The spread is the difference between the ask and the bid price. In the example above, the spread is 0.0005, which is calculated as 1.1705-1.1700.

The pip is the smallest amount of a currency pair. One pip is equal to 0.0001 for most currency pairs. In case of our example, the spread is 5 pips, or 5 times 0.0001, equalling 0.0005. For some currency pairs like the USDJPY, one pip is 0.01.

Leverage allows you to take bigger positions than the amount of money on your account. Imagine this as a multiplier of your profit or your loss. This can be as high as 300. Imagine you have $1,000 on your account and your applied leverage is 100. If you open a long position by using all your $1000, this means you open a trade for $1,000*100, or $100,000. If the price drops 1%, you will lose $1,000 (1%*$100,000), that is, all the money on your account. And the price of a currency pair can very easily drop by 1%. In case of EURUSD, this would mean a price decrease from 1.1705 to 1.1588.

A lot is the standard number of units of a forex contract. It is usually 100,000 units of the base currency. The base currency is the first currency in a currency pair. For EURUSD, the base currency is the EUR and one lot is €100,000. A mini lot is 10,000, a micro is 1,000 and a nano is 100 units of the base currency.

In forex trading, you can encounter different types of contracts: spot, CFD, forward and futures. Spot and CFD contracts are the most commonly traded.

A spot contract is settled two days after the trade. Settlement means that the counterparties are converting their currencies between each other at the price of the trade made two days earlier. Imagine the settlement as a currency conversion made at a money exchange booth on the street. The only difference is that this happens two days after the price was agreed on. However, in most cases, the settlement doesn't actually happen, because spot contracts are rolled over before the settlement. This is done because when you are betting on the direction of a currency pair, you do not actually want to convert money into the other currency, you just want to bet on the price movement. The rollover ensures that the conversion will not happen.

To learn what forex CFDs are and how you can trade them, read our CFD 101 and CFD trading tips.

When your position is rolled over, your online broker closes your current spot position and opens a new one. This process is not visible to you, but it has a fee, called the rollover or financing fee. The rollover fee is calculated from the interest rate difference between the two currencies you are trading. In some cases, you may also receive a fee payment from the broker if the interest rates you trade are in your favor.

A forward forex contract is a contract made on the OTC market. The specifics of the contract, like the term, the price and the settlement are defined by the counterparties on a case-by-case basis. Let's take as an example a company that needs $100,000 in 30 days to pay its employees, but its revenues are in euros. Since it wants to lock the exact exchange rate it gets in 30 days, it will seal a forward contract with a big bank at a fixed price, let's say at 1.1710. After 30 days, they will exchange the currencies and the company will receive €85,397 ($100,000/1.1710). In this case, there is an actual settlement.

A futures forex contract is traded on a regulated market, for example, on a commodity exchange, like the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). When you trade futures, your counterparty is the exchange and the specifics of the contract are predefined by the exchange. When your counterparty is a regulated exchange, you don't need to check your counterparty risk, as this is one of the safest ways of trading. However, the exchange requires a large amount of initial money for trading, so this is not suitable for you if you have only small amounts to invest. For example, if you want to trade one EURUSD futures contract on the CME, you need to have at least $2,000 on your account.

What drives forex market prices?

As we said before, everybody has an opinion about the forex market, because it seems so simple. However, currency markets are among the most unpredictable in the world.

Everything, from monetary policies and government spending to politics and wars, can influence the prices of currency pairs. Therefore, it is difficult to predict which way they are going move.

Nevertheless, economic calendars can help, so at least you know about and can prepare for scheduled events (such as statistical data releases or central bank rate-setting meetings) that could have an impact on the forex market.

You saw the details, now let's zoom out. Here are the top forex brokers for beginners in 2021 for citizens in Lebanon:

Saxo Bank is our winner, the best forex broker for beginners for Lebanese citizens in 2021. Great trading platform. Outstanding research. Broad product portfolio.

All of the brokers we highlighted are great choices. But watch out, forex trading can be risky. If you think you know enough and are good to go, pick your favourite and take the next step in your trading journey. Let us know what you think in the comments section.

Still unsure? Use our broker finder and find the best broker for you.