City Index Review 2023

How we ranked fees

We ranked City Index's fee levels as low, average or high based on how they compare to those of all reviewed brokers.

First, let's go over some basic terms related to broker fees. What you need to keep an eye on are trading fees and non-trading fees.

• Trading fees occur when you trade. These can be commissions, spreads, financing rates and conversion fees.
• Non-trading fees include charges not directly related to trading, like withdrawal fees or inactivity fees.

In the sections below, you will find the most relevant fees of City Index for each asset class. For example, in the case of forex and stock index trading the most important fees are spreads, commissions and financing rates.

We also compared City Index's fees with those of two similar brokers we selected, CMC Markets and XTB. This selection is based on objective factors such as products offered, client profile, fee structure, etc. See a more detailed rundown of City Index alternatives.

To have a clear overview of City Index, let's start with the trading fees.

City Index trading fees

City Index trading fees are low.

We know it's hard to compare trading fees for CFD brokers. So how did we approach the problem of making their fees clear and comparable? We compare brokers by calculating all the fees of a typical trade for selected products.

We have chosen popular instruments within each asset class:

• Stock index CFDs: SPX and EUSTX50
• Stock CFDs: Apple and Vodafone
• Forex: EURUSD, GBPUSD, AUDUSD, EURCHF and EURGBP

A typical trade means buying a leveraged position, holding it for one week, and then selling. For the volume, we chose a $2,000 position for the stock index and stock CFDs and $20,000 for the forex transactions. The leverage we used was:

• 20:1 for stock index CFDs
• 5:1 for stock CFDs
• 30:1 for forex

These catch-all benchmark fees include spreads, commissions and financing costs for all brokers.

CFD fees

City Index has low stock index CFD fees, but high stock CFD fees.

Stock index CFD fees are built into the spreads, while stock CFD fees are charged via commission.

Forex fees

City Index's forex fees are low.

Forex fees are built into the spreads.

Non-trading fees

City Index has low non-trading fees. There is no withdrawal fee or account maintenance fee. 

On the other hand, there is a £12 monthly fee after one year of inactivity.

Can you open an account?

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72% of retail CFD accounts lose money

City Index accepts customers from selected countries including Australia, Singapore and the UK.

Minimum deposit

There is no minimum deposit at City Index.

Account types

City Index provides three account types, which differ in the account balance required, the maximum level of leverage and the provided additional services. 

*This account requires that you hold a minimum €500,000 portfolio or have working experience in the financial sector.

Based on ownership, you can open an individual or corporate account. If you are from the UK, you can also trade using a Self-Invested Personal Pension (SIPP) account.

How to open your account

The account opening is fully digital and it takes only 1 day until your account is approved.

The three steps of City Index account opening:

1. Provide your personal and financial information.
2. Indicate your trading experience and fill out a test on your knowledge.
3. Verify your ID and residency. You can upload a national ID, passport or driver's license for verifying your ID. Utility bills or bank statements are accepted for residency verification.

Account base currencies

At City Index, you can choose from 3 base currencies: EUR, GBP, USD.

This selection falls behind competing brokers. Both CMC Markets and XTB offer more base currencies.

If you would like to change the base currency of your account, you have to reach out to the City Index support team.

Why does this matter? For two reasons. If you fund your trading account in the same currency as your bank account or you trade assets in the same currency as your trading account base currency, you don't have to pay a conversion fee.

A convenient way to save on currency conversion fees is by opening a multi-currency bank account at a digital bank. These offer bank accounts in several currencies with great currency exchange rates as well as free or cheap international bank transfers. Opening an account only takes a few minutes on your phone.

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Deposit fees and options

City Index charges no deposit fees. Besides bank transfer, you can use credit/debit cards and PayPal to deposit funds. Once the account base currency is set, you can fund your account only with the same currency.

A bank transfer can take several business days, while payment with a credit/debit card is instant. You can only deposit money from accounts that are in your name.

City Index withdrawal fees and options

City Index charges no withdrawal fees. The options for withdrawing funds are the same as for deposits. The minimum withdrawal amount is $100 or all your available account balance (whichever is lower). 

How long does it take to withdraw money from City Index? Withdrawals usually take 3-5 business days.

When we tested withdrawal, it took several weeks because we had a problem with credit card withdrawal. The reason for the problem was that City Index can't send money to some MasterCard and Visa credit cards. Instead of credit cards, we had to withdraw via bank transfer, but before doing so, customer service had to add and approve our bank account. It would be great to know in advance which cards are accepted and which are not.

How do you withdraw money from City Index?

1. Log in to your City Index account
2. Go to 'Funding'
3. Select 'Withdraw'
4. Enter withdrawal amount
5. Initiate the withdrawal

You can choose from three web trading platforms:

• Web Trader – City Index's HTML-based trading platform
• Advantage Web – City Index's older web trading platform
• MetaTrader 4 – third-party trading platform, specialized in forex trading

We tested Web Trader as it seems the best trading platform in terms of functionality and design. The platform is available only in English.

Look and feel

City Index's web trading platform is user-friendly and looks great.

It is extremely customizable. It is easy to add, remove, or change the size and position of tabs to create your own unique trading platform. It also lets you pick between a light or dark theme and between 'one-click' or 'two-click' trading.

Login and security

City Index provides only a one-step login. Two-step authentication would be safer here.

Search functions

We really liked the search functions of the web trading platform. You can search by typing the name of the product you're looking for or browsing a categorized product list.

Placing orders

You can use many order types, including some more sophisticated ones:

• Market
• Limit
• Stop
• Trailing stop
• One-cancels-the-other (OCO)

If you are not familiar with the basic order types, read this overview.

There are also several order terms available:

• Good 'til canceled (GTC)
• Good 'til end of the day (GTD)
• Good 'til time (GTT)

Alerts and notifications

You can set alerts or notifications to know when an asset reaches a price target or when your order gets fulfilled. On the web platform, this feature appears either as an icon or a browser notification. On mobile, you will be informed via a push notification.

Portfolio and fee reports

City Index has clear portfolio and fee reports. You can find these under the 'Reports' tab and download them in PDF, XLS, XML or CSV format.

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You can use City Index's own or the MetaTrader 4 mobile trading platform. Both are available on iOS and Android. In this review, we tested City Index's own mobile trading platform.

Look and feel

The City Index mobile trading platform is user-friendly and well-designed. 

We liked the 'Platform tips' option on the menu, which provides a demo of the mobile platform's functions. Another great feature is the embedded economic calendar, which has advanced filter options and can be customized on a high level.

On the negative side, features were sometimes a bit slow to load. 

Login and security

City Index provides only a one-step login.

You can log in using biometric authentication. This feature provides a convenient way to log in to the app.

Search functions

The search functions are good. You can search by typing the name of the asset you're looking for or browse product categories. 

Placing orders

You can use the following order types:

• Market
• Limit
• Stop
• Trailing stop
• OCO

You can also set order time limits.

Alerts and notifications

You can easily set alerts and notifications on the City Index mobile platform.

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City Index offers two desktop platforms, the Advanced Trading Platform and MetaTrader 4. Similarly to the web trading platform, we tested the Advanced Trading Platform as this is City Index's own platform, while MetaTrader 4 is a third-party platform.

City Index's desktop trading platform has the same functionality as the web trading platform. For example, you can use the same order types or price alerts

On the downside, the desktop trading platform is less user-friendly and the design feels outdated. It was hard to navigate on the platform and it felt too crammed with functions.

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72% of retail CFD accounts lose money

City Index is a CFD and forex broker. To learn more about CFDs read our CFD trading tips.

Disclaimer: CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 72% 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.

City Index has an average selection of forex and CFD products.

FCA bans the sale of crypto-derivatives to UK retail consumers from 6 January 2021.

You can't change leverage levels. This is a drawback.

Changing the leverage manually is a very useful feature when you want to lower the risk of your trade. Be careful with forex and CFD trading, as the preset leverage levels may be high.

You can find City Index's research tools on the trading platforms or on the website under 'Market News'.

Trading ideas

City Index provides trading ideas based on technical analysis. You can find them on the platform if you click on 'Trading Central'. At Trading Central you have access to numerous technical analysis based metrics and recommendations.

Fundamental data

City Index does not provide any fundamental data on assets.

Charting

We really liked the great charting tools. There are 90 technical indicators to choose from, which is an impressive selection.

News feed

The news feed is high-quality. You can read news provided by Reuters, as well as analyses written by City Index's own research team.

With the help of the economic calendar, you can see important coming events. When you select an event, you can read a quick summary about it and check its historical data. For example, you can see what the EU employment data means and how it has changed over time.

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You can contact City Index via:

• phone
• live chat
• email

Phone support is great. We connected with an agent instantly and received relevant answers.

If you prefer using live chat, click 'Chat'. It opens a chatbot, which can answer only some basic questions, like "How can I deposit?". It's a bit more tricky if you want to talk to a real person. You have to type 'agent', after which the chatbot offers to connect you with a sales or support agent.

We received relevant but slow answers via email. On some occasions, it took as much as 6 days to get an answer, or even more during the summer holiday season. 

City Index's customer service is not fully 24/7, but is available 24/5 from 5 p.m. Sunday to 5 p.m. Friday EST.

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At City Index you have many options to improve your trading skills:

• Demo account
• Platform tutorial videos
• General educational videos
• Webinars
• Quality educational articles
• Performance analytics tool

We liked the useful and high-quality platform tutorial videos.

By using the performance analytics tool you can understand your own trading behavior better. It provides insights based on your trading history from three angles: psychology, strategy and timing.

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Is City Index regulated?

Yes, City Index is regulated by top tier authorities, like the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).

Is City Index safe?

To be certain if a brokerage is safe, we highly advise that you check two facts:

• how you are protected if something goes wrong
• what the background of the broker is

How you are protected

City Index operates under several legal entities worldwide; which of these will serve you depends on your residency. The investor protection amount you're eligible for depends on the country where the entity serving you is located.

For example, if you are from the UK, you will sign up with StoneX Financial Ltd. and will be eligible for investor protection of £85,000. StoneX Financial Ltd. is regulated by the FCA, the UK's financial authority.

City Index provides negative balance protection for clients under StoneX Financial Ltd. (UK) and StoneX Financial Pty Ltd. (AU) for forex spot and CFD trading, but only for retail clients onboarded under the FCA or ASIC. Professional and clients outside EU or Australia are not covered with any negative balance protection.

Background

City Index is a brand of StoneX Group Inc., a US-based investment company.  This is important as a strong parent company lowers the chance that the company will go bust.

The fact that StoneX Group is listed on the NASDAQ Stock Exchange is a big plus for safety as City Index releases financial statements regularly and in a transparent manner.

City Index was established in 1983 and was acquired by GAIN Capital in 2014. GAIN Capital was acquired by StoneX Group in 2020. The longer the track record of a broker, the more proof we have that it has successfully weathered previous financial crises.

Having a parent company listed on a stock exchange, providing financial statements and being regulated by a top-tier authority are all great markers of City Index's safety.

Find your safe broker

We recommend City Index for forex and cfd traders looking for low forex fees and great research tools.

Below you can find links to all aspects of City Index in this comprehensive collection.

Lower fees, lower costs?

We detailed this in our City Index fees article.

What about the minimum deposit?

Our ultimate guide to the City Index minimum deposit is updated regularly.

How to start your City Index account?

Look no further than our evaluation of the City Index account opening.

How's their trading app?

Here's our expert view after checking the City Index trading app.

Is the quality of customer service satisfactory?

All you need to know about the City Index customer service.

Legit or scam?

Is City Index legit features all the key aspects you need to look at to see if a broker is safe and legit.

Free or premium? Or both?

A glance at actual costs and whether City Index is really free.

Is this broker good for beginners?

We checked it in Is City Index good for beginners.

Should you buy your silver bullets on City Index?

Research for silver bugs in the Silver buy on City Index guide

I want to trade options, are they available at City Index?

We explored the topic in Can you trade options on City Index?

What is the minimum account balance at City Index?

Check out the current account balance requirements at City Index in our What is the minimum account balance at City Index article.

Looking for commission and fees data for City Index?

We collected them in City Index commission and fees.

How do you withdraw money from City Index?

We tested it and collected the options and costs in How to withdraw money on City Index.