Plus500 says German regulator proposals will have “no effect on business”
Shares in one of Britain's largest spreadbetting jumped over four per cent after it hit back at a clampdown by the German financial regulator.
It's been a torrid week for spreadbetters after the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) clamped down on new customer promotions and the amount of risk traders can take on.
German counterpart BaFin revealed plans for similar restrictions yesterday evening.
However Aim-quoted Plus500, which along with IG Markets and CMC Markets is one of the three big market operators, shrugged off the German proposals.
Read more: Now the German regulator has announced a spreadbetting clampdown
"The company therefore believes that any limitations imposed by BaFin in this respect will have no effect on its business," Plus500 said in a statement.
Plus500 added it "welcomes the announcement made by BaFin" and continued:
All accounts offered by the company have always had balance protection, meaning the client cannot lose more than the value of their account.
CMC, which has the largest retail market share in Germany, gave a similarly upbeat response this morning:
"We welcome this balanced approach from BaFin and will respond to the consultation in accordance with the proposed timeline of 20 January 2017."
Read more: FCA gets tough on spreadbetters: But what is a contract for difference?
CMC's shares were up 2.6 per cent in trading this morning.
The first to respond yesterday evening was IG. It said it was looking forward to inputting into BaFin's plans and felt it was already acting in accordance with them
The company considers the BaFin proposal to be consistent with IG's recent introduction of Limited Risk Accounts, which guarantee that a client cannot incur losses in excess of the amount deposited in their account.
IG's shares were up over four per cent in early trading but subsequently relaxed back to be up around 1.5 per cent.