CFD Trading in Australia

Table of contents:

CFD Brokers that offer MetaTrader 4

There are lots of CFD brokers and platforms out there for you to choose from. On this page, you will find the best CFD brokers in Australia that offers trading with the popular MetaTrader 4 platform.

We are compensated for referring clients to some of the listed trading providers.

FP Markets screenshot

FP Markets is a very well-liked trading provider according to its reviews. They offer a wide range of trading platforms and up to 500x leverage.

There is a wide range of tradable instruments at FP Markets. This includes a range of forex pairs, CFDs for more than 10,000 shares, CFDs for commodities, and more.

FP Markets Reviews

4.8 / 5.0 ~1,900 TrustPilot reviews
4.7 / 5.0 ~220 Google Play reviews
4.9 / 5.0 ~22 App Store reviews

Crypto trading

You can trade CFDs with leverage for 4 of the most popular cryptocurrencies at FP Markets. These are Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, and Litecoin. Hopefully, they will add more soon.

CFDs for Australian shares

I believe this is the best CFD broker for trading CFDs for Australian shares. At the time of writing this, there are over 2,800 CFDs for different shares listed on the Australian Securities Exchange.

Platforms

  • WebTrader: Trade with MT4 or MT5 in your web browser without the need to download anything.
  • Mobile Trading App: Trade on your smartphone.
  • MetaTrader 4: One of the most popular trading platforms.
  • MetaTrader 5: Next-genetration trading platform.

Demo: Try trading with a demo account free of risk.

Risk warning: Derivative products are highly leveraged, carry a high level of risk and are not suitable for all investors.

Visit FP Markets
IC Markets screenshot

IC Markets is a very popular trading site with over 1,750 tradable instruments and up to 500x leverage.

This includes forex CFDs for over 60 currency pairs, over 20 indices CFDs with up to 200x leverage, over 20 commodity CFDs with up to 500x leverage, over 1,600 CFDs for shares, over 10 bond CFDs, crypto CFDs with up to 5x leverage, and CFDs for futures with up to 200x leverage.

IC Markets Reviews

4.8 / 5.0 ~15,400 TrustPilot reviews
4.5 / 5.0 ~3,200 Google Play reviews
4.6 / 5.0 ~10 App Store reviews

Review info

The review data from Google Play and the App Store are for the IC Markets cTrader App. There are also other IC Markets apps available.

Crypto trading

IC Markets enables its clients to trade crypto CFDs 7 days a week. There are at least 12 different cryptos here, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dash, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ripple, EOS, Emercoin, NameCoin, PeerCoin, Polkadot, Stellar, and Chainlink.

CFDs for Australian shares

There are CFDs for shares listed on the Australian Securities Exchange at IC Markets, I just don't know how many. There is a market data fee of $22 AUD/mo for ASX trading. The minimum commission fee is $7 AUD per trade.

Platforms

  • WebTrader: Trade with MT4 or MT5 in your web browser without the need to download anything.
  • Mobile Trading App: Trade on your smartphone.
  • MetaTrader 4: One of the most popular trading platforms.
  • MetaTrader 5: Next-genetration trading platform.
  • cTrader: Popular trading platform.

Demo: Try trading with a demo account free of risk.

Risk warning: Trading Derivatives carries a high level of risk to your capital and you should only trade with money you can afford to lose. Trading Derivatives may not be suitable for all investors, so please ensure that you fully understand the risks involved and seek independent advice if necessary.

Visit IC Markets
CMC Markets screenshot

CMC Markets offers a trading platform with access to 10,000 financial instruments you can trade with up to 30x leverage.

This includes over 300 currency pairs, popular cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, over 9,000 shares (including 1,000 ETFs), a selection of commodities, and more.

CMC Markets Reviews

4.2 / 5.0 ~1,200 TrustPilot reviews
3.2 / 5.0 ~2,100 Google Play reviews
4 / 5.0 ~110 App Store reviews

Platforms

  • Next Generation: Choose between the advanced and the standard version.
  • Apps: Trade with the iPhone, iPad, or Android app.
  • MetaTrader 4: One of the most popular trading platforms.

Demo: Try trading with a demo account free of risk.

Risk warning: 76% of retail investor accounts lose money when spread betting and/or trading CFDs with this provider.

Visit CMC Markets
AVATrade screenshot

AVATrade offers trading of cryptocurrencies, ETFs, commodities, and stocks as CFDs. You can also trade forex here.

There are 11 different cryptos to trade here, including the most popular ones like Bitcoin and Ethereum. They offer up to 2x leverage on Bitcoin, 10x on commodities, and 5x on stocks.

AVATrade Reviews

4.7 / 5.0 ~5,700 TrustPilot reviews
4.6 / 5.0 ~5,500 Google Play reviews
4.5 / 5.0 ~420 App Store reviews

Platforms

  • WebTrading: Trade in your web browser without the need to download anything.
  • AvaTradeGo: Trade on your smartphone.
  • MetaTrader 4: One of the most popular trading platforms.
  • MetaTrader 5: Next-genetration trading platform.
  • AvaOptions: For FX and options trading with advanced strategies like "straddles", "strangles", and more.
  • Automated Trading: For auto-trading.
  • Mac Trading: Mac users can trade with MetaTrader 4 for Mac or WebTrading.

Demo: Try trading with a demo account free of risk.

Risk warning: 72% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider.

Visit AVATrade
IG screenshot

IG claims to be the world's leading CFD provider. They very well might be. I can at least let you know that they are one of the most popular ones according to website traffic statistics by Alexa.

With IG you can trade over 17,000 markets. This includes forex, indices, cryptocurrencies, shares, and commodities.

As I write this, they offer trading of 6 different cryptos: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, Stellar, and NEO.

IG Reviews

3.7 / 5.0 ~4,600 TrustPilot reviews
4.3 / 5.0 ~12,200 Google Play reviews
4.6 / 5.0 ~20,900 App Store reviews

Platforms

  • IG's own: This has won several awards. The latest one in 2020.
  • Apps: They offer a feature-rich Android app and a specially designed mobile web platform for iOS.
  • MetaTrader 4: One of the most popular trading platforms.
  • ProRealTime: For easy algorithm building.

Demo: Try trading with a demo account free of risk.

Risk warning: 75% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading spread bets and CFDs with this provider.

Visit IG

What is a CFD?

CFDs are financial instruments that can be used for short-term trading. It is not suitable for long-term investing. There are fees for holding on to a position with CFDs over time. For instance overnight. Make sure you learn how it all works before trading substantial funds. CFDs often come with high leverage enabling bigger results from smaller investments. Both to the downside and to the upside.

CFD trading advantages

There are advantages to CFD trading compared with buying stocks and other financial instruments directly. You can, for instance, trade with leverage and you can also often trade a wide range of all sorts of underlying instruments with the same CFD broker. This includes shares, cryptocurrencies, and commodities in most cases. You can also go short just as easily as you can go long with CFDs which can be a big advantage.

CFD trading risks

As you can see from the risk warning all CFD brokers are required to put on their websites, there are risks involved with online trading, and maybe CFD trading in particular. The main reason for this might be that there is built in a lot of leverage into CFDs. This can be a benefit if you know what you are doing. However, it can be terrifying to see a position move against you really heavily just because of a small drop in price on the underlying asset. CFDs also are subject to other rules as set by the brokers.