How to Spot an Unregulated Broker in 5 Minutes

Most broker scams are not sophisticated. They rely on nobody spending five minutes checking. Here is the five-minute version.

1. Find the exact legal entity

Scroll to the website footer and note the company name and jurisdiction. Big brands operate multiple entities — the FCA-regulated one for the UK and an offshore one for everyone else. Your protections come from the entity on YOUR account agreement, not the logo.

2. Verify the license at the source

Go to the regulator’s own register — FCA, ASIC, CySEC, and others all have public search — and look up the entity name. A license number printed on a website means nothing; scammers copy real numbers routinely. If the register entry exists, check it covers retail forex, not just payments or advisory.

3. Read withdrawal complaints, not star ratings

Search the broker name plus “withdrawal” and read the worst reviews. One pattern matters: deposits are instant, withdrawals need “verification” that never completes. Bonus terms that lock your deposit until impossible volume targets are the same trap in writing.

Every review on this site starts with the regulation check — it is the first row of every quick-facts table, with the license numbers we verified. If a platform fails the five-minute test, it does not get a review; it gets a warning.