FX week in review: Finalto CEO leaves, DeepSeek AI frenzy, Atlético Madrid CFDs sponsor, XTB results

Before we get to this week’s FX and CFDs industry top news stories, and with the first month of 2025 now in the books, we’re pleased to report that FNG had yet another record month of visitors and pageviews (and social media engagement, and email subscribers…) in January 2025.

Driving our growth has been consistently increasing Search traffic – see our Google Search Console data from the last 6 months in the chart below. Also moving us forward of course is a trader and industry executive audience that increasingly relies on FNG for “the real” news and analysis of what’s really going on in the sector. We now rank top-of-page for many if not most of the online trading industry company names and key keywords.

Another good example from this past week was XTB’s 2024 results release.

XTB – like all good companies do (and should do) – focused on the good part of what it sent out, reminding the public that the company saw record Revenues and Profits in 2024.

And most of the other “FX News” sites repeated the company’s mantra in their “reports” on XTB’s results.

But that was all old news, with most of the “record results” baked in already by Q3, which was already reported months ago.

The real news was that XTB actually saw a decline in both top and bottom line results in its freshly reported Q4 period.

Magnates’ article on XTB’s results was titled “XTB Reports 15% Revenue Jump, New Clients Increase Nearly 60%.”

FNG’s article was titled “XTB sees slowdown in Revenues (-1%) and Profits (-6%) in Q4 2024”.

After the results were announced, XTB’s share price dropped (on Friday), by 13%.

Who do you think investors and traders really read and listen to?

Some of the most read and commented-on FX/CFD industry news stories to appear over the past seven days on FNG included:

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Top FX and CFDs industry news stories this week

DeepSeek frenzy sends global equity markets (and crypto) into broad selloff. European equity markets traded down sharply Monday at the beginning of a new trading week, as the rapid success and popularity of a somewhat unknown, low cost China-based AI solution called DeepSeek was calling into question the (many) billions of dollars being poured into the AI sector.

Hantec Markets boosts LatAm presence with Atlético de Madrid sponsorship. Leading online trading broker Hantec Markets and celebrated Spanish football club Atlético de Madrid have signed a multi-year sponsorship deal that will see Hantec Markets become the Club’s official online trading partner in LatAm. This milestone is the first of its kind for Hantec Markets, with Club Atlético de Madrid becoming the first football club to be sponsored by the broker.

XTB sees slowdown in Revenues (-1%) and Profits (-6%) in Q4 2024. Following a strong Q3, Poland based Retail FX and CFDs broker XTB (WSE:XTB) has reported its preliminary results for Q4 and the full 2024 year, indicating a slower Q4 on both the top and bottom line (also when compared to Q4 2023), although overall the company had a fairly impressive 2024.

Exclusive: Kama Capital gets UAE SCA Category One License. FNG Exclusive… FNG has learned that Dubai based Retail FX and CFDs broker Kama Capital has received a “full” Category One broker license, from the UAE financial regulator Securities and Commodities Authority (SCA). Kama Capital, founded in 2022, was operating until now under an SCA Category Five “Arranging and Advising” license, with authorisation to act as a promoter and introducer of financial products and foreign securities.

German online broker Trade Republic expands to Italy. Just three weeks after launching in France, Berlin based online broker and retail wealth management company Trade Republic has announced the launch of its free current account with a local IBAN in Italy, along with automated tax submissions to local authorities.

Top FX industry executive moves reported at FNG this week

❑ Finalto CEO Matthew Maloney steps down.

❑ TopFX hires HFM exec Chris Tsirpi to head Business Development.

❑ Exclusive: FXCubic hires Rui Jin to head APAC sales.

❑ Rostro Group hires Demetra Charalambous (ex Binance, eToro), Sammy Christou (Exinity) to senior roles.

❑ Exclusive: GO Markets’ Head of Risk & Product Development Peter Spanos departs.

❑ Exclusive: OKX hires Liam Birch as Head of Trading in Dubai.

❑ NinjaTrader appoints Jennifer Marszalek as Chief People Officer.

❑ Pepperstone exec Laurent McClintock moves to ActivTrades to head BizDev UK.

❑ Tradu appoints Philip Manning as Chairman.