Traders based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) led the way in global activity last year on Capital.com – and the competition wasn’t even close.
According to data from UAE CFD broker and trading platform Capital.com, residents of the country made 19.5 million trades in 2024.
This is double the number of trades made by those in the next highest-ranking country, Germany.
The volume from the UAE trading platform was also the highest across all markets, at $468.9 billion (£377.6 billion).
The UAE also boasted the most profitable traders across multiple asset classes, with 62.53% of trades exiting with positive returns. This was followed by those in Qatar, who had a 61% success rate.
Capital.com also found traders in the UAE have also been diversifying their assets. They actively engaged with 23 markets, including US Crude Oil Spot, Gold and even Dogecoin.
The UAE has hit the headlines in recent years for successfully enticing a swathe of hedge funds and other financial services businesses to set up shop, largely thanks to its low taxes.
Runner-up Germany came first in one respect: the use of stop-loss strategies. Nearly 30% of trades in the country employed risk management tools.
German traders had the highest preference for equities over other asset classes globally, with 15.68% of their trades in stocks.
Among the most popular trades were the Germany 40 index, cryptocurrency XRP, and meme stock GameStop.
The data was drawn from the trading activity of more than 600,000 global traders who were actively trading on the Capital.com platform between 1 January and 31 December 2024.
Capital.com’s MENA CEO Tarik Chebib, said: “Our latest data shows the remarkable achievements of UAE traders, who are not only diversifying their strategies across a wide range of instruments but also delivering healthy returns from their trades.
“With an impressive trading volume of $468.9 billion and a growing focus on cross-asset opportunities, UAE traders have firmly established themselves as big hitters in the global trading landscape.”
Capital.com is based in London but has offices and operations around the globe.
In March last year, it paused the onboarding of new UK client accounts, stating the decision was intended to ensure that its systems controls, products and services met sector requirements.
The Good Money Guide’s review of the platform finds it has “an easy-to-use and intuitive trading platform and app, that gives access to the most popular financial markets with competitive spreads”.
Robin has more than six years of experience as a financial journalist, most of which were spent at Citywire, and covers the latest developments in the investing, trading and currency transfer space. Outside of work, he enjoys reading literature and philosophy and playing the piano.
You can contact Robin at robin@goodmoneyguide.com
