It’s hard to explain why I love the E*TRADE mobile commercials with the wise-cracking sophisticated baby trader who makes “serious coin” and hires scary clowns with his investment winnings.

If you want to start making some serious coin to hire your own clowns (or what have you, but have been sitting on the sidelines of the sophisticated FOREX market, consider Bay Area-based Zecco‘s FOREX trading platform. I hinted at Zecco’s biggest FOREX dollar giveaway yet coming this fall – well, the time has come this week (starting Oct.1). This is not the biggest FOREX promo ever in the bigger FOREX world, but it is Zecco’s biggest FOREX promo and a solid attempt to even the playing field in the FOREX promo area (fxcm.com, etc.).

Zecco is giving away up to $1,000 – for this kind of serious coin, you will need to deposit $5,000 and make 100 standard lot round-trips (see offer below). If you want to deposit less, you can still make some coin.

The Zecco FOREX trading platform is relatively new (it was introduced in May 2009), but it seems to be gaining some good traction in the overly-saturated online FOREX trading platform market (just google “forex trading platform” if you want to waste your afternoon). It’s hard to get an objective opinion about the pros and cons of the platforms due to the hard-sell for this kind of online trading – and the fact that Zecco is investing a lot in this arena is telling. The most objective view of FOREX brokers I could find is here.

Safety First
As an equity brokerage with a separate FOREX division, Zecco has an added twist over some of the other popular FOREX sites. I spoke with Nick Britz, Director of Business Development and Strategy at Zecco and President of Zecco FOREX last Friday about the upcoming promo. The very first thing Nick stressed for new players in this field is to set up a demo account. Getting your feet wet is invaluable (although you must understand the emotional and psychological differences between real and play money trading). He also stressed that FOREX knowledge is crucial for new traders. Most of the bigger online FOREX sites offer free FOREX education in the form of online tutorials and the like. Zecco also offers a free e-book to all traders with a minimum deposit of $500.

If having a FOREX account with 200:1 leverage feels like a bottomless drink in your hand, consider manually overriding your leverage, or as Nick recommends, “Give a call to Zecco FOREX Customer Service – they can help you turn down the volume.” He goes on to suggest another way: You don’t have to leverage your entire deposit and can keep some in cash, keeping your overall effective leverage at a much lower rate. With a $1,000 deposit, you can have a 10:1 leverage if you work only one $50 mini-lot at a time (one mini-lot of $50 is the equivalent of trading $10,000, or a 200:1 leverage), lowering your effective leverage by trading only portions of your deposit at a time. All the money in your account is at risk however; keep in mind that any bad trade can eat into your remaining cash. You can also use a conditional order for a trade, if you understand the conditions you need (if then… one cancels the other, etc.)

Finally, as with all trading, figure out your strategy and stick to it and avoid trading with your emotions. With FOREX, you must always keep in mind that you can lose 100% of your capital – which is an unlikely scenario for equities, even in a down market. If you can find your comfort level with FOREX, it does offer a nice entry into the global markets and a hedge against a 100% US Dollar portfolio.

Weigh the risks carefully, get educated, and if FOREX works for you, grab some serious coin at Zecco and send in the clowns.

photo credit: Zecco

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