Nigeria has no binary options licensing regime, and sources disagree on whether offshore providers are merely unrecognised or actually prohibited.
Sourcing note: we could not confirm the legal position in Nigeria against a named primary instrument published by the SEC Nigeria. Verify with the regulator before acting on it.
Archive notice: this page was written in 2012, before binary options were banned for retail clients across the EEA, the UK and Australia. It is kept for reference. For the current position, see Legal status by country.
The currency market is the top-selling and biggest market worldwide and also offers private traders a large variety of opportunities. With binary options you can trade currencies, too, but why should you do that when you can also directly register at a forex broker?
There are several good reasons that are in favour of this but of course, trading currencies with binary options has a few disadvantages. The best is to take a closer look at the advantages and disadvantages and to examine binary forex options carefully.
Advantages
Simplicity
Binary options are undoubtedly the easiest way to trade in the finance markets. No other finance tool is as easy to understand and trading with no other finance tool is as easy to learn.Fixed payout
With binary options you already know how high your return is going to be before purchasing the option. And with up to 85 % it can be really impressive. You also know your risk because it corresponds in generally to your investment. When you directly trade at the forex market things are completely different. Before the expiry of the trade you do not know how high your return is going to be. Your risk is neither limited but you can lose a lot at the forex market because you are trading on margins. Therefore, it is really that important to set stops and especially to calculate correctly.Simple money management
You should only bet between 2 and 5 % of your trading assets per trade. By doing so, you avoid unnecessary risk and the threat of a total loss, if things are not going that well. With binary options this is very simple: If your trading account is 20000 €, e.g., and according to your money-management-strategy you risk 3 % per trade then this would be 600 €. You simply invest 600 € in an option and everything is alright.At the forex market, this is much more complicated. There, with 20000 € you might want to risk 600 €, too, but you have to calculate a lot. First, you need to think about where to set your stop. The scope between stop and entry course represents your risk. Then, by converting the trading currencies into your account currency you need to set the necessary scale of your position that corresponds to this risk -for example 2 lots (a lot is a quantity unit in forex trading)
You do not need any stops
The currency market is very volatile and therefore the risk of getting stopped out of the position is very high. But stops in forex trading are inevitable because otherwise there is the risk of a total loss.With binary options this cannot happen to you. Why? You do not need any stops!
Binary options have an expiry time and the only thing that matters is if the option expires either in the money or out of the money.
Disadvantages
Limited return
With up to 85 % the return of binary options is very high but even when the course explodes it is limited to these 85 %.Charts
You have to say it clearly: Binary options-broker do not provide you with an adequate chart software. When you want to make analyses -and you should- then you need to use another charting tool. You can read more about this topic in our article about charts.Funding and withdrawals in Nigeria
Local rails here are local bank transfer, card and crypto; CBN limits on foreign card spending affect funding. Deposit method decides whether money can come back out: card payments carry a chargeback route with a time limit, transfers to an offshore entity generally do not. Confirm the withdrawal method, minimum, fee and stated processing time in writing before funding an account. Profits are generally taxable, with FIRS the relevant authority.
Brokers accepting Nigerian clients
Ranked by our published methodology, which weights licensing at 35% — on an unsupervised counterparty every other quality is contingent. Ratings are derived from the sub-scores, not assigned.
| # | Broker | Rating | Entity holding your funds | Min. deposit | Payout | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Deriv | 7.9 | Deriv (BVI) Ltd / Deriv (V) Ltd | $5 | up to ~95% on synthetics | Visit |
| 2 | IQ Option | 5.1 | IQ Option Ltd (international) — unregulated | $10 | up to ~95% | Visit |
| 3 | Pocket Option | 4.7 | Gembell Limited (Comoros) | $5 | up to ~92% | Visit |
| 4 | Quotex | 4.6 | Awesomo Ltd — unregulated | $10 | up to ~98% | Visit |
| Regulated alternative — does not offer binary options | ||||||
| — | Exness | 8.8 | FSCA (South Africa) — ODP · FSP 51024 | $10 | n/a — CFDs and FX only | Visit |
Advertiser disclosure: buttons marked ad are affiliate links and earn us a commission if you open an account. The others do not. The ranking is derived from the published sub-scores either way, which is why the highest-rated provider here is not the one that pays us.
Risk warning: binary options are high-risk speculative instruments and most retail accounts lose money. Nothing on this page is investment advice or a recommendation to trade.