The Financial Commission today announces the results of its operations for the previous year with the publication of the 2025 Complaints Summary. The forum achieved strong results in key operating metrics for the year with notable growth in many areas, including new complaints filed, amounts sought from traders, as well as average complaint values and high-net worth complaints, while maintaining a continued swift dispute resolution process, with average resolution times of 7.4 days.
The forum also continued to experience= membership growth with 9 broker members joining the forum’s ranks in several key regions. The forum also continued its commitment to protecting traders from online scams by including over 130 new websites on its Warning List.
Key highlights & accomplishments from 2025:
- $21.7M sought from all brokers – 46% growth YoY
- $16.1M sought from member firms – 141% growth YoY
- $506K awarded to traders – modest 5% decline YoY
- $13,685 average complaints value – 50% growth YoY
Other key metrics 2025
- New & resolved complaints – 8% rise YoY
- Share of HNW ($10K+) complaints – 56% growth YoY
- 7.4 days average dispute resolution time – 32% slower YoY
Annual Complaints Summary
Key Takeaways
- The Commission experienced another successful year in operation with over 1,500 complaints processed in 2025 with average complaint values continuing to rise.
- Online trader’s expanding interest in trading opportunities in safe-haven assets, such as Gold led to a noticeable risk in new complaints at the end of 3Q and throughout 4Q 2024, with many trading related complaints filed during this period.
- The Commission also experienced a rise in the value of complaints, both on average, with 50% growth and a continued boost to complaints valued over $10K, whose share among all complaints rose 56% last year as compared to 2024.
- In holding firm to its core principle of objective and neutral dispute resolution to protect traders, the share of complaints ruled in favor of traders in the past year rose slightly when compared to 2024 at 12% of all resolved complaints.
- Average dispute resolution times increased over the course of 2025, though remained swift with complaints being processed in 7.4 days on average.
- The organization expanded its international presence by 16% as compared to 2024 with the addition of 9 new approved broker members to its ranks.
- To combat online scams and fraud, the organization added over 130 websites to its Warning List in 2025 and published several public warnings regarding clone websites and online scams.
Conclusions
The Financial Commission continued to build on its already quick and efficient dispute resolution services for traders and broker members in 2025. Continued demand for trading in safe-haven assets, such as gold and commodities in key regions provided for a 50% increase in the share of trading-related complaints for 2025, as compared to the previous year. In addition, the complexity of such trading-related cases filed in the second half of the year led to a 32% uptick in average resolution times, which still remained very efficient at 7.4 days, as compared to 5.6 days in 2024.
The organization further expanded its membership ranks with new members in the Asia and MENA regions. The organization’s free dispute resolution service continued to be popular in Asia with 50% of new complaints coming from this region, while the share of complaints from the Middle East region grew noticeably by 50% from the previous year. Notably, the EDR forum processed 75% fewer complaints from Latin America in 2025 as compared to the previous year, as well as 50% less from Russia and CIS region during this time. Demand for services among traders in African and European countries held steady at 11% share of all processed complaints last year.
While the majority of complaints in 2025 were related to financial issues with 49% of the total, the share of trading-related disputes rose significantly and accounted for 33% of all complaints in 2025, while non-trading-related complaints accounted for 18% of all complaints. The most popular topics for complaints dealt with funds withdrawal (37%), account block (15%), price check (9%), agreement breach (8%), and platform issues (8%). Of all resolved complaints, 28% were resolved “in favor of the broker”, 12% were resolved “in favor of the client”, and 64% were found to be outside the organization’s jurisdiction. The share of complaints resolved in favor of traders in 2025 increased by 6% as compared to the previous year.
Heading into 2026, the Financial Commission expects to see continued global demand for trading safe-haven assets, such as gold and communities products throughout the year and is expecting to handle a growing number of complaints from traders during the year.
About Financial Commission
The Financial Commission is an independent external dispute resolution (EDR) forum for consumers/traders who are unable to resolve disputes directly with their financial services providers who are members of the Financial Commission.
The Financial Commission initially set out to provide a new approach for traders and brokers alike to resolve any issues that arise in the course of trading electronic markets such as Foreign Exchange, and then expanded into CFDs and related derivatives, in addition to certifying technology platforms used for trading.
For more information, please contact us at [email protected].