King of Crypto! LARS HOLST Founder and CEO of GCEX
Lars Holst CEO & Founder of GCEX
Q It’s fair to say that you started off in a different era of FX with Midas as an account executive. How was it in FX back then? Surprisingly when I started at Midas, FX was only a very small component of my work, with the majority of my focus being on phone trading futures and options and only then much later CFDs on equities. You must bear in mind that during the latter years of the nineties and early noughties, it was quite a novelty to trade online and the market itself was certainly more fragmented than it is today. Commissions were, of course higher per unit but yet we were still much cheaper than the banks, a strategy which worked well both for Midas and their clients.
GAME CHANGERS Issue #25
The FX landscape in particular was a very different beast. Mostly phone based and less via the e-channels we take for granted today. Leads were primarily generated from the Yellow Pages and other phonebooks. Yes, physical hard copy phonebooks. The default EURUSD spread was 5 pips (as an example) but volume was lower as well, and any platforms used were pretty basic. FX brokers to a large extent were not regulated and the opening account process was relatively easy, I guess similar to what we are witnessing in the crypto market today‌. Q What qualities made you stand out as a leading account manager?
