Alpari US Announce "Direct" Currenex Demo Accounts

Following the lead of their Russian cousins Alpari US announced yesterday that they too are now:

Pleased to introduce FX traders to our two new trading platforms, Alpari Direct and Alpari Direct Pro.

The emphasis was a bit different in the US announcement. Currenex get a mention again, but the "ECN" buzzword is conspicuous by its absence. Instead there is a brief explanation of the difference between the two accounts:

Alpari Direct is a platform tailored for individuals wanting to trade higher volumes, at a faster pace and with interbank-level pricing.

Alpari Direct Pro is an advanced institutional-level platform designed for money managers, institutional traders or high net worth individuals wanting to trade high volumes with the fast execution speeds, and sophisticated order management.

The announcement also contained another clue about the way the new accounts will work:

The Alpari (US) website will soon feature a new dedicated section for institutional trading with comprehensive information and details on our very competitive commission offers!

Sounds as though Alpari will be making money from commissions on the new accounts, instead of from the spread as they do on their current MetaTrader accounts. Marketing aside, I wonder what the difference between the two accounts is? Maybe on the "retail" version of the Direct platform Alpari make money from both commissions and the spread!

There's still no sign of a similar announcement from Alpari UK, but at least you can now sign up for a demo Alpari Direct account without pretending to reside in another country, should you happen to live in either the US or the UK.