Pelican and Covid-19
By: Mike Read
Tags: FX, Trading, Helping Others, Charity, Covid 19

Shhhhh this is a little awkward!

The Broking world finds itself in a rather awkward situation. Whilst in the depths of a global pandemic that tragically affects global health as well as unquantifiable damage to a number of industries — brokers are doing rather well.

Traders get excited by two things; volatility (large daily swings) and obvious trends. This pandemic has brought both. Which has led to spikes in deposits (new and old accounts) coupled with unusually large trade volumes.

Pelican is no exception — having seen weekly growth in volumes rise over the past four weeks. Trade volumes are up and corporate clients are all paying on time. Operationally we can all work from home with little disruption — other than homeschooling demands. Support systems are all cloud based — so there are no excuses for a drop in the performance of our service — and demand appears to be strong.

Peaks and troughs

Q2 ’20 is looking solid — B2B projects are still pushing on — albeit at a slightly slower pace. However, if the crisis continues for a sustained period it would be prudent to assume that clients will look to withdraw their funds as they retrench to stockpile as much of their own wealth as possible. This will then have the opposite effect on our industry. Trading is often seen as a luxury past time — when bonuses are good and clients feel they have excess funds to ‘play’ with — and therefore a non-essential practise if a recession hits. It is therefore possible that the broking industry experiences a sharp peak followed by a deep trough.

It is therefore important for Pelican and other members of our industry to be mindful of how fortunate we currently are — but be prepared to weather a storm.

What did you do during the crisis?

Should the pandemic and its subsequent impact on the economy be on the lighter side of forecasts (and therefore avoiding the trough), the broking community should consider ways that it might contribute towards the wellbeing of those making daily sacrifices — such as the NHS and all support workers nationally.

What is Pelican doing?

As a new Company — our financial stability might not be as rock solid as the regulated brokers that are currently making hay. However, we would like to do our bit. It would appear that we’re moving into a phase of profitability — which we hope continues. Therefore we will donate 50% of all profits over and above our forecasts to good causes in the community while this pandemic continues.

What are these good causes?

We would love to hear from you if you have a good cause that you think is suitable for us to donate too (please contact us at: support@pelicantrading.io). But to start with we have found an amazing charity called Duty to Care set up by friend’s of Pelican whose mission is to:

‘Provide wellbeing support via online consultation to improve and sustain the mental health and wellbeing of healthcare professionals during the pandemic.’

We’ll keep you updated with trading volumes and our donations — but I know Sadie and the team at Duty of Care — would love your direct support too.

Image: www.freepik.com: created by starline