Saxo Sees Dip in December FX Demand, Equities Soars 49%

Saxo Bank has released the trading numbers for December, showing a massive monthly surge in demand for its equities offering, but a decline in the foreign exchange (forex) trading volume.

Considering forex first, the total trading volume with the asset class came down to $95.7 billion from the previous month‘s $99.2 billion. That was a month-over-month decline of 3.5 percent. In addition, the daily average volume declined to $4.2 billion last month from November’s $4.5 billion.

Though a monthly decline can be justified as a cyclical trend of the industry, forex demand on the trading platform also dropped significantly year-over-year. In December, Saxo reported $128.1 billion in trading volume, making last months yearly drop as much as 25 percent or more.

Moreover, the reported FX trading volume for December 2021 was the lowest the Danish trading platform had recorded in the whole year.

Jump in Equities

Unlike forex, equities trading demand on Saxo surged by more than 49 percent when compared with the previous month. In absolute terms, the total monthly volume with equities came in at $233 billion. On a yearly basis, demand for equities instruments increased by 153.8 percent.

While commodities demand declined by almost 15 percent to $25.6 billion in December, commodities demand remained flat at $6.8 billion. Despite the downturn in forex trading, the upward drag in equities demand resulted in an uptick in the overall monthly volume that came in at $361.1 billion. Additionally, the total monthly volume surged by 23.6 percent month-over-month and over 42 percent year-over-year.

Furthermore, Saxo offers cryptocurrency derivatives to its clients in Singapore and Australia. Launched in May last year, crypto products are high in demand as they brought in $2.5 billion in turnover until October.