What Is Financial Spread Betting Leverage and Margin?

What is spread betting leverage?

Leverage is the borrowed money that you receive from your financial spread betting broker and is automatically added to your bet once you enter the position.

Leverage increases market exposure relative to the capital posted. The effect is simple: the trade becomes more sensitive to price changes, for better or worse, depending on how well it’s managed.

With a $200 balance and 1:20 exposure, a position would behave like a $4,000 trade. A move of only a few points can quickly close the trade at a loss if risk controls aren’t used.

Leverage is mostly relevant for traders who already understand volatility, margin requirements, and how to manage a losing trade without damage to their account.

How leverage works in spread betting

Leverage in spread betting works by allowing you to control a larger position size than your initial deposit.

This is possible by borrowing funds from your broker, almost like a small loan.

This increases your exposure, which means price changes have a larger impact on your results.

In financial spread betting, a ratio of 1:50 would increase your position size by 50 times the value of your collateral, allowing you to take larger positions in forex, stock indices, or commodities.

Let’s say that if you deposit $500 and use 50x multiplier your total position size would be worth $25,000.

The takeaway is simply that small price movements have a large effect. That can help or hurt a trader very quickly, depending on how the trade is managed.

Disadvantages and potential advantages

Below are some of the main disadvantages and potential advantages of leveraging your account in spread betting:

Disadvantages:

• Increased risk – The risk is amplified to the same extent as profits. Your account PnL will fluctuate down just as up and your leveraged losses will increase the loss per point.
• Margin calls – All margin-based accounts are at risk of a margin call if the capital balance falls below the required level. Some spread betting brokers require up to 20% of the trade value to come from your pocket. Should your capital fall below this 20% threshold your broker will automatically warn you.
• Complexity – Leveraged products can be more difficult to understand as you need to understand how the dynamic between these concepts works. Many traders tend to overleverage which can cause unexpected losses.
• Reduced control – Many traders struggle to stay in control when exposure increases. The market moves faster than expected and discipline is tested immediately. Advanced traders make sure they apply good leverage risk management before trading.

Potential advantages:

• Increased exposure – Leverage magnifies the impact of every price change. The trade responds faster, so profits and losses develop more quickly than in an unleveraged trade. This requires strict sizing and consistent risk control because a single mistake can drain the account faster than expected.
• Great flexibility – Another factor that is often overlooked is the flexibility that credit gives you when speculating. You can spread out the margin capital in your account to trade several positions at the same time which can be used to execute several spread betting strategies at once with the same initial stake.
• Smaller capital requirement – A trader can open positions without posting the full amount. This doesn’t reduce risk. It simply shifts more responsibility onto margin monitoring and trade discipline.
• Short selling – Spread betting allows traders to take positions in falling markets. This can be effective, but it also increases the importance of timing and risk controls, since losses can accelerate when price bounces.

What is spread betting margin?

Margin is essentially the minimum deposit that the broker requires for you to open positions.

It acts as collateral for the borrowed money you receive when you enter the market.

Minimum deposits vary by platform. A very small balance has less room to absorb losses, which is important to keep in mind when trading leveraged products.

For example, if the margin requirement is 10%, and you want to open a position worth $50,000, the collateral deposit with be $5000.

Keep in mind that this is not a fee, it is simply the balance that you maintain in your account to open positions.

Once you have made the initial deposit, you can choose how much capital you want to spend on each trade.

It is important to read the requirements of each platform you trade with since they all have different conditions.

How it works for spread betters

Your balance is your own money and all your profits and losses and added or deducted from this amount.

The margin is also included in the calculation of the full position size together with leverage.

The full size of a spread bet is made with this formula:

Margin * Leverage = Position value

The capital value is always much smaller than the total position size since it is usually only a fraction of the total value.

This structure makes spread betting easy to access, which is exactly why risk management is so important. The barriers are low, but the consequences of mistakes are high.

How they work hand in hand

It is the combination of margin and leverage that makes spread bets tick and one can not exist without the other.

It works much the same way as a mortgage or a car loan where you put down a collateral amount to receive a larger sum.

Here your own money is called the margin and the money your broker lends to you is called the credit.

Together they create a way of speculating on global markets without owning the underlying asset.

Most spread betting brokers have mirrored prices much the same way as CFD brokers.

Here is an example to give you a better idea

Let’s say that you have $5000 in your spread betting account and you want to trade FTSE.

FTSE is currently trading at 7,000 points and the margin requirement of your broker is 10%.

At a margin requirement of 10%, you would need to deposit $700 as a balance.

Now, suppose you open one FTSE position and the market pushes higher during the day and the FTSE index ends up at 7,100.

The key takeaway is how small price movements translate into meaningful gains or losses. Without risk controls, the same volatility that creates opportunity can close the trade at a loss very quickly.

However, should the FTSE fall to 6,900, your spread bet would lose the same amount, $100.

In this example, you can see how leverage and margin can give you increased buying power and the potential for higher returns.

It is also worth mentioning that there are always increased risks associated.

Use our spread betting calculator to find out the profitability of your spread bet.

Margin calls in spread betting

A margin call in financial spread betting is a request from your broker to add more funds into your trading account to maintain the required margin level.

This happens when your losses have grown too big and your account is at risk of liquidation by leverage.

A margin call can be triggered by a sudden drop in the markets caused by an unexpected news event or simply by using too much credit.

It is a safety system that most brokers have that protects you from losing more money than you have invested.

The margin call is essentially for protecting both the trader and the broker from the account going into debt.

This can happen if the broker doesn’t have a negative balance protection and your losses get out of hand.

It is important to monitor your capital levels to stay on the safe side.

Margin requirements are also a thing

Margin requirements in spread betting refer to the amount of capital that must be deposited in order to open a bet.

This is a form of collateral that brokers have added as a downpayment to receive the borrowed funds.

The margin requirement is typically a percentage of the overall spread bet value.

For example, should you open a position worth $25,000, and the requirement is 5%, you are then obligated to maintain at least $1250 in your account.

This system is designed to let traders trade with a certain amount of capital that is not too risky.

Brokers make money from leverage when a trade is opened and closed through the leverage fee.

Should a trader overleverage and liquidate the account balance immediately from overleveraging the broker has lost income on that trader.

At any given time when trading, keep an eye on your current capital level to stay within risk limits.

Spread betting without leverage

In financial spread betting, it is possible to trade without leverage to further eliminate the risk of losing money, although this approach limits profitability in forex, stock indices, and other asset classes.

In this case, a margin requirement is not necessary since your total cash balance will act as risk capital.

Your purchasing power will be greatly reduced and the maximum position size will be based on the amount of money you deposit into your account.

Trading without leverage reduces both risk and potential return. Some traders choose this approach to maintain clearer control over their exposure, especially when testing a new strategy.

With limited capital, unleveraged trades produce smaller outcomes. Whether that’s acceptable depends on the trader’s goals, experience, and tolerance for risk.

Traders who don’t feel comfortable with the elevated risk factors might be better off not trading spread betting products.

Wrapping it up

In conclusion, leverage and margin are risk tools. They increase exposure, which demands discipline and a clear understanding of how position sizing, margin, and liquidation work together.

This same structure can cause rapid losses for traders who don’t fully understand how exposure and margin interact.

Each spread betting broker has a margin requirement and it is up to each trader to maintain a safe level of margin to not get issued a margin call.

This can be done by either using less credit or a good risk management strategy.

The option to spread bet without leverage is of course available, however, this significantly reduces the purchasing power of your positions.