BaFin Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (Bundesanstalt für Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht)

#Germany's integrated regulator

BaFin supervises banks, financial services institutions, investment firms (Wertpapierinstitute), insurers and securities trading. For the largest German banks it works alongside the ECB within the Single Supervisory Mechanism.

#BaFin and CFDs

BaFin was ahead of ESMA on retail CFDs: from August 2017 it prohibited the marketing, distribution and sale of CFDs with an additional payment obligation to retail clients in Germany, effectively requiring negative balance protection a year before the EU-wide rules.

#Why many international brokers are BaFin-supervised

After Brexit, several UK and Australian groups chose Germany for their EU entity – including IG Europe GmbH, CMC Markets Germany GmbH and Pepperstone GmbH. German neobrokers such as Trade Republic (a bank) and Scalable Capital are also BaFin-supervised, as is flatexDEGIRO Bank, which operates DEGIRO across Europe.

#Checking a firm

BaFin's company database (Unternehmensdatenbank) lists authorised firms and passported firms operating in Germany. BaFin also publishes consumer warnings about unauthorised offers and suspected clones. Clients of German investment firms are covered by the EdW (90% up to €20,000).