The financial spread trading world is in a constant state of flux. From telephone spread betting to online, to mobile trading platforms, spread betting has evolved year by year. The rise of the internet and, more recently, mobile and android trading have made spread betting more accessible than ever before. With mobiles increasingly becoming the primary device for internet access and communication, particularly in emerging markets, accessibility and multimedia features are a key requirement for engaging with consumers. In this respect, modern financial spread trading easy. The spread traders of today can speculate on every conceivable financial market, and do it all from the comfort of their home or mobile phone.

Mobile gadgets are of course increasingly popular with consumers and traders are no exception. Spread betting providers should seek to deliver a very stable and secure platform and high-quality execution like they do on their web platforms. IG Index presently appears to have the best spread betting application for Android.

One could well say that Apple’s iPhone still dominates the smartphones industry. However, competitors are rising up to the challenge and Google has in particular released its Android operating system for free to mobile phone industry manufacturers such as HTC, Samsung and LG. This is making the Android operating system very popular as these manufacturers can practically add it to any of their phones – ultimately giving clients more choice. Most spread betting platforms nowadays are optimised to run on the latest touchscreen technology and Android smartphones.

Today, mobile is a key element of most spread betting brokers’ growth strategy and a number have invested heavily in creating broad range of platforms from which they can drive mobile usage from both their existing base and new customers. Most spread trading providers have developed native apps for iPhone, iPad, Android and J2ME alongside Mobile Web Applications. With today’s mobile trading platforms, spread betters can keep track of market trends and trading positions, place alerts and acquire trading signals and market commentary – all this while at a cafe’ or running errands, playing snooker, or whatever else they prefer doing over sitting in a desk chair all day.

In emergencies I’ve sometimes managed to run stockbroker and spread betting web sites on my Android mobile phone. Granted the small screen experience is not perfect but it’s just about usable and handy in such situations. However, when it comes to tablets and phones you normally get a much better experience when you run a dedicated app that is designed for Android users. In this respect spread betting providers IG Index, Capital Spreads and City Index all offer bespoke apps, but unfortunately none of the stock brokers I am familiar with.

IG Index recently reported that as much as 25% of its clients now use a mobile phone as well as a normal computer. Presently much of the volume focuses on Apple’s iPhone but IG believes that this is likely to change in future as Android powered phones keep gaining in popularity. The company has recently released a trading app for phone using Google’s Android operating system. The new Android app from IG Index is designed to give Android users the same level of functionality that iPhone users has got accustomed to enjoy including streaming Reuters news, automatically updating charts, and tap execution of spread trades, stop losses and limit orders.Mobile trading is one increasingly popular way to react to market movements. Spread traders look for volatility to create trading opportunities, trading opportunities, and with this comes quick price changes. It is important that spread traders are able to react quickly by being able to access live prices and trading on the go. And the important of being able to put on a trade quickly hasn’t probably ever been as critical as it is now with rapidly changing market conditions pushing markets to extremes. The key benefits of mobile platforms include: control, independence, involvement, monitoring, access, consistency, and enhancement of consumer experience.

Having said all that, despite the incredible rise of Android, the largest volume and uptake of the online trading revolution presently revolves around the iPhones. Android is however the fastest growing operating system and more spread betting providers are likely to adopt betting apps soon but the next logical step is ‘the long tail’.

‘I saw it compared to cars the other day. While the iPhone is like a BMW, people still drive a Ford. The more easily-acquired customers are the iPhone users, then you also have Android and the natural form of uptake will be the rest, which is normal browser technology on a Nokia or a Sony Ericsson for example. That will be a huge long tail.’

Spread betters traditionally consider volatility as a desirable quality to have in order to create trading opportunities, and with this comes rapid price stock market price fluctuations. It is important that a spread trader is able to react quickly, by both being able to monitor live prices and trade whenever they spot an opportunity, on the go.

Android spread betting provides traders and investors with an efficient, quick way to stay in control of their investments, anywhere in the world at any time