Ori Hazan, VP Business Development @ Panda TS
Ori Hazan, VP Business 
Development @ Panda TS
Development @ Panda TSAn enthusiastic and creative leader with the ability to inspire others, Mr. Hazan has great analytical and communication skills with a deep understanding of business models.
Mr. Hazan has a B.A. in Economics and Management and over 5 years of experience in the Forex and Binary Options industry. He started his career as a financial dealer in an Forex brokerage, building his reputation and advancing to the Chief Dealer position.
Mr. Hazan joined Panda TS in June 2014 and was the company’s first Customer Success Manager. Very shortly, he was promoted to VP Customer Success and ran the
entire Customer Success Team.
entire Customer Success Team.
In December 2015, he was promoted again to Panda’s 
VP of Business Development. As a part of the role, Ori is responsible for all commercial operations in Panda, including sales and strategic partnerships.
VP of Business Development. As a part of the role, Ori is responsible for all commercial operations in Panda, including sales and strategic partnerships.1) What has been happening in the Forex industry over the past year in terms of new brands and competitors?
We see a lot of new brands entering the market with impressive products and offers. Many more than before. In the past, companies succeeded only because they had a genius CMO running the marketing operations. Now, more than 95% of new brokers rely on affiliates to generate traffic. Most of the time, if the relationships are good – money will be made.
As we consider this particular aspect as one of the most crucial for the success of a broker, we’ve established a dedicated integration team, whose sole purpose is to meet the specific demands of affiliates. In addition, the team takes care of the complex integration of over four different suppliers of affiliation tracking systems.
Another thing that helps new and veteran brands to succeed is flexibility and the ability to think outside of the box. While most Forex websites look exactly the same and offer the same services, it is very important to provide some kind of added value to your customers. This can be a unique product or optimizing the website’s technology to better suit the customer’s business activities. Our main focus at Panda TS is to help our brokers, both big and small, create a unique customer experience and optimize their management systems
2) In which direction is the industry going in terms of growth?
In the past two years, it looked like Binary Options were going to be here forever, and that most entrepreneurs preferred to launch a Binary Options operation. Today, with changes in Binary Options regulations worldwide, it seems like Forex is coming back strong.
Due to this reason, we’re putting a lot of focus on our Shared Wallet solution, which combines trading Forex and Binary Options under the same account. Thanks to easier conversion for Binary Options and higher player value for Forex, the ROI is increasing by more than 300%.
In terms of end users, there is a lot to be done in order to re-build trust with the investors. Hopefully regulators will become stricter. And with a more hands-on approach, they will be able to filter out people who are not equipped to run a financial brokerage.
3) Is the growth of mobile affecting the industry?
Mobile demand is definitely increasing every day. Today, clients want not just to trade from their mobile app, but to manage their entire relationship with their broker through it, and they want to do it from anywhere they wish.
We understand the importance of mobile in today’s world and we are adjusting our solutions accordingly. Starting from enabling deposits and registration from the apps to integrating mobile tracking and pop-up notifications.
4) What are the new industry regulations and what do you think about them?
The two main regulation authorities in this industry are still FCA and CySec. They are the strictest with their clients, and they are getting tougher every day. There are other regulation authorities who are quite popular today, such as Belize or Vanuatu. They are cheaper to maintain and the capital needed is much lower. However, it appears that they will soon lose their appeal due to new demands from European authorities.
We are definitely in favor of new strict regulations (within reason of course, not just long bureaucratic procedures). We hope it will help restore the industry’s good name. Of course, we’ve aligned our systems (both platforms and reporting) with all regulators’ demands worldwide in order to make it easier for our clients to get their regulation and automatic procedures approved.
Hopefully in the near future, the regulators will be overseeing platforms as well, so traders will gain even more confidence.
5) What are the latest technical developments in the industry?
In terms of end users, people want a simplified trading experience. A lot of brokers want a trading platform that will appeal to both experienced and beginner traders. While experienced traders mostly want the industry standard MT4, brokers must also find a simpler, web-based platform in order to attract beginner traders.
In addition, one of the best selling points these days is the integration with liquidity providers and hedge funds that allow our brokers 24/7 trading, including Saturdays and Sundays. This brings the trading hour session up to 40%.
In terms of back office systems, brokers must automate back office procedures in order to be more efficient and profitable. For example, implementing auto-dialer, and creating efficient workflows instead of wasting agents’ time on unnecessary clicks. Everything should be done automatically.
Also, we have recently been seeing a lot of security breaches in the market. So, our team has developed and implemented double key authentication to protect the broker’s main asset – his data.
6) Are there are changes and new restrictions for accepting payments from clients? How does this affect you?
There are many payment solutions in the market today, and as a broker you need to choose the right ones. As a technology provider, we do everything we can for our brokers to be as successful as possible. As a result, we make sure all available payment solutions are offered to them. We will integrate any PSP, EPM or wire solution our clients ask for, and as soon as possible. Of course, thanks to our vast experience and connections in the industry, we’ll be able to advise our clients on the best payment methods for them, according to their needs.
However, as the market matures, it will definitely get harder for unregulated brokers to operate and we’ll need to come up with new solutions for them.
7) What do you think needs to be done in order for a new brand to succeed?
- Marketing – Bring a high volume of leads to the sales team. These days it’s mostly done by affiliation management, but there are a few amazing people who know how to generate traffic on their own. When working with affiliates, you have to be connected to all major affiliate networks.
- Sales – Achieve high conversion rates with a very strong retention team.
- Technology – Choosing the right technology provider is crucial for a new brand. You have to make sure your provider will be able to answer your needs and requested changes on the fly, letting you focus on what you do best. Of course, stability of systems and high level of service are things that a brand cannot be successful without.
- Management – Get a good general manager to point the troops in the right direction and hire experts in each field to run the teams.
- Payments – Payments are a tricky field these days. A broker must be integrated to a wide variety of payment solution providers in order to guarantee the smooth operation of its brokerage.
- Way of operation – Even unregulated brands must operate as a regulated entity. Brands who do not work according to strict compliance and support protocols, including internal supervision and inspections from time to time, will not stay in business for long.
- Budget – Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of thinking that it’s OK to start with low capital and to let it grow slowly. A brokerage cannot operate with low cash flow, as it will be gone very soon, after investing in offices, recruitment, salaries, technology, opening companies and bank accounts. As a result, the operation will collapse. Today, in order to invest in this kind of business for the long term, the needed capital for an unregulated brokerage is at least $500K, while a regulated broker would need at least another million.
8) What is unique about your company?
At Panda TS, we don’t just offer an out-of-the box online brokerage solution, like other technology providers do. Each and every one of our customers gets customized product development services, so we can tailor our technology to meet their individual business needs. It’s this boutique approach to customer service, paired with our proven trading technologies, that enables our customers to be more profitable compared to market standards.
