The Reputational Paradox: Data-Driven Insights into Trustpilot Moderation and Review Bias in the FX/CFD Ecosystem Introduction

If there is one platform that holds a unique position when it comes to customer trust and brand perception in the online trading industry, it is probably Trustpilot. For years, companies proudly displayed their Trustpilot ratings across landing pages: “Top Rated on Trustpilot” became a trust signal in itself. In an industry where credibility is difficult to build, a strong review score often helped companies stand out. 

At the same time, there was also an open secret in the industry: review manipulation was widespread. Fake reviews, incentivised ratings, and aggressive review collection tactics became common practice. 

Now, with the mass adoption of AI, the discussion around online reviews is changing again. AI tools have made it easier than ever to generate convincing reviews at scale, while platforms like Trustpilot are facing increasing pressure to strengthen moderation and enforcement. In recent months, the company appears to have taken a more aggressive stance against suspicious review activity and guideline breaches. 

This raises a bigger question for the industry: are trustpilot scores still measuring customer trust, or just how well companies are managing their online reputation?

Looking at current Trustpilot data across the online trading industry, breaches of the platform’s guidelines are no longer isolated cases. Out of 42 analysed prop trading firms, 11 are currently flagged for “Breach of Guidelines,” representing around 26% of the group. Among crypto exchanges, 8 out of 48 analysed brands are flagged (17%). For CFD brokers, 8 out of 62 companies are currently flagged (15%). 

“What is interesting is that this is not only affecting small or unknown brands. Some very established companies with large customer bases are also currently flagged,” says Christian Görgen, Marketing Consultant at FYI.LTD, a marketing intelligence platform covering the online trading industry.

At the same time, ratings across the industry remain relatively strong overall. Among companies without warning flags, CFD brokers currently average a Trustpilot rating of 4.09 and prop firms 4.21. Crypto exchanges stand out as the clear exception, with a significantly lower average rating of just 2.48. Review activity is also substantially higher among CFD brokers and prop firms, suggesting that many companies in these sectors are actively encouraging customers to leave feedback. Compared to the previous month, the analysed crypto exchanges added only around 798 new reviews, while CFD brokers gained more than 11,200 and prop trading firms over 14,000 new reviews. The numbers highlight how important Trustpilot still is within the online trading ecosystem. Many retail traders continue to check reviews before opening accounts, purchasing challenges, or depositing funds, which is why companies remain highly focused on maintaining a strong Trustpilot presence.

It is important to understand that a “Breach of Guidelines” warning on Trustpilot can mean many different things. According to the platform’s policies, fake reviews, incentivised reviews, and biased review collection are all considered violations. At the same time, Trustpilot has become the dominant review platform for industries like online trading and fintech. For many users, checking Trustpilot is one of the first steps before opening an account or depositing money. As a result, many companies have become heavily dependent on the platform, not only in terms of complying with its rules and moderation policies, but also through paid tools and subscriptions used for active review collection and reputation management.

The bigger issue, however, is that online reviews rarely reflect the average customer experience in a balanced way. Most users will not leave a review when everything simply works as expected. Negative experiences are different. Frustration creates action. Reviews are therefore often shaped by disputes, support delays, account restrictions, or financial losses.  This becomes obvious when looking outside the trading industry. Major global brands like Booking.com, Spotify, and Netflix all have surprisingly low Trustpilot ratings despite serving millions of happy users worldwide. 

Online reviews are often driven by a small minority of highly emotional customer experiences, particularly negative ones. In many cases, people are far more likely to leave a review after a bad experience than after a normal or satisfactory one. The debate around online reviews has become so intense that Finanzfluss, one of Germany’s largest financial literacy websites, recently decided to shut down its own community-driven review functionality. Founder Thomas Kehl stated on LinkedIn that the move would reportedly cost the company a six-figure amount in annual revenue. In his post, Kehl argued that modern review systems increasingly reward companies with aggressive review management strategies rather than truly reflecting product quality or customer satisfaction. “The reviews do not differentiate between good and bad providers. They only differentiate between providers that actively manage reviews and those that do not.”

And the discussion around fake reviews is not limited to financial services or startups anymore. In some industries, the problem appears to be even bigger. In Italy, the situation around manipulated online reviews in hospitality became so serious that the government proposed new legislation aimed at tightening the rules around customer feedback. Under the proposal, users would need to provide proof that they actually visited a restaurant or hotel before being allowed to leave a review. The proposed rules are currently focused on restaurants and hotels, two industries where online ratings can have a direct impact on visibility, bookings, and revenue. At the same time, the move highlights a broader shift: regulators are increasingly viewing fake or manipulated reviews as a consumer protection issue rather than just a platform moderation problem. As online reviews continue to influence purchasing decisions across industries, pressure is growing not only on platforms like Trustpilot, but also on businesses themselves to prove that reviews reflect genuine customer experiences.

We are entering a period where almost anything written online can be questioned. AI-generated content is making it harder to know what is genuine and what is not. Because of that, the question may increasingly shift from what is being said to who is saying it. For online trading brands, this could change how trust and reputation are built. Anonymous reviews on a single platform may become less important than being consistently mentioned across respected industry websites and media outlets. Industry-specific review platforms can still play an important role, especially if they focus more on verification and expert-driven analysis. At the same time, opinions from people with an established track record in the industry may carry more weight than reviews from completely anonymous users.