Best Market Maker Brokers in 2026

The phrase “market maker” refers to a dealer (or, broker) that, quite literally, makes markets. A market maker establishes prices and executes orders to buy or sell at those prices in order to capture the spread between them. Market makers profit both from this spread and potentially from any risk they internalize by holding the opposite side of your trade.

There are two sides to every trade: one side is simultaneously buying or selling to the other. A market maker either takes the other side of your trade (internalizes the risk) or sells it to another entity (externalizes the risk). An agency broker only does the latter; by sending the order to another dealer or market maker to execute the trade (externalizing the risk), agency brokers capture a small commission from the spread.

The differences between market maker brokers and agency brokers are often blurred because many brokers may use a combination of these approaches (or may even claim to be one while secretly doing the other). In addition, untrustworthy market maker brokers may employ questionable dealing practices that put traders at a disadvantage.

While your broker may match your trade to another client, send your order to another broker to execute, or take the other side of your trade directly as a market maker, they are always the counterparty to your trade. The three types of brokers you might deal with are:

• Market Maker Brokers: Executes your order internally by taking the risk on the opposite side of your trade (internalizing the risk).
• Agency Brokers: Sends your order to another market maker broker (known as a liquidity provider) to execute your trade (externalizes or offloads the risk).
• Hybrid brokers: This broker does both. Be aware: Some hybrid brokers may claim to be agency-only brokers sending all orders to external liquidity providers (LPs), but in reality are sending some orders to their own market maker entity/liquidity provider.

The largest market makers are institutional brokers engaged in proprietary trading, such as banks or hedge funds. They are responsible for trading billions or even trillions of dollars worth of assets each day. These companies use their own capital to act as market makers and internalize risk in line with their overall financial strategies.

For example, Flow Traders and Virtu are two large market maker proprietary trading firms (commonly known as prop trading firms). While they don't offer brokerage services to retail clients, there’s a good chance that when you are trading with a broker that sends your order to an exchange, they are the market maker selling to you when you buy (or, buying from you when you sell).

Citadel Securities is another large market maker with a mandate to make markets on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) as a designated market maker (DMM). This designation means that for certain securities Citadel has to be willing to be a counterparty to a trade to ensure the market functions properly, and not just to make a profit. In other words, even if everyone else is buying a security and the price is going up, a DMM would have to sell into that buying frenzy as part of its mandate.

Some of the larger over-the-counter (OTC) market makers that operate institutional trading desks or offer crypto execution services from their platform to retail and institutional clients in 2026 include the following crypto brokers:

• Coinbase Advanced
• eToro
• DRW Cumberland
• Virtu Financial
• Citadel Securities
• Fidelity Crypto (does not disclose LPs)

Market makers make money by capturing the spread (difference between the bid/ask price) on your trade. By exiting their side of the trade and immediately buying back at the asking price, market makers can capture the spread and turn a profit. Alternatively, a market maker broker may hold onto their position on the other side of your trade and internalize the associated risk. This just means that the market maker is willing to weather the risk that comes with holding onto the position to capture potential profits (or losses).

Yes; by definition, market makers take a position on the opposite side of your trades – buying when you sell and selling when you buy – but that doesn't mean market makers actively care whether you make or lose money on those trades. It all comes down to how the market maker manages its risk.

In a perfect world where market makers are following the rules and acting ethically, there would be no concern that market makers are actively hoping (or, causing) you to lose money when taking the opposite position in your trade. However, given the potential for a conflict of interest (and the growing number of scam brokers), there have been examples of disingenuous market makers engaging in unfair trade practices over the years, such as stop-loss hunting or asymmetrical slippage.

Every market maker wants to make money, so it's crucial that you only use highly trusted brokers to ensure that your interests are aligned and that they are not trading against you on purpose. The key is to understand their available execution methods and trading costs and to find a broker that can handle your trading needs.

The Electronic Communications Network, or ECN, is a computerized and centralized order book where clients are automatically matched and the size of each order is visible to all parties. While this has worked to a certain degree in other asset classes, like crypto exchanges, for forex markets they have largely failed to attract meaningful volumes except for a few real ECN trading venues (i.e., LMAX, which is regulated as an exchange).

The main concern for traders using an ECN model is that slippage can have a more significant impact on market prices due to limited volumes at the top of book prices (orders occurring at current market prices). As a result, a large market order that cannot be completely filled at the current price will experience partial fills at progressively worse prices.

Market makers are actively establishing the market prices where they are dealing for traders, while an ECN is a place where traders can place orders in the hope they will be automatically filled by other matching orders or market makers also trading on the platform.

The main difference is that on an ECN, if you don't have enough liquidity and orders available for a proper depth of book, your market order could get filled at a worse price if the full amount isn’t available at the current spot price.

A market maker broker will usually handle this issue by placing limits on the number of orders you can execute in an automated manner, in addition to maximum position limits per asset or a limit on the overall number of orders you can place at any one time.

I've found that the biggest advantage that comes with using a market maker broker is that you'll likely experience less slippage and fewer rejected orders, compared to agency execution. A market maker broker establishes the market prices and executes your orders directly rather than relying on a third party.

The market maker is also ultimately responsible for itself when it comes to trade execution. By contrast, any issues that arise with an agency broker could be out of their control as they may blame the external market makers they are using (i.e., the liquidity provider or execution venue they passed your trade to for fulfillment).

The biggest disadvantage of trading with a market maker is that if you're consistently making money, there is a chance that your execution quality could suffer if the broker decides to move you to a different client group. Not all market maker brokers will do this, and the decision to move you will depend on the terms and conditions for your account, the size of your profits and overall trading balance, and (perhaps most importantly) how the broker manages its risk.

This same disadvantage may exist when you are dealing with an agency broker. When your trade is sent to a third-party market maker for execution, the agency broker can also run into the same issues that might cause the market maker to alter the execution quality.