Plenty of brokers have launched copy trading in the last two years. Fewer can say what it did for revenue.

The pattern is familiar. The module goes live, there is a fortnight of client curiosity, and activity settles somewhere nobody builds a business case on. Sometimes the strategies themselves are the problem: too few worth following at launch, and nothing to sustain interest once the early performers cool off. Just as often what is missing is everything around them, which strategies clients actually see, who markets them, and how anyone gets paid.

That is the gap Aquariux is targeting with Pelican-powered copy trading in AQX Trader. AQX Trader provides the broker-branded, multi-asset trading experience. Pelican Network provides the copy-trading infrastructure and access to an established Network of more than 9,000 strategies across more than 70 broker relationships. Aquariux delivers AQX Trader to traders in 133 countries and grew transaction volume across its platforms by more than $21 billion year on year, an increase of more than 70%.

“What brokers tell us is that they no longer have to treat copy trading as a project. It is there when they launch AQX Trader, with strategies already in it. That takes six months and a lot of risk out of the plan, because the thing that kills these launches is opening a marketplace with nothing in it. Since March we have carried on building with Pelican rather than treating the integration as finished. Brokers get a product their clients use, providers get a bigger audience, and both of us have a reason to keep improving it.”

Michael Lim, CFA, Managing Director, Aquariux

The Network is the starting point

Depth is difficult to build alone. Recruiting providers one at a time, then keeping a marketplace populated as performance cycles turn over, is where most independently built marketplaces thin out. Pelican Network reports more than 1.5 million copied positions opened per day and record monthly notional copy-trading volume above $300 billion, including approximately $180 billion in cross-broker volume. Those figures describe the Network as a whole, across every broker relationship Pelican supports. For an AQX Trader broker, what matters is the size of the pool it connects to on day one, not a forecast of its own volumes.

Scale does not mean showing everything. Brokers select and curate Network content around their own client base and commercial model.

What it changes for the broker

Letting clients browse and compare thousands of strategies reaches an audience that spreads and execution never will: people interested in markets but unsure how to place a first trade. It also gives the self-directed trader who has started losing a way to stay active in the same account, and gives CRM teams fresh strategy content for reactivation campaigns. It does not remove trading risk or guarantee improved performance.

Then there is the arithmetic. If one provider places 10 trades and 10 clients copy each one, the broker sees 110 trades rather than 10. That example is illustrative and varies by broker, strategy and copier behaviour, but at Network scale Pelican Network reports a single strategy with approximately 350 copiers generating $25 billion in notional volume in one month.

Give the partner channel something to sell

Most IB conversations are still about rebate rates. Copy trading gives an IB two ways to earn: marketing Network strategy content to their audience alongside the rebate arrangement they already have, or, where commercially configured, making their own strategy available to copy through AQX Trader and earning performance fees on top. Pelican Network automates the calculation, deduction and payment of performance fees, including multi-level structures, distributing more than $2 million across the Network in an average month, with around $3 million distributed last month. In June 2026, Japanese strategy provider Gemslime earned approximately $700,000 in performance fees, a historic record for a single provider on the Network rather than an indication of what any provider should expect. Arrangements remain subject to the broker’s commercial setup and jurisdiction.

“The technology matters, but the part that cannot be built overnight is the Network. Building more than 9,000 live strategies across 70 broker relationships has taken years. The infrastructure around that Network then has to distribute activity at scale, automate performance fees across multiple levels, and support brokers operating within different financial regulatory frameworks. That combination of Network depth, infrastructure and regulatory capability is what gives brokers something meaningful to launch with from day one.”

Mike Read, Director, Pelican Network

Integrated Copy Trading, Built Into the Broker Experience

Browsing strategies, account linking, copying and management run inside the broker’s own AQX Trader environment rather than a separate consumer destination. Pelican Network supports copying across MT4 and MT5 alongside AQX Trader, so a strategy originating on one broker’s servers can reach clients operating on another. Pelican Network also supports regulated broker models through entities regulated in the UK, Cyprus, Mauritius and South Africa, subject to each broker’s own licence conditions.

Both teams support brokers through launch, with 24/5 support, a dedicated account manager, and an initial curated shortlist rather than access to 9,000 strategies and a login.

Where it goes next

Within a year the broker question will not be whether copy trading is offered, but what it returned: partner revenue, reactivated accounts, volume attributable to copied activity. That makes it a platform requirement rather than a module, connected to acquisition, CRM, partner management and reporting.

Brokers evaluating copy trading can see the Network, the curation controls and the performance-fee structures running inside a live AQX Trader environment. Aquariux and Pelican Network are taking joint broker briefings now.

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