Top CySEC-regulated brokers, ranked by our disclosed methodology. A CySEC licence carries the right to passport services into Bulgaria under MiFID II, but passporting works via a per-country notification the firm's home regulator files on its behalf -- it isn't automatic, and which specific products or account types are actually offered can vary by entity and by country even where notification is in place. Treat "CySEC-regulated" as confirmation of the licence, not a guarantee that every broker below is actively onboarding Bulgaria retail clients today -- confirm directly with the broker. Brokers we cover whose only licence is offshore (e.g. Seychelles FSA) aren't EU-passportable at all and are left out of this page for that reason -- see our full reviews for those.
Bulgaria joined the EU in 2007 and still uses its own currency, the lev (BGN), which is pegged to the euro; the country has targeted future eurozone entry. Domestic oversight of financial markets sits with the FSC, though in practice most retail forex and CFD trading in Bulgaria happens through brokers passporting in from elsewhere in the EU, CySEC-licensed firms among the most common.
No broker in our current CySEC-licensed dataset is headquartered in Bulgaria, so the ranking below reflects our overall EU-wide scoring rather than any Bulgaria-specific presence.
Base currency: BGN · Local regulator: FSC (Financial Supervision Commission) · EU member since: 2007
Any broker serving Bulgaria retail clients operates under MiFID II, the EU-wide framework covering investment firms, plus the retail-facing product intervention rules ESMA introduced in 2018 (leverage caps, standardized risk warnings, negative balance protection, and a ban on bonus incentives). A CySEC (or other EU member-state) licence is the precondition for legally offering these services anywhere in the EU/EEA, but the firm must also complete a MiFID passporting notification for Bulgaria specifically -- it is not automatic just because the firm is licensed somewhere in the EU.
This is the detail most broker-comparison content glosses over: investor compensation for a passported broker (the large majority of brokers on this site, relative to Bulgaria) comes from the broker's home-country scheme, not a Bulgaria-specific one. For a CySEC-licensed entity, that means Cyprus's Investor Compensation Fund (ICF), covering eligible retail clients up to €20,000 per person if the firm fails -- the same cover regardless of which EU country the client lives in. A UK FCA entity instead carries the UK's FSCS cover, up to £85,000 per person, via a separate licence that doesn't passport from the EU side at all post-Brexit.
No broker in our researched set is confirmed to hold a Bulgaria-licensed entity specifically (as opposed to a passported CySEC or other EU entity), so no Bulgaria-specific compensation scheme applies to any broker reviewed here -- it's the home regulator's scheme in every case. See our investor compensation schemes page for the general mechanics.
Retail leverage is capped under the same ESMA-derived limits across every EU member state, Bulgaria included: 30:1 on major currency pairs, 20:1 on non-major pairs/gold/major indices, 10:1 on other commodities and non-major indices, 5:1 on individual equities, and 2:1 on crypto-asset CFDs. Clients who qualify as "professional" under MiFID II's elective-professional criteria (meeting at least two of: a sufficiently large portfolio, relevant trading frequency/experience, or relevant industry employment) can apply for higher leverage, but lose the retail-specific protections -- including, notably, negative balance protection -- that come with those caps.
Gains from spot forex, CFDs, and OTC derivatives are generally described as taxed under Bulgaria's flat 10% personal income tax rate (net gain = sale price minus purchase price). Some sources claim a standard expense deduction effectively lowers this to 9%, but this is disputed between sources. The EU/EEA-regulated-market capital gains exemption that applies to shares/ETFs does not extend to CFDs or forex. Very active, frequent trading risks reclassification by the tax authority (NRA) as a business activity, changing the treatment, though the exact threshold wasn't found. Consult a Bulgarian tax adviser and the NRA directly.
General overview only, not tax advice -- rules change and depend on your personal circumstances (including whether you're classified as trading as a business). Confirm your specific position with a local tax advisor.
ePay.bg, Bulgaria's leading domestic online payment system, is explicitly listed as a supported deposit option on at least one major e-wallet used by Bulgarian traders, though no forex/CFD broker was confirmed to support it directly.
The FSC maintains a publicly updated blacklist of unauthorized investment/forex/CFD platforms, and Bulgarian courts have ordered ISPs to block access to unlicensed brokers (40 sites blocked via a 2018 Sofia Regional Court order) -- a genuine additional consumer-protection layer. On product rules specifically, the FSC's 2019 CFD measures largely mirror the EU/ESMA framework rather than add materially beyond it.
None of the brokers in our researched set are confirmed to be headquartered in Bulgaria, or to hold a Bulgaria-licensed entity specifically -- every broker ranked below passports in under its EU licence from elsewhere (typically Cyprus). We don't have comprehensive data on which brokers have filed a branch-level or local-office notification short of full headquarters, so we don't claim one here rather than guess.
Ranked using our disclosed overall broker score (nine weighted categories, led by regulation & client protection and trading costs) -- every broker here holds a CySEC licence capable of being passported into Bulgaria, not a confirmed, currently-active local notification for each one (see the nuance above). We don't have independent country-level trading-volume or market-share data, so this reflects broker quality and, where applicable, a confirmed local headquarters -- not measured local popularity. See our comparison tool to compare any two directly, or the leverage guide for what the EU-wide ESMA rules mean for your account.
Is a forex/CFD broker regulated if it says it's "FSC-licensed"?
Only if it appears on the FSC's own register of licensed investment intermediaries or the EEA-passporting notification list. The FSC publishes and regularly updates a blacklist of unauthorized platforms, and Bulgarian courts have ordered ISP blocks on unlicensed sites -- verify independently on fsc.bg rather than relying on a broker's own claim.
How are my forex/CFD trading gains taxed in Bulgaria?
Commonly described as taxed at a flat 10% (some sources say an effective 9% after a standard deduction, though this is disputed) under the Personal Income Tax Act. Confirm with the NRA or a Bulgarian tax adviser, especially regarding loss offsets and possible reclassification as business income for frequent traders.
Bulgaria: FSC (Financial Supervision Commission) (official site) · EU-wide: ESMA · Broker licensing: our CySEC regulation page