Reports Archive
All published GCTSI quarterly reports, sorted by most recent.
The GCTSI Research Group publishes quarterly reports benchmarking bid-ask spread efficiency across nine trading platforms for three commodity instruments: gold (XAUUSD), silver (XAGUSD), and crude oil (USOIL). Each report includes a platform-level Spread Efficiency Ranking, instrument-level spread data tables, and a structural analysis comparing CFD and perpetual contract spread behaviour.
Reports are produced using spread data sourced from ThePriceChart.com and follow the standardised collection and calculation process described in the GCTSI Methodology. All reports are published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence and may be freely cited with attribution.
Published Reports
March 2026
Q1 2026 Global TradFi Spread Report
The inaugural GCTSI quarterly report. Covers January–March 2026. Includes the first Platform Spread Efficiency Ranking across nine venues (Bybit, OKX, Bitget, Flipster, Binance, CoinEx, IG, Exness, FXCM), with separate rankings for crypto perpetuals and forex CFDs. Key finding: spread dispersion between the tightest and widest platforms exceeds 300% for XAUUSD during peak-liquidity hours.
Read the Q1 2026 report →Upcoming Reports
The Q2 2026 report will cover April–June 2026 and is scheduled for publication in early July 2026. The report will track spread changes relative to Q1 baselines and include a quarter-over-quarter trend analysis.
For methodology details and platform selection criteria, see the Methodology page. For information about the research team, see the About page.