Investors following easyMarkets learned this week that the broker’s Q2 trading review points to a pronounced defensive turn among retail traders, with gold topping activity and overall volumes falling back from both Q1 2026 and Q2 2025 as clients chose discipline over aggression.
What the easyMarkets Q2 Trading Review Found
Gold held its position as the most traded instrument on the platform across the second quarter of 2026. Crude oil ranked second, and US stock indices completed the top three, but the story of the quarter was less about which markets were active and more about how cautiously traders approached them.
Giannis Nikola, Chief Risk Officer at easyMarkets, put it plainly: ‘The defining trend in Q2 wasn’t a particular market, it was the way traders approached risk. We saw clients becoming more selective with their trades, reducing overall exposure and making greater use of stop-loss orders as geopolitical events and macroeconomic uncertainty made sustained market direction harder to identify. It’s a sign that today’s traders are increasingly prioritising discipline and capital preservation while remaining ready to act when opportunities arise.’
Day trading was the dominant strategy, allowing clients to respond to short-term price moves without carrying positions overnight. Stop-loss orders (instructions that automatically close a trade at a pre-set loss level, limiting downside) saw wider adoption, which easyMarkets said reflected traders wanting to define their maximum risk before entering a position rather than reacting after the fact.
Oil’s Quarter: Hormuz Disruption and a Late Resolution
The energy market’s volatility during Q2 had concrete, documented causes. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported that petroleum markets faced continued disruptions to international crude oil and product flows through the Strait of Hormuz for much of the quarter, pushing prices higher and amplifying volatility. US distillate exports averaged an estimated 1.56 million barrels per day in Q2 2026, around 30% above the five-year average, while jet fuel exports hit 356,000 barrels per day, more than double their five-year norm, as traders rerouted supply chains around the blockage.
The International Energy Agency’s May 2026 Oil Market Report showed just how severe the supply squeeze became. Global refinery crude throughputs were projected to fall by 4.5 million barrels per day in Q2 2026 to 78.7 million barrels per day, with operators contending with infrastructure damage, export restrictions, and reduced feedstock availability. The IEA also recorded that observed global inventories, including oil on water, were drawn down by 250 million barrels over March and April 2026, a rate of 4 million barrels per day.
A resolution emerged in mid-June. According to an EIA press release, a memorandum of understanding signed on 18 June between the United States and Iran led to the strait reopening and shipping traffic recovering. The EIA expects worldwide crude production and trade flows to return to near pre-conflict levels by year-end, with most previously shut-in production coming back online by the first quarter of 2027.
For easyMarkets clients trading crude oil during those months, the price swings were real, but the platform’s data suggests they did not chase them. Positioning remained measured, with traders limiting exposure rather than scaling up risk into the volatility.
Risk Tools and Capital Preservation
The broader pattern across the quarter, across gold, energy, and indices, was one of restraint. easyMarkets offers negative balance protection as a standard feature on all accounts at no additional cost, meaning a client’s account cannot be driven below zero even if markets move sharply against an open trade. In an environment where oil prices were swinging on geopolitical headlines, that structural safeguard matters for anyone managing short-term positions.
The broker, founded in 2001 and offering over 275 tradeable instruments, noted that clients made greater use of stop-loss orders throughout Q2, reinforcing the capital-preservation theme Nikola described.
Q3 Outlook: No Clear Trend Yet
easyMarkets is not calling a directional shift for the third quarter. The broker expects markets to remain driven by macroeconomic data releases, inflation figures, interest rate expectations, and geopolitical developments, with energy markets and global equity indices the sectors most worth watching.
With Hormuz shipping recovering and the EIA projecting a supply rebound by year-end, energy traders will be watching whether crude prices deflate as shut-in production returns, or whether fresh geopolitical friction keeps the volatility premium alive. That binary is the clearest setup heading into Q3.
