Strong Iconic Logo for Global Financial Trading Broker

Tradestone Markets

Tradestone Markets is a Canadian company that offers global financial trading products. Some of these products include Foreign Exchange (FX), Contracts For Difference (CFDs), Gold/Silver, Oil and Energy.

We're a Canadian based firm so our key markets will be in Canada. Though we have a global market of clients who will be trading a diverse range of financial products, from foreign currencies to oil and gold.

Our clients are financial institutions, businesses of all sizes and private investors. The logo should be bold and stand strong beside logos of the big banks and other financial institutions. If it can have a subtle accent to show that we're Canadian that would be great as well.

STYLE & CONTENT
- Modern, strong and sophisticated.
- "Tradestone" is more important than the "Markets" piece of our name. If the logo quickly flashed across a screen the name 'Tradestone' should stand out.
- An iconic graphic to go with the company name, though please play with the text as well. The icon shouldn't totally overpower the company name and they should definitely look like they belong together. Here are some icon ideas:
- Globe
- P&L arrows as long as they're going UP
- A globe with arrows around it
- A globe like a stock ticker
- 4 stock arrows of varying colours or shades of grey to show the many markets that we deal in.
- Arrows, graphs, something stylized
- Anything else to portray finance, trading, global financial markets, profits, etc.
- No stock images, cartoons or clip art.
- We prefer a wide vs tall logo so would prefer the icon to go to the left of the text. Though then again if it's flexible and can go above or beside the company name that would be great.

NOTE: The icon shouldn't overpower or visually hide the name 'Tradestone'. It can be larger, but when you quickly look at the logo you should easily be able to see both. If this quickly flashed past a screen people should quickly be able to see the name 'Tradestone' along with our icon as the brand gets more recognized.

Along with the icon, if you find a way to work in a subtle Canadian feeling, such as a maple leaf, that would be great. It could be something as simple as the center of the O being a maple leaf. Here are some sample logos: http://logoblink.com/2008/03/18/can…-logo-set/. I have also attached a maple-leaf that you can use as a reference in your designs. And if you're feeling really artistic and have an idea for a snarling angry moose like the snarling angry bull that you'll see in some other logos, then we'd love to see it.

COLORS
- Please see the attached sample logos as they have great colors. We like the idea of a blue or green and then a medium to dark grey for the secondary color. Some designers have used all three colors and it looks great.
- Please don't use a hard black text. A dark grey is better.

USES
- Should look good on a white and dark background.
- The logo should have a 3D and 2D version
- Should look good in both color and black & white, and be faxable.
- Should be readable down to 120px wide

FILE FORMATS
- .jpg, .ai (CMYK), layered .psd (RGB)

We'll be monitoring this contest closely and will post feedback regularly throughout the day. For any private questions please email martin@coastalextreme.com.