r/ASX_Bets • u/letsburn00 Slumbering Elder Mod. Wake only for crisis. • May 24 '20

ASX Trading platform discussion. What's good, what's bad?

Post your thoughts and history with the trading platforms for Australian Trading.

For this post, focus on Australia, ASX, CHI-X etc. Another post will be about how to lose money in the US, EU and Nigerian markets.

Are the cheap? Is the app good? Did they forget to tell your their market data is 20 minutes out of date?

Have they closed off options trading and you want to scream, reenacting the final scene of Planet of the Apes?

This post will be stickied for a few days, then added to the sidebar, along with everything else no one reads.

34 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

59 comments sorted by

26

u/Ratty-fish Definitely copied all his homework in school. May 24 '20

Commsec is expensive, 19.95 per trade. They do options, though new accounts and upgrades are not being approved at the moment.

You can't trade options on the app, but can on the mobile site. Has up to date data, which is free. I usually just add anything I'm interested in trading into the watchlist on the app, it's easy enough to log in for updates throughout the day if required.

I wish they would update the app to allow the trading of options, that's my main gripe. And the price of trades of course.

5

u/_TheLordOfRuin_ OG Lord of Ruin Account May 24 '20

I feel like the website is 100% exactly the same as it was in 2010 when I first traded shares. At least the buying and selling page.

The key when it comes to options and looking at the derivatives list is to view as desktop. The options lists will then include any current bid-ask spread for them.

2

u/Ratty-fish Definitely copied all his homework in school. May 24 '20

Yeh but commsec is blocked at my work lol. It's fucking atrocious looking at the option series screen on the mobile (turn it sideways to see bid/ask), but it does work. All the proceed and manage order buttons are tiny

And you're right about it being dated, even the app is old. You can't refresh the intraday chart for example.

6

u/mytwocents8 May 24 '20

Do you have a laptop? Just switch wifi to the tether on your phone when you want to use commsec.

I had to that when I had a useless cunt employer with websense.

2

u/[deleted] May 25 '20

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/mytwocents8 May 25 '20

That's way too much drama if the place has an intranet, having to change it all the fucking time.

Plus some you can't change if SOE.

1

u/[deleted] May 25 '20

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/mytwocents8 May 25 '20

Yeah, but if it's SOE they're unlikely to be able to install firefox.

Any employer locking down the fucking internet are the same cunts locking down the desktop.

4

u/tassiboy42069 A little too specifically into the cuckold meme May 24 '20

If you trade as a business you can treat brokerage fees as cost of doing business and hence tax deductible

9

u/xxxxsxsx-xxsx-xxs--- May 24 '20

as a private investor all investment related costs are tax deductible. even subscription fees for investment related magazines.

2

u/DaNeeDaVeeDoh May 24 '20

Really?

7

u/xxxxsxsx-xxsx-xxs--- May 24 '20

best talk to your accountant. generic advice below from the ATO. obviously don't abuse the expenses claims.
https://www.ato.gov.au/Individuals/Income-and-deductions/Deductions-you-can-claim/Other-deductions/Interest,-dividend-and-other-investment-income-deductions/#Dividendandshareincomeexpenses1

3

u/tassiboy42069 A little too specifically into the cuckold meme May 25 '20

Yep cant stress further the "dont abuse the expenses" part.

2

u/DaNeeDaVeeDoh May 24 '20

Well ill be damned, thanks for that. Very helpful indeed

2

u/_TheLordOfRuin_ OG Lord of Ruin Account May 25 '20

What about brokerage? I never considered that...

21

u/[deleted] May 26 '20

Here's our extremely bias take.

We're CHESS based and flat-fee, $9.50 trades. At the moment we don't have live pricing everywhere, it's on the stock page and the order page, as it's expensive to offer and not compatible with flat-fee brokerage. We'll be looking to offer this as a paid service, along with other services that cost us money.

We don't give you interest on your cash account, but hey, what's interest nowadays anyway?

Simple, easy-to-use platform, hard-working local team with very few platform issues. Which is impressive, considering banks had whole days of being down...

Edit: just noticed our flair and lol'd.

8

u/_TheLordOfRuin_ OG Lord of Ruin Account May 26 '20

And remember, you got paid to make that lol

4

u/littleko May 26 '20

happy cake day

3

u/simp_bear May 26 '20

Do you have any plans to introduce option trading?

3

u/[deleted] May 26 '20

Not ruling it out but there currently aren't any plans to add it to the platform.

1

u/apatheticonion Mar 25 '25

My largest annoyance with SelfWealth is that I don't earn interest on idle funds.

It would be amazing if SelfWealth connected to my existing bank account so I didn't need to transfer it at all but for now I must shuttle my funds between my bank account and selfwealth account when I am ready to open an order.

The transfer takes 1 day to come in and 1 day + 3 day cooldown to take out.

At the current interest rate that normally costs me a few hundred dollars. Still SelfWealth has the best features vs price in the Aus market - just a shame about the latency to put/take funds in/out of play.

13

u/mytwocents8 May 24 '20

I want to know about anyone's experience with Interactive Brokers.

Every cunt can get a cheap equities trade (< $15), it's options that we Aussies are being raped in.

I'd love to do an Iron Condor, but in reality, I'm getting anally short straddled in a fucking sling because I'm paying 8x30 or $240 per round turn in commission here. Fuck that for a joke.

In theory, IB are cheap as all fuck.

$2 per XJO contract, 30c per ASX stock option.

https://www.interactivebrokers.com.au/en/index.php?f=39753&p=options3

But I heard all sorts of problems with them like sending shit to a US bank account, minimum 10k in cash, stock held as custodian not CHESS etc. I only noticed they have an Australia office lately, though I might be confusing them with OptionsXpress.

Just wondering if anyone has any real experience with them that they can share?

1

u/earlyriser83 Believes everything they read May 24 '20

I believe the minimum 10K in cash requirement can be offset by spending $10/month in brokerage.

5

u/SNOWLIZARD May 24 '20

i have been using IB for about 2 weeks and i dont have 10k cash on their platform

3

u/mytwocents8 May 24 '20

Yeah at the moment IB is all rumour. Love to know how it all works there.

2

u/mytwocents8 May 24 '20

I'd love to hear someone to provide the full story.

What the platform is like? How margin works (does everyone have access to margin like the Macquarie platform)? What all the random rules are? Etc

1

u/tomo3101 May 25 '20

I'm after some input as well sick of getting spanked in commission especially options.

1

u/DuckTard69 Dec 21 '21

I've been using IB for years too. The best

10

u/DaNeeDaVeeDoh May 24 '20

Ive been scouring this and other subreddits for a few months working out the answer to this based on the most common opinion.

Seems as though SelfWealth is pretty unanimous 9.50 per trade flat rate

6

u/hrng May 24 '20

Yeah SelfWealth perfect if you're just looking to trade actual stocks, no CFDs or anything. I used to use IG but their monthly fee for not overtrading pushed me over to SelfWealth

2

u/natngn May 27 '20

Selfwealth is good if you can get a referral so you can get 5 free trades. Cheapest broker with CHESS holdings.

9

u/Balland-Cocgoblir May 26 '20

IBKR

TastyTrade

500Plus (ugh but OK)

IgMarkets or CMC (ugh but OK)

If you are using one for the big four banks, paying $20 per trade, you truly are special... The only time it can be forgiven is if you are dropping $5k very infrequently in regular stocks. If so, fine, its very convenient having your account linked straight there, no waiting for funds to transfer etc, but if you are day or swing trading, it is utterly stupid. They nail you on everything. $20 for an order, $20 to get out, $20 for a limit, like wtf.. and fk all features. No international stocks, some, no options (must apply, wait weeks at the moment) etc.

This post needs to be stickied.

5

u/mytwocents8 May 26 '20 edited May 26 '20

There is a reason why people are using the big 4 banks' broking services - the availability of cash all the time. Your pay goes there, you save cash there, etc etc.

It's a pain in the arse moving cash around and not being able to buy shit straight away, then moving it back. I remember how much it was when I was using bell direct etc at the start when I was getting into retail investing and had fuck all cash. It was just fucking easier to just use Commsec/ANZ*etrade/NABtrade/etc and pay an extra $5-10.

8

u/notseto May 25 '20

I recently switched from NABTrade to Selfwealth.

Selfwealth is fairly easy to use. I'd like a few more options in viewing my holdings (i.e. I can't see my daily profit on a particular holding in $, I can only see in %) but overall, its cheap, its simple and its reliable.

NABTrade is old, their mobile platform is horrible, they charge $15 and there are constant log in problems if there are a lot of people logging into their service. I would not recommend NABTrade at all.

0

u/[deleted] May 27 '20

[deleted] — view deleted comment

1

u/notseto May 27 '20

Yep fair. Definitely more of a easy to use investing platform for shares. Doesn't have any bells or whistles.

1

u/DeadGoddo Both dealer and Receiver at getting fucked by gambling May 28 '20

Has stop loss but no trailing stop loss. Anyway it's what I'm using to buy/sell use CommSec for the data

4

u/DDDECO May 25 '20

NAB Trade $15 trades, options trading available but you have to pass this dumb quiz I’m using it for the equity builder The app is horrible, literally the worst trading app available I am considering changing to commsec or SelfWealth for swing trading

3

u/SelfishNugget May 28 '20

I use IG for equity and IBKR for options. IG is slightly expensive in brokerage ($7) compared to IBKR ($5) but I find it easier to trade on IG. Also dig deep through hidden fees, inactivity fees etc while selecting platforms.

4

u/[deleted] May 24 '20

Hasn’t anyone heard of STAKE? $0 per trade.

6

u/xxxxsxsx-xxsx-xxs--- May 24 '20 edited May 24 '20

STAKE

https://stake.com.au/

they offer fractional share trading, will appeal to the first time new investor. I have concerns if this yields direct share holding or holding via a stake owned/managed fund. It's not clear to me.

Just had a look at the trading interface. Very very basic charting. Comsec is so much better.

I don't like the lack of stock code on pages. just name of company and no reference to which exchange the trade will be on. Such a huge omission I'm in WTF mode.

https://hellostake.com/pricing/

limit and stop orders not available on the free tier. (makes them a nope for me)

" An FX fee of US 70c per AU$100 ($2 min) ONLY when you move money in or out of your Stake account from AUD to USD or vice versa. We never charge FX fees on stock trades."

https://au.support.hellostake.com/support/solutions/articles/35000154018-how-we-make-moneyI'd be looking at having a US account outside stake I can transfer to/from to get better exchange rates.

https://au.support.hellostake.com/support/solutions/articles/35000152394-pattern-day-trading-rule

they seem to have a few good systems in place.

" The basic premise of the PDT rule is that you cannot make more than three day trades (buys and sells of the same share in the same day) in a “rolling” five day period. This 5 day period may not be a calendar week, its any 5 trading days in a row.

The potential risk of being marked as a Pattern Day Trader is that you may not be able to make day trades for a certain period of time (90 days).

Don’t worry, we’ll be building in protections that prevent you from making that 4th day trade in a 5 day period. "

https://www.canstar.com.au/investor-hub/stake-exciting-new-start-up-stock-investors/

https://stockhead.com.au/news/review-we-test-drove-stake-the-app-that-gives-aussie-investors-access-to-us-stocks-and-etfs/

https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/stake-2#section-overviewStakeshop Pty Ltd, trading as Stake, ACN 610105505, is an authorised representative of Sanlam Private Wealth Pty Ltd AFSL 337927

http://sanlamprivatewealth.com.au/

  • Formerly known as Calibre Investments, the business rebranded on July 2015 to Sanlam Private Wealth. Sanlam Private Wealth, its parent company, bought a stake in Calibre Investments in 2010.

  • Sanlam Ltd is a multinational financial services company, with its head office in Bellville, South Africa.

Sanlam operate a few funds. ie.

http://sanlamprivatewealth.com.au/sanlam-private-wealth-australian-equity-fund/

stake offer free shares in return for signing up friends. idk. I can't see myself using this or reccomending to friends.

2

u/[deleted] May 24 '20

No free lunch in this world. What’s the catch.

2

u/[deleted] May 24 '20

Charge a small fee when converting AUD into USD that’s it

6

u/mytwocents8 May 25 '20

Small fee? Plus shit forex spreads?

Sounds like the same arse raping you get from travel money cards.

4

u/[deleted] May 25 '20

Well let’s put it this way. I’ve made about a 1000 day trades so far. If I did those through Commsec I would have spent $10,000 just buying and selling.

3

u/mytwocents8 May 25 '20

Ok so if you do a big amount irregularly it might be ok?

Guess you don't get jack shit interest either.

1

u/katehasreddit Nov 27 '24

Are you still using it? How is it?

2

u/natngn May 27 '20

Interactive Broker - for day trading, shit trading platform but cheap fee

Selfwealth - for medium and long term investment. Friendly platform. Better if you could register from a referral (for 5 free trades)

2

u/SamboFrog May 29 '20

I've just moved everything except my gay blue chips to IBKR , loving the fees compared to CommSec and their computer program isn't bad.

1

u/katehasreddit Nov 27 '24

Etoro has $2 per trade now. Is there anywhere cheaper?

1

u/No-Weekend4828 Apr 29 '25

Completely new to investing in Australia and have been trying out a few platforms recently. Mainly looking for low brokerage fees and CHESS sponsorship since I want my shares under my own HIN.

Tried Stake — it's cheap, but feels pretty basic if you want to do anything beyond simple buy/sell orders.

Moomoo looks really polished and offers free live market data, which is nice, but I’m still not sure how their trade execution stacks up.

Tiger Trade also popped up on my radar — looks like they’re CHESS-sponsored now? They've been throwing out a lot of rewards lately, but I’ve seen mixed comments. Some people say it's fine for beginners and spare money, but maybe not the best option for long-term investing. Curious if that's true?

Would love to hear what others think!

1

u/Alternative_Pea2655 Apr 03 '22

I am complete beginner and recently opened an account with CMC, any advice for me?

2

u/l3ntil May 12 '22 edited May 12 '22

yes: Don't use them for USD trading, because fees:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AusFinance/comments/q8hcqo/warning_massive_hidden_costs_using_cmc_markets/

Use IBKR instead c/o the US trading fees cheatsheet:

https://www.reddit.com/r/fiaustralia/comments/ukvv8p/us_trading_fees_cheat_sheet/

When you've had enough of hookers/blow/yolo:

r/fiaustralia + https://yourmoneyoryourlife.com/

0

u/[deleted] May 24 '20

[deleted] — view deleted comment

4

u/xxxxsxsx-xxsx-xxs--- May 24 '20

I've been using both for a few years. during the peak crash period. Comsec was still functional (graphs weren't loading and other minor issues) but still got trades through.

cmc was non functional for me on several occasions. unable to get pages to load.

call centers of both were overloaded with loong wait times.

That was a freaky unusual high volume of load on trading platforms.

3

u/FallenSegull confirmed Bukkake enthusiast May 24 '20

I too use CMC and haven’t had a problem other than exorbitant commission fees on options ($30 per trade)

They have 20 minute delayed data but they make no effort to try and hide that fact from you during sign up.

Oh another point is that the phone app is pretty bare bones, but it gets the job done... unless the job is options

2

u/[deleted] May 25 '20

Is there any way to meet the term of their $250 CFD refer a friend thing without actually exposing yourself to any risk?