Would you recommend IB?

[stevet]

jitasb

1. you do pay commision and exchange fees with spreadbetting - since it is factored into the wider spread - and remember - the wider spread exits on the open and close of whatever you trade

2. i doubt that spreadbetting companies mess with prices - they might do - but they would be stupid to and its also pointless since my understanding is that all their clients are quite capable of losing on their own - this concept of them messing with prices came from clients who dont understand how futures prices move -and how the spreadbettors price off futures and especially in relation to how the spreadbetting companies price their dow bets

3. you only pay tax on profits - so the key reason that you dont pay tax when spreadbetting is that no one makes a profit! - the tax authourities would soon make it taxable on profits if they saw they were losing tax revenue - but they tax it the same as gambling - on the bet value - remember the tax people get to see the records of the spreadbetting companies and the see it as pure gambling and the punter always loses - tax people are noted for generosity!

 

[options]

"i doubt that spreadbetting companies mess with prices - they might do - but they would be stupid to and its also pointless since my understanding is that all their clients are quite capable of losing on their own - this concept of them messing with prices came from clients who dont understand how futures prices move -and how the spreadbettors price off futures and especially in relation to how the spreadbetting companies price their dow bets"


That old chestnut again.
Do you sb Stevet?

FX this time. Same contract etc etc, or am I missing something?

 

[options]

and again

 

[options]

Most times they are exactly the same pip for pip. At these extreme times it does throw up some interesting arbing ops.

 

[cloudbase]

jitsab......Hi, first post on here, so be gentle with me.
Just a few observations on you last post re conclusions.
1.......This is true, but needs to be taken in context as an overall package.
2.......Its not so much that they mess with the spreads as the fact that at market turning points they will be up to 15 infront of the action .......ie market tops at say 9600 and S/Bett price
will be 9590 so there is 10 points slippage there @ £5 / point
£50 they have just taken from you!
And yes they all mess with the price to take out stops.
3.........No you don't have to pay capital gains with the S/Betts
but as you can see from the above example they have already cost you an extra £50 plus an extra spread of 2.5 on US indicies
so that's another £12.50 making a total £62.50, from that you need to take away the cost of Direct Access say £3.50 for round trip and say £.75 round trip for exchange costs making a saving of £58.25 per trade.
I, like most other people hate paying tax but this is a case where
i would be happy to do so.

 

[stevet]

options

i dont spreadbet - but i did look at how they operate to see if there were opportunities -

but arbing requires 100% control over entry and exit, price and size, of both the arbed contracts, and the ability to get enough size on to make it worthwhile and that just aint gonna happen in spreadbetting

 

[jitasb]

Cloudbase...

No probs..I'll be gentle
In fact I'm a new member as well, so haven't posted much before last week.

Anyways....I agree, you have to take into account the package as a whole with regards to spreads etc. Good point about Market turning points.
As always the proof is in the pudding, so I'll probably try out Direct Access and see how I get on.
Just out of interest do you (or in fact other readers) just trade index futures (and forex futures) via Direct Access ?? Or do you trade stock futures as well ??
Might stay with spreadbets for individual stocks as they tend not to 'mess' around with them too much ??

Ta..