The point I was making to New Trader et al, is that the issue with spreadbetting is not the spreadbet 'wrapper' but the underlying you are exposing yourself to. It will always be an OTC exposure, but there is a big difference between trading against the house where they are incentivised to beat you (or at least you have no idea whether they are hedging you out and treating it as a commission trade, or hoping you lose), and the Prospreads type model which is pure comm. Ok, so you have counterparty risk, but ultimately the Prospead model is identical to the OTC CFD trades that institutional investors use to trade UK stocks, and in my book counts as 'professional' as a platform.