Alpha content predictions

Just for fun, lets have a go at predicting what the Alpha account may contain while we wait for the official announcements.

My predictions:

  • Priority access to new stocks & markets (i.e access for first 6 months limited to Alpha then released on Basic)
  • Research & analysis data
  • Additional graphing abilities, i.e. the ability to sort & filter graphs on stocks, price, quantity etc
  • Auto-reinvestment / DRIP capabilities
  • A pair of Freetrade socks (because who wants a metal card when you can have socks :rofl: )
  • @Viktor personal mobile number for 24/7 support

So the last two might not be so serious, but I’m really interested to see what we can all dream up, you never know, you might even give Freetrade some ideas!

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  • more order types (stop loss etc)
  • ‘free’ ISA account
  • improved/non-beta insights page
  • National Declaration stocks (fingers crossed)
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  1. Real priority customer support could be great. I know that every customer has to get excellent customer service but with millions of customers those who are paying for the service should be prioritized. This bothers me a lot when a paid account in one of the neo banks tells me that the waiting time is around 2 hours.

  2. Ability to keep USDs on a separate account when selling US stocks to avoid having double FX fees when reinvesting or rebalancing the US stocks.

  3. Ability to gift any share in Freetrade to people who are not part of the platform. I would love to get someone a piece of Tesla for their birthday. May be in some physical form like a plastic Freetrade card.

  4. Ability to create multiple portfolios in the
    app to monitor their performance separately.

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3 is a brilliant idea.

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Please, no more plastic waste!

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Paper certificate then :wink: I love the idea of gifting shares to someone. Not sure how that would work given the need to enter details on the register

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After searching the community found that it has already been suggested quite a while ago. Some of the legal/tax implications have also been mentioned.

My no.1 is a live quote system. It’s the one big negative about freetrade when selling it to people. Me: You can buy stocks but you just dont know the exact price you’ll pay. Them: You serious? You buy stocks for an unknown price? Me: well I get quotes from HL and then its normally identical. Them: Hmmmm.

Let’s get this live price going. Its holding freetrade back from taking over and keeping key wealthy investors outside the app.

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Completely agree.

I use Advfn, free live prices but only for a few seconds. It might be easier/quicker than a HL quote.

Mutual Funds/OEICs.

Yes, I know they’re out of fashion the past few years, and FT has been against the idea of adding them in the past.

But I think they need to revisit that decision. Mutual funds are still where the vast majority of long-term investing is done, and that’s not going to change anytime soon.

If they added a selection of mutual funds comparable to say HL, with very low account management charges (say 0.1%, or free) under the Alpha umbrella, I can see Alpha and FT as a whole doing very well.

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My main one even though unlikely, multi currency accounts. Pleas, please, please.

@Duncan do your magic mate

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All the other predictions seem fine to me but this one sounds like a really risky idea.

It may drive people with FOMO to join plus or it may drive Fomo customers elsewhere.

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I could not agree more. No one is going to he executing large trade amounts with a potentially unknown price. For example, selling shares owned by executives in order to move them into an ISA is not an option at the moment as the risk of getting a different price, and realising a loss, is too much.

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This is something of a wishlist for Plus, but here goes:

  • Free ISA
  • Free SIPP
  • Limit orders
  • Slightly better currency rates
  • Slightly better versions of some tools
  • Early access to new features/markets (costs freetrade nothing and gives them free beta testers)
  • Icons, badges etc (again costs nothing)

I think certain things should remain free to every user to boost adoption, and should be priorities for freetrade this year:

  • Fast (< 1 sec) ledger updates and lack of glitches like graphs momentarily showing the wrong amount - this is so important to the perception of quality, at the moment the app needs some work IMO
  • Free trades
  • Watchlists (like limit orders without execution)
  • An emphasis on long-term investing
  • Autopilot investing - direct debit or standing order setup within FT, pick an index and then that’s it - tailor graphs etc to the long term
  • Tools with a focus on 5-10 years not days or months
  • Comparison tools showing growth vs indexes and vs average freetrade user - can we lift everyone by showing what outcomes they can expect?
  • Better data and focussed on what matters - market cap, cape, sector comparisons etc
  • Great customer service, with common problems automated out of existence

I do feel most customers need to be educated when they start on the likely outcomes of stock picking, and the tools given to them dictate how they invest - for example if you put the emphasis on funds (as at hl) users will invest there, if you put the emphasis on stocks (as at FT) users will invest there, if you give them indexes and show them long term gains, more might invest there. The tools that we use dictate the horizons of our world in many ways.

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@Rollingskies Happy Birthday (according to the icon next to your profile pic haha)! :slight_smile:

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Perhaps but Freetrade have already stated that some stocks will be available in Alpha only - my idea on this is that they are Alpha only for a duration then released into Basic accounts to avoid that situation - temporary better then permanent IMO

More analysis i.e. Dividend dates, total dividend, bigger sector breakdowns

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I agree better late than never. It makes good business sense as it will definitely drive people to Plus.

I don’t think it will even be an issue until FT has a fully fleshed out stock universe. I think it will be IPOs where the strategy might misfire.

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+1 for this. Would love to move over my HL funds to FT

Might be worth voting for share gifting. I’d really like it if we could buy a physical ‘stock gift card’ for someone, and it would be an extra revenue source for Freetrade too.

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