Feature request: ability to select to buy or sell by number of shares or cash amount

[Tom88]

@Geo0rgi

I still don’t understand this current approach to only be able to buy in money amount. Why can Robinhood, or Tradinng212, or Revolut users be able to buy whole shares as well as fractionals, while Freetrade users will have to use this half solution?

This summarises my question in a nutshell. Why are Freetrade proposing a hybrid solution that doesn’t line up with industry best practices?

[don_quixote]

You would only have to sell the 0.3

Whether it is automatic or not, I’m not sure

[moon]

TLDR: Some fractional shares beta testers have been surprised by the fact that they ended up buying a non-integer amount of shares (ex: 1.01). Rather than fractional buying being the default option, they would prefer being able to buy an exact number of shares, say 23 or 12. This sounds like a feature request which the FT team can certainly address. Maybe one for @Ian ?

[Pdw]

@Geo0rgi

There is still not a proper explanation on what exactly is stopping you from giving your customers both options.

They have said in another thread the ama will cover all of this, and why they have done what they have

[o99]

I’m not particularly bothered by whether or not I have fractional shares when using Freetrade.

But it would bother me if I have to manually go through all my holdings and liquidate the fractional components to make the shares eligible for transfer out (instead of liquidation of fractional component being automated during a transfer out process).

Would make me think twice about using Freetrade, even when transfer out functionality becomes available.

[AchillesFirstStand]

@hrochfor1

Dividends are just divided neatly so if you have 0.5 of a whole share you earn 0.5 of the allocated dividend per share (they key part is the yield remains identical only the nominal amount earnt is lower).

I am saying will the yield actually remain identical, if the fractional share dividend has a fraction of a penny as a component, then i assume you lose that fraction of the penny?

Say my 0.1 share gives 23.5p dividend, i assume you lose the half? Which means you’re worse off owning a fractional. The guy saying that fractionals make absolutely no difference seems to be incorrect.

[kevinpeters (Kevin)]

Hi, first of all, I am in favour of the fractional approach to investing, I’m not looking to switch platforms so the challenges of switching has no affect on how I choose to invest, I’m with Freetrade because I love both the platform, the community and the accessibility of the Freetrade team.

So I have been following this thread and have been surprised at the opposition to the change. However I do have one observation to make if I may; @Viktor I can see that on selling you can sell by inputting the number of shares you wish to sell, and when buying you have to use a £value. I think what those against the change are asking for is the approach taken to sell shares is applied to buying.

I’m fine as it’s, as for me shares are a long term hold and I buy a each month building a portfolio, so I’m the main I’m uninterested whether I have 45.73829028 shares in a company or a round 45, but of it others it seems to bother them.

Just thought I’d raise my observation.

[don_quixote]

They haven’t said anything about how they will transfer out.

Hopefully, it will be automatic I.e.
A. Sell all fractions of shares
B. Leave fractions in Freetrade

[o99]

Yes, hopefully.

[Dave (Dave Smith)]

@AchillesFirstStand

Say my 0.1 share gives 23.5p dividend, i assume you lose the half? Which means you’re worse off owning a fractional. The guy saying that fractionals make absolutely no difference seems to be incorrect.

That may be true, but you’re only talking about potentially losing up to half a penny. If it’s rounded up you might gain gain half a penny and whoever owns the smaller [piece of the share loses their half penny.

[hrochfor1]

So typically these are rounded up to ensure investors do not lose out but there are also plenty of companies which exist today who pay fractions of pennies in dividends (so 6.773 pence per share etc.) and the brokerage houses seem to manage.

[hrochfor1]

Read the above post, it is a problem which exists and is managed currently. Not a new problem brought in by the use of fractionals.

[Eden]

I can see the confusion, and it doesn’t appear completely answered. Terms say you can’t transfer fractional shares, but from a user perspective you may have bought 10 x 0.2 shares meaning you can’t transfer any of it as it’s 10 x 0.2 shares on the books. That would be good to have clarified.

In any case I also like the option to buy in shares not currency. And this option seems to have never existed.

We can sell in number of shares, can’t we buy in number of shares as well?

(Equally btw, I want to be able to sell an amount in currently, not number of shares) it’s weird that you support opposite systems for buying and selling. I think no ones bothered until now as they just use a work around. Fractional shares break that system.

[beluga (Gary)]

@Eden

Terms say you can’t transfer fractional shares, but from a user perspective you may have bought 10 x 0.2 shares meaning you can’t transfer any of it as it’s 10 x 0.2 shares on the books.

10*0.2= 2 whole shares, which you can transfer. This question has been answered above.

[Eden]

Your likely right in that that’s how it work, but maybe I missed it but I never saw it addressed.

10 x0.2 shares is 2 shares, but its 10 fractional shares on the book. What was unclear is how that relates in a transfer for example, are 2 shares moved or 10 fractional shares.

I saw this

@Viktor

Ah, thanks for this lead.

I re-read that part of the T&Cs, and now I see why that bit may have caused confusion! We’ll look to improve it ASAP.

Now we know what to do, so we can (and we will) communicate this better!

But this never actually answered the question that was asked. Which I’m sure your right, once you reach a whole share it is treated in every case as a whole share going forward.

[Viktor]

@Eden

once you reach a whole share it is treated in every case as a whole share going forward.

Just to officially confirm, this is exactly how it works!

Sorry for what seems like confusing wording.

[101]

Super confused. Will it still be possible to purchase say 5 whole shares in one purchase?

[Eden]

Thanks Viktor. That’s exactly the clarification I just wanted to be clear on.

Appreciate the quick reply.

(I hope you might take in the option for buying in shares amounts or currency amounts for a future release perhaps, I know technically this has never been an option that was available)

[Eden]

@101

Will it still be possible to purchase say 5 whole shares in one purchase?

For US shares, not really. At least not with accuracy.

Technically speaking Freetrade has never had the option to buy in share amounts. We’ve all just been working around this by putting in the amount we want to spend to get a specific number of shares (something I’m not sure if Freetrade had realised some people were doing)

So in reality nothing has actually changed in the way we buy shares, you still enter an amount and Freetrade gets as many shares as it can for that amount. The difference now is that US shares can get fractions to fill up the total amount you enter.

It’s a partial regression in my eyes, but not because a feature was removed, it’s just revealing an unintended condition of how buying in a £ amount works.

[101]

Thanks for the answer. So to purchase US shares you can only purchase £100, £10, £5.50 type of amounts and then, when purchasing UK shares you have to keep typing in random amounts of ££’s to try and get the correct amount of shares desired?

I kinda want to purchase share prices at the share prices.