I really believed in Freetrade, Iāve invested in the crowdfunding and even stretched myself for that Freetrade NFT perk that was supposedly going to be ācoolā. I canāt believe how much theyāve wasted the momentum that they had during the, admittedly inflated, adoption rate of the Covid pandemic.
Itās tragic that they lost their early mover advantage to drop so far behind. The only thing Iām glad of is that Iāve not invested as much in Freetrade as Molten Ventures/Draper Esprit has, as they must be sweating bullets right now (if capitalism actually had any long term consequences for those higher up the chain).
Once again, congratulations to the 212 leadership team for blazing ahead with features as usual. I note that AJ Bell this week announced that they are halving their charges from Ā£9.95 to Ā£5.00 per trade. If Freetrade wasnāt an actual company and was just a pressure group then I guess theyāve achieved change in the brokerage market and should be applauded. If that was the case though, then Iād have probably donated to the cause instead of investing in the dream.
Iām not greedy; I used to dream of an exit for my crowdfunding shares of 2x. If I come out of this with 50% of what I put in then Iāll consider myself lucky.
@Viktor@adam and @acamp Cows are a lot like elephants. Big poops, and we never forget,
I feel very similar - I wonder if they are looking to sell to 212. The ability of FT to execute is honestly appalling. Treasury bills is the only thing of note I can recall over last 6-8 months.
Iām sticking with FT as Iām invested but that isnāt going hold for long
And you can bet on the fact that they will increase the subscriptions this year again yet we are getting nothing for it.
I am also getting really annoyed that when you contact customer services every time it takes a week before you get any reply from them that is a disgrace.
I used to daydream about Freetrade being the grown up āneo brokerage platformā that would be bought by the grown up ā neo start-up bankā Starling. Then as reality shifted, I thought maybe Freetrade and Monzo might couple up. Iād settle for Freetrade selling out to Klarna or Bet Fred.
Now, Iām not sure what the Freetrade exit strategy is. I donāt see them sucesssfully going public themselves nor being accquired for a healthy multiple by someone else, unless itās by an out of touch, over bonused, over pensioned dumb ham faced boomer CEO of a failing previously bailed out British high street bank.
Put FrettleTraddle by RoyalBankOfNorthernBradfordLloyds on your 2074 Bingo Card.
Thereās not much mention of the market leader Hargreaves in this thread, thereās been a good long read article on the FT. HL has 40% of the DIY investing market, Iād guess more than 40% of transfers Freetrade receives are from HL (this was closer to 80% when I was at II). HL isnāt doing so well due to itās aging infrastructure, if you want to see how itās customers feel, read the comments from this article!
Thereās an opportunity here, notice how the tube ads are targeting portfolio transfers, rather than the usual freeshare sign ups.
A few points:
Fallen out of the FTSE100
Third most shorted stock in the UK
Woodford saga
āit is struggling to attract younger investors at a fast enough clip. Its customer growth rate has slowed to its lowest level in a decade, while competitors gain ground.ā
āFor many of its upstart rivals, Hargreaves Lansdown has come to resemble the financial advisers it once derided ā clunky and expensive.ā
āHargreaves Lansdown was one of at least 10 of the worldās largest brokers that found its systems overwhelmed. The UK platform experienced outages as well as thousands of duplicated trades, leaving some accounts in debt and causing extreme stress to investors.ā
Some comments:
In the 8 years I have been using HL, the app UI was updated twice. Costs aside, the ageing tech is downright shameful.
What is spectacular is how little the platform has changed over 10+ years
Itās sad and shame!
Freetrade management needs to do work better to become a recognised entity!
Just not getting votes from investors in freetrade as best trading platform and displaying trophies!
My understanding now is freedom is good in building castles in the air without sticking to reality!
I hope freedom survives and I get back my investment!
Freetrade was mentioned few times in this Financial Times article about Treasury Bills offering:
āBut trading app Freetrade started offering access to 28-day Treasury bills in December last year, which are issued at auction on a weekly basis. It says its customers are currently buying about Ā£5mn worth each week, making them the most popular product on its platform.ā
Iāve been with FT for less than two years and with the upcoming changes allowing us to invest in more than one S&S ISA I think Iāll take this opportunity to try some other platforms. Iām currently on the annual subscription model, but thinking itās wise to change to monthly even at a slightly higher cost to allow me to transfer out fully within the year if I decide. I enjoy the interface on FT but it does feel like itās stagnating compared to some other brokers, which is a real shame. Hopefully these ISA changes encourage even greater competition and can only be better for the consumer.
I am in the same situation I will make sure that my annual subscription doesnāt renew later this year as Freetrade is getting worse so I am leaning towards jumping ship before it sinks as lets be honest they have done nothing and are doing nothing to give people confidence in Freetrade anymore.
Well dividends have gone to taking a long time to reach us.
Customer service has gone to taking at least 1 week to reply to every message, the same issue has been ongoing for about 3 to 4 weeks because i get a reply then they misread my reply and then takes another week to acknowledge they misread the reply etcā¦
I believe the opposite is actually true, dividends used to take longer but have improved (specifically US ones, but also looks like many UK ones as well). This change was introduced a few months ago if I remember.
I couldnāt comments on the customer support as I donāt use it often
Iād have the same question to be honest, in what way has it stood still? Iām just seeing if we can be specific on the issues people actually have?
As theyāve had treasuries added (December); recurring orders (June); direct debits (June); larger order limits (PTM covered by Freetrade) (October);
These are some of the things theyāve added or improved on recently.
I get it might come off as me trying to be a bit of a Freetrade shill, but it seems it would be more beneficial if people brought up specifics, as i get the feeling that itās more that people are missing their favourite thing so arenāt considering much about the things that have been improved on.
Did FT ever say why there NFTās were cool in the end? Or was it due to the people giving them money for them? I am into 4 digits investing but not the 5 for this but was going to beg, borrow and steal to hit that target at the time. It just felt like FT started talking again when crowdfunding was needed so didnāt have enough faith anymore at that stage.
Surely they are legally obliged to have dished these out with all the perks after using them to entice people to part with money. Maybe they did and I missed it.
Canāt agree enough with your comments though in general!!
Agree with you in principle but DDās should not be anything to shout about at all as a standard feature, recurring orders doesnāt work with complex shares so is incomplete and the fact, not FTs fault, that you canāt buy fractionals now makes a lot of the improvements redundant for many people.
I would say they are much slower than rivals rather than still or backwards.