We’re not a bank, so like everyone else it does cost us to convert funds and move money across borders. We want to be transparent about this and pass on a very good rate. Our 0.5% charge compares well to the 1%+ you would receive from other brokers (eg HL starts at 1.5%), plus many other brokers do not provide visibility on what the base rate is that the markup is charged on. We use the interbank/wholesale rate from Barclays as our baseline.
We’ve also benchmarked against other UK fintechs. Revolut charges 0.5% once you’ve used up your ‘free’ monthly allowance and TransferWise charges 0.4% + 80p on USD/GBP transfers, for example.