Apparently from next month 212 are going to be charing 0.15%FX on non-UK trades. Have seen on their forum people kicking off about it and wonder peopleās thoughts on if weāre going to see an influx of 212 refugees? Also wonder if itāll prompt FT to lower the FX fee to narrow the gap? Iām mainly interested in US and donāt love paying FX on every trade (though better than paying commish!)
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Welcome back to the community!
Nothing comes free in life and if something is indeed free then you and I are the product - see Facebook for example.
- It costs money to build and run the platform on Google Cloud (600k customers and increasing at a rapid pace)
- Costs money to pay employees
- Costs money to market
- Costs money if partnering with 3rd party vendors
Iām all for bringing the FX charge down by a bit but the FX fee is one of the ways for FT to generate revenue and they have been transparent about it from the start.
They have also indicated that the FX cost will come down eventually.
Welcome again to the community and happy investing!
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T212 is a private company.
We live in a free country.
T212 is free to do whatever T212 considers relevant for their business.
I personally think T212 will increase their FX fee after this first raise sooner than Freetrade will lower Freetradeās. Time will tell
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Ha thanks for the welcome. And yep, I donāt think FT have been ambiguous, I just wonder if they will be able to bring them down a) with scale and b) with increase volume on US trades in particular.
Iād rather pay FX on funding and then hold in foreign currency but totally get that would be a massive functionality change.
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Itās also worth bearing in mind that plenty of brokers charge an FX fee and commission. HL, for example, charge a 1% FX fee. As well as Ā£11.95 a trade.
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Interestingly saw a real variation in opinion. A lot of the experienced members of their community seemed to react as we would, shrugged and accepted that it was on the cards, but others on twitter and reddit seemed furiously angry that a line had been crossed. Remember their motto was āno fees, no limitsā and with the Ā£100 minimum on limit orders, the limits on meme stocks and now the fees, they seemed betrayed. FX fees have a huge impact on traders in smaller countries or currencies which they cater to. I doubt it will do huge damage in the long run but theyāve lost that immediate hook of āno feesā and new traders will look more closely at whatās on offer in future. Time to capitalise Freetrade!
How do the fees stack up to Freetrade?
Iām with the majority here, it seems just a fact we all accept and Iām not too bothered by it.
I just hope that if people come to Freetrade from T212 due to the fees, they realise thereās many more reasons to stick around 
Yeah for sure. The old brokers (HL, AJ Bell, II, etc.) have the most outrageous fees. Iām surprised that no brokers have a model where you donāt pay a fee (however small) on each trade.
I transferred my ISA from Freetrade to Trading 212 this tax year to capitalise on fractional US shares that werenāt at that time available on Freetrade.
Iāve already signed up to Freetrade Plus in advance of the new tax year to build my wealth and long term investments with Freetrade.
I feel Freetrade are building rock solid foundations from scratch and the juggernaut will take off.
Iāve been really impressed with the vision from Viktor and Adam and the progress thatās been made in the last year.
Honestly I think the Freetrade brand will be mahoosive.
Ultimately both companies will continue to grow.
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I personally canāt wait for T212 to open up shop again so i can joinā¦Whatās going to make either one of them the most popular will be a combination of who has the better customer service and who pays out dividends in the most timely mannerā¦I think most expect fees of some sortā¦Theyāre no more free than āāFreeāā trade are.
Ha, that would be Hargreaves Lansdown then, good customer service, good website, decent app, all divis paid on time (in the 8 years Iāve used them).
However, their fees are a tad expensive, hence here I am with Freetrade.
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Iām reading threads on Reddit about T212ā¦Alot of them are saying their dividends get paid a lot quicker than they do here on Freetrade so i suppose itās courses for horses.
The way i see it from a bussiness side. They advertised as a free platform for a very long time, build up the customer base that way. Now they will slowly be adding more and more fees. That is a way to make the company more profitable. im sure they will increase the fx rate again in the future as well as add more charges. they will lose some customers but a the end of the day the ones that stay will make 212 more profitable at the end. and just remember if you been with a company for a long time you will not change due to small add ons on cost.
what im saying is only from the point of view of the bussiness thatās what i would do myself if i was in charge. At the end of the day its all about the profits and im 90% sure the cost will go up with time.
Take everything i said with a pinch of salt. This is all my own opinion and speculation. with the customer base they gathered with free aproach is definetly amazing, but they are in the stage of making money for the company. Before hand they were surviving on cfd trading fees but now its definetly a time to grow that profit margin and that might actually add up on development of the app and making it better.
I like freetrade aprouch way more, I own my shares, no cfd trading ect. All i want is some freetrade shares because i believe their aproch will gather more customer overtime. It will take way longer due to their aproach in comparisons to t212 but the customers that gather will stay way longer.
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My experience is that FT pay dividends consistently quicker than T212 not the other way round, but that T212 is still cheaper even with the new FX fee.
Thatās kinda my pointā¦Everyoneās experience seems to be different; which in turn only proves a complete lack of consistency.
Hi. Just found this thread. Interesting?
I have been on 212 six months and overall itās pretty good I think. Iām not bothered by the fx fee, we all know it costs to exchange currency so no big deal. There was always a variation in price to allow for that so nothings changed too much. My only small nag with 212 is the AIM execution times which arenāt quick. But that seems to be fairly normal from what Iāve seen now.
I signed up here a couple weeks ago. On comparison to FT I think both have strengths and weaknesses. Here youāll pay a flat Ā£9.99 a month if you want the full experience and low caps and AIM are locked otherwise. Not so on 212 as itās all there. I prefer the layout on 212 as well. They have fractionals and pies available as well.
I canāt comment on any fx here as I only trade UK on FT.
I think thereās a purpose for both account types ultimately. I will keep both.
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If theyāre fleeing 212 for Freetrade because they donāt like having to pay a 0.15% FX fee, then theyāll be in for a bit of a shock. 
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My bigger issue with T212 is the poor customer service (not limited to t212 as FT is also struggling to cope by the looks of some of the threads), but more than anything the gradual erosion of trust from saying that any fees would only be for new features, to saying the invest/isa side are sustainable then profitable to introducing fees on deposits then fx fees. What is next?
For me it was the same with FTās introduction of the Plus paywall on previously āfreelyā available stocks.
I donāt mind paying for things and both FT and T212 have massively reduced the cost of investing for small retail investors but Iād rather have a clear idea of fees/paywalls etc at the start than a shifting of goalposts later on.
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You think it will come down soon?