Belgo should check the website more often:-)

We have term accounts which can be opened online.
The rates can be found here:

https://www.keytradebank.ch/en/banking/term

But it is only interesting for EUR as you can see, as for CHF the level is zero or close to it. We offer a small interest on the CHF cash balance on the trading accounts (0.125%).

best regards

Patrick

hehe, well you got there finally. Excellent, thank you for this information Belgo.

I find Swissquote website very complicated, but over the phone thy are really helpfull without even charging extra to buy/sell over the phone rather the over the internet platform, thats different then most other banks.

They are cheaper then other banks but not to much...

I opened an account with Swissquote and I have to say everything about their platform is utter crap.

I wanted to learn a bit about trading so this was my first broker and I couldn't compare it with anything else. At the beginning it looks ok, you look for a company, you find it, you buy a few shares, you sell it, etc... things seem to work. Nevermind the high fees, the bank is 20 minutes from your home and you feel safe about it.

Ok, so you have learned how to buy and sell... now you want to go out all the way and do something extremely complicated: you want to buy the company but instruct the system to sell it if you lose more than 10%. No can do. Well at least not if it's not a swiss company (or something weird like that).

You want trailing stops? even less... you want 'one cancels all'? out of luck.

You want to short a stock (yes, I am evil)? No, we swiss are nice people and we don't think a company can't go down, ever!

You want to use leverage? Cheesus christ! We ain't no hedge fund.

You want to trade options? Well, you can but the interface is 'funny' at best. You want to buy a butterfly? Man, this is a stock broker, what are you talking about? You want to sell an Iron condor? Man, drugs are not good for you.

You want to trade CFD's? You guessed right!, we don't know what that is!

You want something different to a web interface? Man, the intertubes are THE future.

I haven't used that account in a year or so, time to close it now.


I suggest interactivebrokers if you want access to many markets with many different ways to buy and sell. If options are your thing then go for thinkorswim, it has a great interface and I love their graphs. If you like leverage go for mfglobal. There are sooo many things out there and opening accounts in other countries is even easier than doing it with swissquote. Just give it a try, that's what I did and I realized how much swissquote sucks.

I have been using Swissquote for 6 months and am mildly pleased with them. On the one hand you can pay 9chf for trades on a reasonably wide set of funds and ETFs; on the other hand, they will charge you insane amounts for trading outside of this range (min 150).

Terco, you recommend other brokers that are based outside of Switzerland. I'd love to do that, but what does it imply in terms of taxes (e.g., I have a broker in France and they take some taxes on my capital gains, which they wouldn't in Switzerland)?
In particular, I am reluctant to open a US broker account, so what are the options from other countries, and what taxes will they collect from capital gains and dividends?

Thank you so much!

There is no capital gain tax in Switzerland only fortune tax. A french broker takes money out of you account when you are a swiss resident? I would close that one.

Although the brokers I mentioned are US companies, you can just talk to their overseas offices if you have any question. IB has an office in Zug I believe or you can just go to their UK website and officially open an account with them (Interactive Brokers UK), you can also keep your CHF as base currency so you don't have the exchange risk.

No tax whatsoever with IB UK so far... why should they?

Has anybody opened an account with "Belgo" (Keytrade Bank) ?

If yes, I would like to open an account there and if someone suggest me as a client him and me each get 100 CHf credit...

Looking forward on hearing from you guys.

Thanks

btw. the fees do look much more attractive then swissquote, will post my experience once i have some...

The Swissquote savings account is pathetic as they only willing to commit
to the 1 % interest rate up to 50 000 sFr.
Above that its even worse than Credit Suisse.

It seems to me that Swissquote adds 0.85% to all stock transaction
fees.This is also worse than Credit Suisse.
Maybe does not sound like much but it's 850 Sfr. on a 100 000 sFr. transaction.

http://www.swissquote.ch/sqweb/tradi...te_clients.jsp

Look at the "Terms and General Information" in the link

Hello MarkH, please tell us where you got the 1% interest rate on savings account information?

Going by my account, it clearly states "Interest rates that start at 1,1466%".

You can check it at this link:

http://www.swissquote.ch/sqweb/savings/introduction.jsp

and further broken down here:

http://www.swissquote.ch/sqweb/savin...ction_fees.jsp

I have had a SwissQuote account for a while with two stocks in it with a long-term strategy.

The killing point for me are the yearly charges. Considering small-medium positions (10-25k CHF) and typical yields (2-3% after taxes) the returns are 200-750 the yearly charges. If to that we add quarterly charges of 50-100CHF/year.

For small positions (10k), Swissquote is a ruin for long-term investors.
For moderate positions (25kCHF), they will take 100 of your optimistical yield 750 CHF (or 13%).


For the rest, I do not care: I am no millionare!

PS: I think I will transfer my stocks to Swissquote, as they have free deposit. (anyone can confirm?)

Yes,Yes,Yes.I just rounded it off to 1%.Is there a huge difference to 1,1466 %.Cmon.

Hello,

I'm currently client at Keytrade and the people are very nice and professional. Furthermore, the transactions costs seems to be cheap and they also offer the opportunity to invest in several markets.

Regarding Swissquote services, we were just announced of the 2 new additions the other day. Got to say, as a client I really like what they do.

1)
http://www.swissquote.ch/sqw-group-r...e_110607_e.pdf

Media information Gland/Zurich, 7 June 2011
Swissquote and Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank to offer online mortgages
Under a cooperative venture with Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank (BLKB),
Swissquote is adding a significant new dimension to its range of services on
7 June 2011: it is offering online mortgages at highly attractive conditions on
swissquote.ch.
To underscore the importance of the venture to both companies, BLKB will be acquiring a
5 percent holding in Swissquote Group Holding Ltd.
At Swissquote, mortgage queries will be processed completely online. With over 175,000
clients, Swissquote is the largest online bank in Switzerland. In addition to trading accounts for
securities and forex trading, Swissquote’s service offering includes a saving account and an
innovative ePrivate Banking account. As Swissquote Bank CEO Marc Bürki points out, “Being
able to offer mortgages online in collaboration with a first-class Swiss cantonal bank creates
genuine added value for our clients”.
BLKB has an AAA rating from Standard & Poor’s and, according to the latter’s assessment,
ranks among the most strongly capitalized banks in the world. Handling a volume of almost
CHF 14 billion, BLKB is the leading mortgage provider in Northwestern Switzerland. For BLKB
CEO Dr Beat Oberlin, the cooperative venture with Swissquote “bears testimony to the high
quality standard of the bank and its mortgage products”. From a strategic standpoint, the
online offering opens new perspectives for the bank on the Swiss market. Beat Oberlin: “The
combination of our strong position in the mortgage market and the innovative drive of
Switzerland’s leading online bank will generate potential and growth in what is a very dynamic
environment.”
Swissquote “Banking. Self-made”.
As a leading provider of online financial services, Swissquote offers innovative solutions and analysis
tools to meet the wide range of demands and needs of its clients. As well as various online trading
services, the user-friendly platform also provides solutions for eForex, ePrivate Banking and flexible
saving accounts. In addition to a low-cost service for private clients, Swissquote also offers specialized
services for independent asset managers and corporate clients.
Swissquote is quoted on the SIX Swiss Exchange (SQN) and holds a banking license. The company is
subject to supervision by the Swiss Federal Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) and is a
member of the Swiss Bankers Association.
For further information
Swissquote Bank AG:
Marc Bürki, CEO Swissquote Bank AG, Chemin de la Crétaux 33, CH-1196 Gland
Tel. +41 22 999 98 50, fax +41 22 999 94 54, mobile +41 79 413 41 45
marc.burki@swissquote.ch
Nadja Keller, Assistant to CEO
Tel. +41 44 825 88 01, nadja.keller@swissquote.ch
Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank:
Christoph Loeb, Corporate Communications, Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank
Tel. +41 61 925 92 33, fax +41 925 92 08, mobile +41 79 292 56 48
christoph.loeb@blkb.ch

2)
http://www.swissquote.ch/sqw-group-r...e_110614_e.pdf

Media information Gland/Zurich, 14 June 2011
Strategic cooperation between Swiss Life and Swissquote
Swiss Life and Swissquote Bank Ltd. have agreed to form a partnership in the area of
bank products. Under the new collaborative arrangement, Swissquote will handle the
settlement and management of saving and investment products on the Swiss market
for Swiss Life. Swissquote will thus become Swiss Life’s new strategic partner in the
field of assurbanking, i.e. the distribution of banking solutions via insurance channels.
In concrete terms, starting 1 January 2012, Swissquote Bank Ltd. will act as custodian bank
for Swiss Life’s banking clients. As of this date, the approximately 20,000 accounts
(representing some CHF 450 million in assets under custody) will be transferred to
Swissquote. The client base comprises saving, time deposit and fund accounts. “After closely
examining various options, Swiss Life ultimately decided in favor of Swissquote” says
Ivo Furrer, CEO Switzerland at Swiss Life. “With its highly innovative approach, cutting-edge
technology and range of efficient services, Swissquote will make a significant contribution
toward Swiss Life’s goal of substantially increasing the reinvestment rate over the next three
years.”
Going forward, cooperation between the two companies is to be intensified mainly in the
development of innovative products and online services for pension clients in this age of digital
natives. Marc Bürki, CEO of Swissquote Bank Ltd., is convinced that “the Swiss market offers
excellent opportunities for shared web-based products, services and client platforms”.
Swissquote “Banking. Self-made”.
As a leading provider of online financial services, Swissquote offers innovative solutions and analysis
tools to meet the wide range of demands and needs of its clients. As well as various online trading
services, the user-friendly platform also provides solutions for eForex, ePrivate Banking, eMortgage and
flexible saving accounts. In addition to a low-cost service for private clients, Swissquote also offers
specialized services for independent asset managers and corporate clients.
Swissquote is quoted on the SIX Swiss Exchange (SQN) and holds a banking license. The company is
subject to supervision by the Swiss Federal Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) and is a
member of the Swiss Bankers Association.
For further information:
Swissquote
Marc Bürki, CEO Swissquote, Chemin de la Crétaux 33, CH-1196 Gland
Tel. +41 22 999 98 50, fax +41 22 999 94 54, mobile +41 79 413 41 45
marc.burki@swissquote.ch
Nadja Keller, Assistant to CEO
Tel. +41 44 825 88 01, nadja.keller@swissquote.ch
Swiss Life
Media Relations
Tel. +41 43 284 77 77
media.relations@swisslife.ch

If you are a buy and hold type, I would recommend Swissquote as you won't be trading much so it doesn't matter and you do have access to a lot of markets. You pay a small quarterly custody charge, and otherwise you pay by the trade.

Your trading account is automatically denominated in CHF, USD and EUR. The spread when converting is quite small and is also instant.

Their savings account has a 1.14% yield, but it costs you 2 CHF to send cash in or out. Annoyingly, it takes 2-3 working days to transfer money between savings and trading accounts.

Their US options trades are very cheap, and it is very easy to be authorised to use options. There appear to be none of the options trading levels as you might find in US or UK. But their options coverage sucks. Only about 1200 shares and ETFs from the US.

The platform is primitive and slow. Basic yet manages to be confusing at the same time. Their iPhone and Android apps are quite limited also. The Java-based analysis tool is mostly useful for looking at Swiss stocks as they historical data are not to be found in the usual places, e.g. Yahoo, etc. But this tool does not have very many technical indicators. The biggest omission for me are exponential moving averages.

The types of buy and sell orders you can place depends on the exchange the security is quoted on. e.g. no stop loss orders on LSE.

No shorting.

I have not tried their Forex platform, and their PB platform looks neat but it makes me suspicious. I can't quite work out what it does.

Saxobank don't support options at all, and if you are a Mac user you can look forward to crippled functionality. I have not managed to make sense of the complicated Saxobank tariff, but I suspect it works out more expensive than SQB if you don't trade very often.

The problems with Thinkorswim, OptionsXpress, etc. are you have to feed your dollar-denominated account, incurring time delays, unknown currency spreads and of course currency risk. Bear in mind in the last six months USD, GBP and EUR have fallen 16%, 12% and 7% vs CHF respectively. You really don't want to have your profits languishing in a foreign account for too long.

The best thing I came across was a Geneva/based private bank who offer the Interactive Investor platform to their clients. I took one look at the application form for an account and decided not to bother for now.

Well there's a 14% difference

+ in english
+ simple
- expensive
- clunky interface

Their FX platform is called fxBook, but since a few months now they are the owners of the ACM (Advanced Currency Markets, FX specialists from Geneva) platforms, these to are now also available, with a Metatrader 4 platform, to Swissquote clients.

As for their e-PB trading platform, I have not tried it, not sure if it is something that interests me that much, but I do know that you are able to demo trade it, so if you are not too sure if it is something for you yet you have enough interest to find out more, this is probably the way to go, like with FX demo trading...you can screw up to your heart's content, after all it's only virtual money!

Actually as we are talking about saving accounts in Switzerland...then the answer has to be "YES!"

Because you would be hard pressed to find anything at all over 1% in this country...and with the added bonus of no withdrawal penalties to boot.

Now if you are trying to compare the % to the UK, then that is a different kettle of fish all together.

I made an account a few weeks ago to do some trading on the side, and while I am not the most experienced in financial trading and thus can't make comparisons to other online brokerages, I was quite shocked of the quality of Swissquote's online offering. I mean, generally the look was cluttered and didn't exactly look slick, but don't they all in the financial industry? And then..

Following the links from their main page to log in and do my business, I found that all web pages were being served as unencrypted http by default. It's only when you manually edit the address bar that you get access via encrypted https. This seemed to be the case even with the page where you change your password.

At the risk of being patronising to the computing-savvy, this means that info between your computer and Swissquote travels through the many computers and routers on the internet without much privacy. Out of many things, it means it's quite easy for someone who has access to traffic logs on, e.g. your ISP, to see your new password when you change it. This doesn't automatically mean you're compromised, but it's something I find too sloppy for a company I would deal with in a financially major kind of way.

Hence I'm re-initiating my search for a broker; I'm wondering if anyone chose a broker other than Swissquote because their trading application, either on the web or otherwise, looked better in any way.

I don't know if anyone mentioned this yet, but, it matters if you are an American, residing in Switzerland, wanting to trade American securities; apparently you aren't allowed to. I was booted from my Swiss Bank because of a change in trading laws, and went to Swiss quote. There too I cannot trade US securities. I was also told I can't buy options on the ASX. Which I see some posters here saying that it is possible...what don't I know?