[XTR]

Regarding US stocks, what's your preferred method? I'm thinking spread bets are probably easiest?

This is a good question which I have been struggling with for a while.  I've a SIPP with Hargreaves Lansdown with has forex fees of 1%, on buying and selling and an ISA with Interactive Investor which has 1.5% each way.  I've not put it in a spreadsheet lately, but I must be loosing around 5% per trade with the latter given forex fees, slippage, spread etc.

This seems to have ground my account down unless the market breadth is really strong.  However, I'm doing the best I have ever done in my ISA at present despite this - but this may be a fluke.  I'm looking to move my ISA to Trading212 as they don't have charges.  However, with my ISA doing the best it has ever done right now I'm going to stay as I am for the immediate future.

The other point to look for is available order types (for US stocks).  HL only has market and fill or kill orders for US stocks.  So no stop losses and the fill or kill is a buy limit order that is closed if it is not filled on market open.  This makes it difficult to get in at a good price, especially if a stock has just broken out.  II only has buy limit orders - but I find those ensure that I either get in at the right price or not at all, which works better for me.  II also has stop losses.

I have tried a demo spreadbet account, but not tried a real one.  I've tried running it based on a quite modest amount of cash, an amount that I would like to start with,  However, if using proper position sizing based on risk I find the account is too small to open many of the positions I would like.  This is interesting, as it seems like if you control risk carefully works against the leverage.  Of course the temptation is to push the limits you have set yourself, and with things being volatile I don't feel like going for a leaveraged account right now.

The reason I like spread bets (IG) is that there is no tax due and unlike an ISA, no charges. Yes there is an increased spread which is how IG (and the no fee ISA platforms) make their money, but their bid/ask is usually pretty good and occasionally better than that offered by my (HL) ISA account. I find that the extra spread is more or less equal to the ISA fees and commissions. The other main benefit with spread bets is the option for guaranteed stop losses and trailing stop losses.