Interactive Brokers – is a good choice both for beginners and advanced traders.
I have chosen IB mainly for the low costs of trading.
The ugly. Inactivity fees for accounts of under 100.000$.
Registration. The process is quite long. It may take 30 minutes to fill all the forms and some more time to collect necessary documents. Minimum account deposit is 10.000 € or $.
Trading platform. For beginner (as i am) the platform is rather simple to understand. Left top window is portfolio. Left bottom corner order entry: where you set/search for security, then you choose buy or sell, set the price and choose how long is your order valid (day or GTC, which is usually 6 months)
Costs of trading. The usual cost of US security trade is 1$ and 4€ for European security.
Other uses. I use the IB to take USD payments by ACH method from third party. I do not need US bank account.
- Borrow against your account at rates of 2.66% APR or less.
- Earn interest of 0.66% APR on your qualifying idle balances and extra income by lending your fully paid shares.
Alternatives. If if was from USA or Australia I would choose Robinhood
Should You consider other brokerages? It depends on your needs, but the costs bellow for trades speak for itself: