FX charges with HL

1st May '18 by Aesurgenor

20 comments 5457 reads

I know there was recently (and have been regularly) comments and questions about the cost of dealing in foreign shares on the various platforms.
I've just received the following email from Hargreaves Lansdown which appears to make them more competitive?

"From today, we’ve lowered the foreign exchange (FX) charge on all overseas share deals.

The charges now start at 1%, and get lower for deals over £5,000. All clients will pay less per deal.

Charges from 1 May

Deal value FX Charge
First £5,000 1.00%
Next £5,000 0.75%
Next £10,000 0.50%
Value over £20,000 0.25%

The new charges apply to different tiers within each deal, rather than the total value. For example, on a £10,000 deal you’ll pay 1% on the first £5,000, and 0.75% on the next £5,000. Previously, you’d pay 1.5% on the full £10,000."

Allan

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PhilHofGrowYourDough

1st May '18

Hi Allan,

Do you think they read the other thread where I said they only thing that'll drive down the fx charges is competition?

Interesting, could be used as leverage against other brokers?

Offer me the same or better or I'm off!

Hmm, I'll take a gander at their website.

Thanks
Phil

Aesurgenor

Phil,

My memory of the discussions was that HL were (among) the most expensive so there may well be an element of this being a response to the cheaper competition.

Allan

Rusty2

This is good news as I was thinking of switching for foreign shares. But they have not informed me of this change.

Andrew L

This is great at least FX competition. Interative Investor are now much more expensive. They even increased their charges from 1% to 1.5% after the TD merger. Youinvest are in the middle at 1%.

HL. cutting prices to be competitive is a surprise! It shows that maybe IG and De Giro are shaking up the market!

I wonder to what extent I'd be able to trade Euro stocks online with them?
For example, in my holdings I currently have the following European stocks ...

Aste (ASP.PA)
Devoteam (DVT.PA)
Holland Colours (HOLCO.AMS)
Itera (ITE.OS)
Trigano (TRI.PA)

Howard Adams

Hi Allan

Many thanks for the post, very good news.

Regards
Howard

PhilH - I think their coverage of European stocks wasn't as good as Youinvest when I last checked. I would just pick up the phone and ask them. When I last looked at HL they seem to hit you with lots of hidden charges. I.e. telephone dealing extra etc etc.

Herbie

I received the email at 12:55 this lunchtime. So, I presume they will be informing all customers.

I haven't checked their website to confirm it's true!
:-)

Allan

Edit....Just checked the website and yes, the new charges are listed as per the email I received.

website shows it is true. A £25k overseas trade did cost 1.5% in FX costs but now costs 0.6%. I.e. down from £375 to £150. A pretty good decline!. Youinvest and III now look much less competitive. Youinvest is less competitive for amounts over £5k and III is just less competitive full stop as their FX rate is 1.5% to start with:

http://www.hl.co.uk/shares/share-dealing/overseas-share-dealing-service

This update makes me consider HL as the platform I could switch to from Youinvest. However, HL fund platform fees at 0.45% are much higher than Youinvest at 0.25%.

JohnEustace

A welcome step for sure as their fees were exorbitant but what I really want is the ability to hold dollars or euros in my account so I don’t have to change currency on every transaction.

Phil I trade with HL, ASTe, HOLCO you can trade online, TRI is only by telephone. Itera I can't see. Devoteam seems to be online but market is closed at the moment.

Yes it's on their website. Think it's a bit poor not to inform all customers before the changes. Last time I got an email about 3 days after JohnEustace about change to "Complex investments".

Thanks Herbie, What would the telephone charge be? It seems to be a bit vague on their website?

pgs501

Totally agree John. I am under the impression that there were currently no ISA providers that you can do this with and as someone who is keen on diversifying internationally (with stockopedia's help of course) these forced FX charges make it significantly worse.

I have never used it but it is "1% of the trade value, minimum charge £20, maximum £50."

Vsihv

Not to mention of you get overseas divi. It's welcome but still tiered, but nobody joins HL for lower cost.
Would also like to just hold $. With ETFs, it's far cheaper holding the £ equivalent if it exists.

I just opened an account with III as well - my dad was a TD direct and got moved said it was better for overseas as can hold ccy - but looking at above comments, maybe HL is now cheaper?

abtan

If I see an international stock on HL that I'd like to trade online, I simply email them and ask them if they can update their system so that I can trade it online.

They've become quite accommodating and most requests are put through, eg £ALMIC a few weeks ago, which I was quite surprised with as it is only a £60m Market Cap company at the time.

I have a feeling they would allow online trading for Trigano if you asked...

Thanks for that abtan!

jonesj

My benchmarks are:
1 iWeb were charging 0.5% when I originally started with them [but last time I looked they had priced themselves out of the market at 1.5%].
2 I can still transfer money to an overseas bank account & lose 0.5% from mid market. That includes moving the money !
3 OCBC in Singapore charged 0.4% on forex for trades.

So HL are closing the gap, but the system described in the opening post is complicated and they still take about 0.875% on a £10k trade. Plus their fee.

Hopefully HL are reversing the trend on forex rates.

andyfwwrench

2nd May '18

I complained about the FX charge every survey HL sent out. IG has a very keen price, close to spot I think, and also allows holding dollars and Euros, at least in the standard account; I'm not sure if it is allowed in ISAs? I find I need multiple providers anyway to get the best coverage of overseas shares, and should I ever want them open ended funds, which IG don't offer at all for example.

FX charges with HL

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Aesurgenor

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