Where to buy shares?

loksat

Hi,

Iam new to investing in shares. COuld someone tell me how to buy shares? Can i do these online? Please advice

Steve_xx

Yes you can buy shares online, but first you need to set yourself up with a trading account. This usually means depositing enough money in the account to cover potential purchases of shares. Here's a couple of links:

https://share-dealing.iwebsharedealing.co.uk/sharedealing/public/SdWelcomeLogin.asp

http://www.hoodlessbrennan.com/

SalsaDanca

You can buy shares online, in fact that's the cheapest and easiest way to do it. Different brokers have different charging structures, so before you can choose a broker you need to decide how often you are going to trade.

All brokers will charge you a fee each time you buy or sell shares. This may be a fixed charge (probably about £10), or a percentage of the transaction. There may also be a monthly or annual fee, or an inactivity charge if you do not make enough trades within a certain period. If you aren't going to trade much, avoid the monthly or annual charges and inactivity charges, even if it means paying higher dealing costs. If you are going to trade a lot, a broker with an annual fee and lower dealing costs might work out cheaper.

Most brokers pay a very low rate of interest on cash held within your account.

When you buy shares online, you will not get a share certificate - your shares will be held in a nominee account by the broker, and you view your portfolio online. Some brokers will issue a share certificate for an extra fee. Some companies have shareholder perks (for example, Thorntons send out discount vouchers with their annual report) which are only available to people who have a share certificate - you won't get the perks if you keep your shares in a nominee account.

If you are not already using your stocks & shares ISA allowance, you can buy your shares within an ISA to avoid capital gains tax.

There are many brokers, but I use and recommend these two:

SelfTrade (http://www.selftrade.co.uk/) have no monthly or annual fee, and no inactivity charge. They charge a fixed £12.50 for each trade. Ask on the referrers board, and you can earn £50 for opening an account and making a trade worth £500 or more. Selftrade do not have a dividend reinvestment plan, so there is no cost-effective way of reinvesting dividends. If you want a share certificate, they will issue one for an extra £10. You can open a stocks and shares ISA with Selftrade, which costs £6.25 per quarter plus the normal dealing fees when you buy and sell shares.

Motley Fool (an investment website at www.fool.co.uk) Sharebuilder, run by the Halifax. Again, no monthly or annual fee. You can buy or sell shares online for £10. They have a cheap dividend reinvestment program, and you can set up a regular investment program to buy shares for only £1.50 per transaction. They will not issue share certificates.

Regards,

Rob

fatman_2

im newbie to investments, but done a little research and found that, "The Share Centre" has the best rates for small amounts of money. They take 1% (min £2.50 for buying, and £7.50 for seliing). Has anyone tried this company and have any views?, Im looking to try out a few shares in various companies with each share about £100 each.

Heres there site: http://www.share.com/webp/d_share.htm

Sobraon

Halifax Sharebuilder is commission free on regular investment purchases until the end of the year.

BMWobbleU

Sobraon wrote: »

Halifax Sharebuilder is commission free on regular investment purchases until the end of the year.

This is a good route to long term share investing. But, if loksat wants to actively trade, commission will have to be paid.

loksat

Thanks to all of you. This will sure help me a lot to understand shares better.
You all have been a great help.