Best Broker for US Stock&ISA investing? (this is my pick, any comments?)

blackeagle

Hello everyone,

I have been looking to changing my broker recently and wanted to share with you what I think and hopefully get some of your comments..
About 70% of my investments are in various Vanguard index funds and 30% in stocks (mainly US.)
I have balanced risk profile with my Vanguard portfolio but for my stock investments, I like taking risk and going for early stage tech companies, biotech firms, etc.
Therefore, what I look for in a broker is:

•  Low trading fees especially in the US market so that I can invest small amounts in several high risk stocks rather than big lump sums in a few stocks which is not ideal for me. (Say you have 5x biotech picks and want to invest £1k in each, then fees really add up in most brokers..)

•  Offers ISA so that I can get tax benefits.

There are several resources that I have already looked at such as the below.
I have also talked to customer services of several providers to double check whether they had any hidden fees/made sure I understood their fees right.

• https://uk.stockbrokers.com/compare

• https://brokerchooser.com/compare-brokerage

• https://goodmoneyguide.com/stock-brokers/

After my research, I believe the best pick for me would be IG.
Now, the reason I think so is that they do not have any account fees and trading US stocks is completely free as long as you have placed 3 transactions the month before.
I understand there are cheaper platforms such as Degiro but the problem is that they do not offer an ISA. IG also does not charge any custody fees if you place 3 transactions per quarter which sounds great. Most brokers on the other hand, charge fixed %s of your holdings or fix £.

My current broker for US dealing is AJ Bell and I am thinking of leaving it because it charges 9.95 per transaction and halves it only if you placed 10 transactions the month before. Most large scale companies like HL, HSBC or Fidelity also have relatively high transaction fees.
I have gone with AJ Bell at first as I was new to the UK and the company seemed to have very good ratings in terms of customer support and reliability and I did not research much. Now, I am thinking of transferring all my holdings to IG, opening new year's ISA there and trading US stocks on that platform.

I wanted to check how this sounds like to you. What are your top picks? Any comments on IG based on your past experience?
Any other options that you think can serve better for trading purposes / ISA?

Many thanks in advance for reading this and looking forward to your insights!

masonic

If you are going to go with a bookmaker with a side-line in investing, why not Trading212? Far cheaper option.

blackeagle

masonic said:

If you are going to go with a bookmaker with a side-line in investing, why not Trading212? Far cheaper option.

Thanks, certainly a good option! I thought I checked it but they do offer ISAs which I thought they did not.
They do not seem to offer customer service over phone which is a concern but overall reviews seem very positive. It is just that it is a relatively new company and IG feels safer as it has track record and publicly traded, based/regulated in the UK while trading212 is in Bulgaria. These might be just nonsense to others but I feel my money is safer with older companies.  I will definitely look into it further though as in terms of fees, it is certainly advantageous.