Moving from US based share management company to UK?

funky_chicken66

Hi I'm looking for some advice.
Many years ago, I used to work for a US based company's UK subsidiary. I bought some shares through the employee programme. These are US based shares and are managed by a US based company; The dividends are reinvested to buy more shares in the same company. Due to poor service from the company I'd like to look into options to move to a UK based management company. I've seen some suggestion that Equiniti/Shareview may offer this service.

My questions:

1. Are Equiniti Shareview reputable?
2. Are there any better options?
3. Are there any tax implications? I'm a UK tax payer and wave filled the W-8BEN with the IRS?
4. Is re-investing the dividend still possible
5. Any other implications or issues that I should be aware of?

Thanks
C

sausage_time

I moved some US shares from my employer nominated broker to Trading 212. Part of the motivation was to Bed and ISA. The FX costs are low, no transaction or platform costs, and interest on cash. It has worked well for me. I had an existing general investment account with T212 so it was an easy choice in my case.

They seem to offer dividend reinvestment (not needed in my case). And I had to complete a W-8 BEN on-line.

funky_chicken66

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81930718#Comment_81930718

Sounds perfect, thank you

sausage_time

One thought - you may not be able to do an in specie transfer. Something to check.

If not, you may have to sell with your US broker and then buy back here. That's what I wanted to do anyway (for Bed and ISA) so not an issue for me, but you may have to think about Capital Gain/Loss too.

funky_chicken66

Yeah, I was hoping to avoid that. It looks like (or I can't find) that Trading 212 don't support transfers from the existing management company.

DRS1

Redmayne Bentley get mentioned on threads about people wanting to sell certificated US shares. Maybe they'd also be set up to take a transfer from your US management company?

sausage_time

Ah yes, I'd previously asked T212 support about direct transfers from my US broker. Not supported, see their response.

I am afraid that we are unable to facilitate the transfer due to internal risk and compliance policy, which currently does not allow us to process portfolio transfers from US-based providers.

refluxer

My impression of Equiniti is that they only/mainly deal with UK shares and securities ? They are the registrars for a large number of FTSE companies and provide CSN facilities.

Unlike some online brokers, they don't charge inactivity fees but their dealing fees are high so I would avoid them, regardless. They charge 1% for selling online (<£50k) with a minimum of £20, compared with fee-free dealing with companies like Trading212 and even more established brokers like Scottish Widows (was IWeb) only charge a flat fee of £5.

I'm not sure whether any of these companies can accomodate what you want to do though, so you'll have to do some digging.

WastedWords

maybe Interactive Brokers.