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Experienced Investor

IG Group launches high-tech stockbroking platform

Lucinda Beeman
Written By:
Lucinda Beeman
Posted:
Updated:
15/09/2014

IG Group has launched a new stockbroking service with real-time pricing.

The platform – available across a suite of devices including smartphones and tablets – offers investors access to over 4,440 shares and is supported by a range of analytical tools, charting, market news and videos.

Tim Howkins, chief executive of IG Group, told Your Money that the platform takes the advanced technology developed for spread betting and Contracts for Difference (CFDs) – both niche ways of playing the financial markets that rely on the ability to respond quickly to price movements – and puts it to use in the retail stockbroking space.

He said: “Anyone who has ever done a spread bet would be horrified to trade a stock on a price that had been held for 15 seconds, as some incumbent platforms do. The global financial markets are faster moving and more entwined than ever before and traditional trading platforms available to those wanting to buy stocks online simply haven’t kept pace – they are basic and opaque.”

The platform charges no platform or management fees, but does take a commission of between £6 and £12 per UK trade in line with the frequency of a user’s activity. The charge for a US trade is two cents per share in commission – with an online minimum of $15 – on top of a foreign currency exchange charge of one third of one per cent.

“We’re targeting this at active investors,” Howkins said. “Users now have the right information, at the right price, available to them at the right time and in a highly transparent way – whether through a desktop computer, a phone or a tablet. This has the potential to revolutionise online stockbroking.”