IG Spreads, Commission and Financing Costs
The major instruments are consistently competitive all the way down to the more illiquid stocks and assets classes.
- Indices like the FTSE 100 spread betting spreads and CFD charges are are 1 pip with margins at 0.5%, pretty standard
- For Forex they have some razor tight spreads though offering 0.6 pips on EURUSD and AUDUSD with margins at 0.5%
- Commodities like Gold have a spread of 0.3 pips which is very tight and 2.5 pips on silver, but 2.8 pips on Crude. Margins range from 0.5% to 1%
- Financing costs are pretty standard at 2.5% over under the relevant interbank rate.
Market range and asset coverage.
IG currently offer 15,000 global markets. You can trade anything from exotic non-deliverable currencies to AIM stocks. The online platform provides access to most, but anything you cannot trade online give the dealers a call and they can get you a price.
IG also offer an institutional service through their IG Markets division to hedge funds and professional traders so have a wide range of exchange memberships that filter their way down to private clients should one wish to take a position in something out of the ordinary.
These include, Bitcoin, options, bonds and Sunday trading.
Main Advantages of IG
- Wide asset coverage
- Tights spreads
- Institutional accounts
- Physical stock can be used as collateral
- Direct market access
- Experienced dealers
- API access
- Automated trading
Main Disadvantages of IG
- No rebate scheme
Education, Analysis and Added Value
IG have a lot of added value features with information, analysis and tools for traders integrated into their website including webinars, client sentiment, automated signals and technical analysis tools.
Once you are logged in to their platform you get access to it all including client sentiment.
IG Trading Platforms.
Primarily IG clients use the in-house developed trading platform has been given a long over due upgrade and face lift.
MT4 is also available with IG should you with to automate some of your trading without using IGs own API.
FCA regulation
You can see IG’s FCA regulation on the FCA register here. They are still registered as IG Index or IG markets.
