If you are looking to diversify your portfolio, you probably would have come across IWDA and VTI. Boththese funds provide you exposure to some of the world’s largest and most widely held stocks while spreading your portfolio over several sectors.
With both ETFs being a decent choice to add to your portfolio, you may be wondering what are the key differences between these two indices, and which should you invest in?
If you have been looking for a broker to invest or trade with, you would probably have come across Saxo Market’s SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor.
What are the key differences between these two platforms and which should you use to invest in?
Here’s what you need to know to help you decide:
The difference between SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor
SaxoTraderGO is more geared towards actively trading on the market, while SaxoInvestor is more geared towards a buy and hold strategy.
SaxoTraderGO is an award-winning trading platform that has the interface and tools to ensure smooth and seamless trading.
On the other hand, SaxoInvestor is more tailored towards investors who are newer investors. SaxoInvestor offers a lower barrier to entry and a more simplified user interface if you’re just looking to dip your toes into investing.
The similarities between SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor
SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor both share the same account, hence you would not need to create 2 separate accounts if you wish to use both platforms.
Both of these platforms have demo accounts as well, these paper accounts allow you to try out both platforms using simulated money to get a feel of the platforms first.
SaxoTraderGO demo account user interface
SaxoInvestor demo account user interface
Available financial products
SaxoTraderGO offers a wider range of financial products to use on the platform such as forex, CFDs and futures. Meanwhile, SaxoInvestor is more limited in its options, having only stocks, ETFs, mutual funds and bonds.
Here is the list of the available financial products on the two platforms.
Products found in both platforms
Description
Stocks
Over 19,000 stocks across 37 international exchanges
Bonds
Over 5,000 government and corporate bonds
ETFs
Over 3,000 exchange traded funds across over 30 exchanges
Mutual funds
Over 500 mutual funds with global investors
Managed portfolios
Defensive to aggressive portfolios adjusted to your goals
Regular savings plan
Defensive to aggressive portfolios from S$100 contributions per month
And here is the list of financial products only available on SaxoTraderGO:
Products only found on SaxoTraderGO
Description
Forex
182 major, minor, and exotic FX pairs
CFDs
Over 9,000 on stocks, indices, forex, commodities, options, or bonds
Futures
Over 200 futures across 23 exchanges internationally
Commodities
Trade spot metals, corn, and Brent Crude or WTI crude oil
Forex options
44 Forex vanilla options across major pairs
Listed options
Over 1,200 listed options across 23 global exchanges
SaxoTraderGO comes out on top over SaxoInvestor by having a lot more products available. However, SaxoInvestor being a more beginner friendly platform, does not list the more complicated financial products which you may not touch if you’re a new investor.
This helps to keep the platform and user interface cleaner and easier to navigate with less of an information overload on the screen.
Functions
Likewise, for each platform’s functions, SaxoTraderGO has a wider selection of functions for traders while SaxoInvestor has fewer functions to not overcomplicate its platform.
While both SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor allow you to buy and sell stocks, you can place different types of orders on SaxoTraderGO, such as:
Buying on margin
Shorting on margin
Premarket
Postmarket
On SaxoInvestor, you are limited to simply buying and selling your financial product with your funds during market hours.
On the other hand, on SaxoTraderGO, you are able to buy and sell during the premarket and postmarket as well. To add to this, you are also able to use leverage and buy or shorton margin.
Purchasing on pre and post market on SaxoTraderGO
Pre- and post-market trading sessions allow investors to trade stocks between the hours of 4 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. during pre-market trading, and 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. for the post-market sessions.
Investopedia
Premarket in SGT: 4 p.m. – 9:30 pm
Postmarket in SGT: 4 a.m. – 8 p.m.
The margin is the collateral that an investor has to deposit with their broker or an exchange to cover the credit risk the holder poses for the broker or the exchange. An investor can create credit risk if they borrow cash from the broker to buy financial instruments, borrow financial instruments to sell them short, or enter into a derivative contract.
Investopedia
Why is this important?
If you are looking to actively take profits or enter positions before the crowd, it is crucial to be able to participate in the pre and after market hours. This will allow you to react accordingly to major catalysts that could cause shares to skyrocket, allowing you to take a position early during the run up.
Buying and selling shares on margin effectively amplifies your buying power and provides you the option of being able to profit from a downtrending market as well.
However, do take into consideration that losses on margin are similarly amplified. You may also suffer margin calls if the losses are too great and your account does not have sufficient funds.
A margin call occurs when the value of an investor’s margin account falls below the broker’s required amount. An investor’s margin account contains securities bought with borrowed money (typically a combination of the investor’s own money and money borrowed from the investor’s broker).
Investopedia
What about the type of orders?
Both platforms also differ in the type of orders they have. Again, SaxoTraderGO has a greater selection of orders as compared to SaxoInvestor, which only has the basic types of orders.
Here is the full list of the types of orders that both platforms have.
A market order is an instruction by an investor to a broker to buy or sell stock shares, bonds, or other assets at the best available price in the current financial market.
A stop order is an order to buy or sell a security when its price moves past a particular point, ensuring a higher probability of achieving a predetermined entry or exit price, limiting the investor’s loss, or locking in a profit.
A trailing stop is a modification of a typical stop order that can be set at a defined percentage or dollar amount away from a security’s current market price.
A stop-limit order is a conditional trade over a set time frame that combines the features of stop with those of a limit order and is used to mitigate risk.
A one-cancels-the-other (OCO) order is a pair of conditional orders stipulating that if one order executes, then the other order is automatically canceled.
Algorithmic trading uses a computer program that follows a defined set of instructions (an algorithm) to place a trade.
*Algo orders offer a wide variety of strategy that you can use, including: dark, iceberg, implementation shortfall, limit on close, liquidity seeking, market on close, peg, pre-market limit, TWAP, VWAP, with volume
SaxoTraderGO thus has more options for experienced traders, allowing more freedom in the style of trading, such as setting stop losses or buying in different lots. Meanwhile, SaxoInvestor only has the basic market and limit which is still sufficient for investors who are newer to the trade.
Types of orders for SaxoTraderGO
Types of orders for SaxoInvestor
Fees
SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor have the same cost structure. There are 5 different tiers that you can get depending on how much you pay each month: bronze, silver, gold, platinum and diamond.
These tiers will dictate your commission prices and other costs, with diamond being the lowest in cost and bronze being the highest in cost.
For comparison purposes, we will be looking at the fees for the bronze tier.
Annual custody fee (if opted out of Securities Lending)
0.12%
Here are the full details for the other tiers and other costs that you will have to incur if you trade on these platforms.
You may want to note that you will only incur monthly fees if you subscribe to the abovementioned tiers or for their equity market data subscriptions.
Funding
SaxoTraderGO has a higher barrier to entry, with a minimum deposit of S$3,000 for your initial funding, but there is no minimum deposit after that. Meanwhile, SaxoInvestor has no minimum deposit at all.
However, both platforms require you to make a minimum of S$2,000 for the initial funding of a regular savings plan!
SaxoTraderGO
SaxoInvestor
Initial deposit
Minimum S$3,000
Nil
Any funding after initial deposit
Nil
Nil
Regular savings plan
Minimum S$2,000
Minimum S$2,000
For those getting into investing, S$3,000 may be a little too steep to begin with. SaxoInvestor is thus easier and less cumbersome for those starting their investing journey as compared to SaxoTraderGO.
Depositing into SaxoTraderGO via Wire Transfer
Incentives for higher funding
Saxo Rewards also offers Platinum and VIP accounts if you have a large amount of funds in your account. If you trade quite often, you are also able to earn points which will be used to upgrade your account to higher tiers.
Here is a comparison between the SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor platforms:
SaxoTraderGO
SaxoInvestor
Available financial products
More
Less
Functions
More
Less
Difficulty to use
Harder to navigate
Easier to navigate
Fees
Similar
Similar
Funding
Min. S$3,000 for the initial deposit
Nil
Availability
Same
Same
So which platform should you use?
Choose SaxoTraderGO if you want a more comprehensive trading experience
SaxoTraderGO offers more financial products and functions that give you the flexibility to make more advanced trades.
You will be able to trade on margin and have the ability to profit from downward moving markets with SaxoTraderGO as well. This will help to increase your effectiveness as a trader.
SaxoTraderGO is thus a better platform if you’re a seasoned trader, or if you’re looking to amp up their trading experiences.
Choose SaxoInvestor if you want to learn more about investing
SaxoInvestor has an easier user interface to navigate which will be less daunting if you’re new to investing.
With just the basic products and no complicated functions, you will be less likely to be overwhelmed by the number of options available if you’re a newer investor.
Conclusion
Both platforms allow you to purchase financial products and begin your investing or trading experiences.
The main considerations you should consider include:
If you want to invest over the long term or take trades in the short term
Want more complex functions at the cost of a more difficult user interface to navigate
Your initial funding costs
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With both ETFs being a decent choice to diversify your portfolio, you may be wondering what are the key differences between these two indices, and which should you invest in?
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