SaxoTraderGo vs SaxoInvestor – What’s The Difference?

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.

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:

1. Buying on margin
2. Shorting on margin
3. Premarket
4. 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 short on margin.

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.

Order Type	Description
Market	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.
Limit	A limit order is a type of order to purchase or sell a security at a specified price or better.

And here are additional orders that are only found on SaxoTraderGo.

Order Type	Description
Stop	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.
Trailing stop	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.
Stop limit	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.
One cancels the other (OCO)	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.
Algo (strategy*)	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.

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.

Type of Fees	Amount
SGX	0.08%, min. $5 SGD
NYSE	0.06%, min. $4 USD, capped at 100 USD
HKEX	0.15% min. $90 HKD
ASX	0.10% min. $8AUD
TSE	0.15% min. 1,500 JPY
Forex	0.7 pips for EUR/USD, 1.1 pips for USD/SGD
Annual custody fee (if opted into securities lending)	0.06%
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.

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.

Classic	Platinum	VIP
Min. initial funding: USD 10,000	Min. initial funding: USD 250,000	Min. initial funding: USD 1,250,000
Tight entry prices	Up to 30% lower prices	The very best prices
Best-in-class digital service and support	Best-in-class digital service and support	Best-in-class digital service and support
24/5 technical and account support	24/5 technical and account support	24/5 technical and account support
		Local-language personal relationship manager
		Direct access to trading experts, 24/7
		1:1 SaxoTrats access
		Exclusive event invitations

Availability

Both SaxoTraderGO and SaxoInvestor have the same platform availability, including:

1. Desktop
2. Apple App Store
3. Google Play Store

Verdict

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:

1. If you want to invest over the long term or take trades in the short term
2. Want more complex functions at the cost of a more difficult user interface to navigate
3. Your initial funding costs

Are you passionate about personal finance and want to earn some flexible income?