Saxo vs Interactive Brokers 2024

First, you need a broker that has all the features you need. If your broker does not fit your investing requirements, you must find another one. Therefore, we must compare the features of Saxo vs Interactive Brokers.

However, many brokers have many more features than we require. This does not make them better necessarily. We only care about the features we require. As simple passive investors, we use only a few features.

First, we can look at stock exchanges. In this case, both Saxo and Interactive Brokers provide us with access to the main stock exchanges. We have access to the major Swiss, European, and United States exchanges. These stock exchanges are all we need to build a great portfolio. Of course, they provide access to many more stock exchangers, but if we do not need them, we do not have to worry about them.

As for instruments, both brokers will provide us with access to ETFs, stocks, and bonds. Again, this is more than enough for simple investors, and both brokers provide access to further instruments such as futures and options.

Both brokers allow us to trade with US ETFs, the most efficient ETFs for Swiss investors. It is important because not doing that would be a significant disadvantage for one broker.

You can get interest on cash and margin loans at both brokers. Only Interactive Brokers offers fractional shares, but this is probably not something very essential for most people.

Overall, when comparing Saxo vs Interactive Brokers, both brokers have more than enough features to invest in the stock market.

It is critical to compare the fees for investing with brokers. Indeed, if we have the same portfolio on two brokers, the fees are what will differentiate our total returns. So, we will look at the fees of Saxo vs Interactive Brokers, in detail.

One disadvantage of IB is that its fee structure is more complex than Saxo. IB has two different fee structures (tiered and fixed) and two different fees for the currency conversions (manual and automated). For stocks, I will use the tiered pricing, which is generally better. And I will detail both for currency conversions.

We can start with the fixed fees. The management fee of Saxo is 0.22% per year, with a maximum of 120 CHF per year. The percentage is high, but the maximum is low, so it is a relatively fair fee. On the other hand, IBKR has no management fee.

For transactions, we must consider that fact that Saxo is a Swiss broker. As such, it will incur some Swiss stamp duty. Other than that, Saxo pricing is simple. Here are a few examples for standard stock exchanges:

• SIX Swiss Stock Exchange: 0.08% (minimum of 3 CHF)
• Euronext Paris: 0.08% (minimum of 2 EUR)
• NYSE: 0.08% (minimum of 1 USD)

On the other hand, IB system is very complicated. I will not detail it here, but you can read more on my article about IB Fixed and Tiered pricing schemes.

To compare Saxo vs Interactive Brokers, I took different scenarios and ran them through our broker comparator and got the results for the total fees of each broker. I have defined six scenarios:

• A: 1000 CHF in portfolio, 100 CHF in monthly investment and 0% world allocation.
• B: 1000 CHF in portfolio, 100 CHF in monthly investment and 100% world allocation.
• C: 1000 CHF in portfolio, 100 CHF in monthly investment and 80% world allocation.
• D: 10000 CHF in portfolio, 500 CHF in monthly investment and 80% world allocation.
• E: 50000 CHF in portfolio, 10000 CHF in monthly investment and 80% world allocation.
• F: 100000 CHF in portfolio, 2000 CHF in monthly investment and 80% world allocation.

For small scenarios, Saxo compares well to Interactive Brokers. Then, it starts to become pricier. The good news is that the custody fees are capped at 120 CHF per year. So, even if you have several millions, you will not pay more than 120 CHF per year in custody fees. Then, the stamp duty starts to weigh on the balance (but Saxo cannot do anything about that). The currency conversions are also much higher for Saxo than for IB.

We can also look at currency conversion fees in detail. Saxo has a 0.25% currency conversion fee. A manual conversion on IB costs 2 USD (or 0.002% if you convert more than 100k). An automated conversion costs 0.03% without minimum. Here are few examples of conversions:

• 100 USD
  • 0.25 USD at Saxo
  • 2 USD for a manual conversion at IB
  • 0.03 USD for an automation conversion
• 500 USD
  • 1.25 USD at Saxo
  • 2 USD for a manual conversion at IB
  • 0.15 USD for an automation conversion
• 1000 USD
  • 2.5 USD at Saxo
  • 2 USD for a manual conversion at IB
  • 0.30 USD for an automation conversion
• 10000 USD
  • 25 USD at Saxo
  • 2 USD for a manual conversion at IB
  • 3 USD for an automatic conversion at IB

Overall, as long as you are using the cheapest way to convert, Interactive Brokers can be much cheaper than Saxo to convert. That being said, Saxo is quite fair at currency conversion, when we compare with other Swiss brokers.

Overall, when comparing Saxo vs Interactive Brokers, while Saxo is very fairly priced, Interactive Brokers is still significantly cheaper.

We use also compare the safety of holding investments at Saxo vs Interactive Brokers.

Both brokers are well established and are in a good financial situation, with many customers (both have beyond one million customers). This makes them less likely to fail.

The technical security of both brokers is good. I have not heard of any major breach in either of these brokers. They both have support for a second factor of authentication (2FA). I would personally not use a broker that does not have a second factor. This is a crucial step in improving the security of your online accounts. Interactive Brokers goes one step further in forcing 2FA for all users.

Both brokers are regulated. In Switzerland, Saxo is regulated by FINMA, like all other Swiss brokers. As a result, 100’000 CHF of cash will be insured in cash of bankruptcy. IBKR has SIPC protection, protecting up to 500’000 USD (250’000 USD of cash protection). So, unless you keep a lot of cash, you should not have to worry about it.

In both cases, assets are segregated, so your shares are not in their accounts. This is done slightly differently by both brokers. In Switzerland, Saxo does full segregation, with one account for each customer. And IB uses so-called omnibus accounts, which are accounts for multiple customers. In practice, it should not make a difference.

Overall, as for safety and security, both Saxo and Interactive Brokers are safe.

Finally, we can look at the reputation of Saxo vs Interactive Brokers.

Even though it is far from perfect, I usually use Trustpilot as a source of reviews. Saxo gets a 3.7 out 5 for the reviews on the whole group and 4.2 for the reviews on the Switzerland entity. So, based on that only, Saxo is slightly better than IB. On the other hand, IB only gets a 3.3 out of 5.

In both cases, the most negative point is about the customer service. On the positive, we find some good reviews about IB fees and some good reviews about Saxo being easy to use. And we also find some contradicting reviews because some people truly enjoy both customer service. This is often the case because people generally do reviews either when they are really happy or really angry.

If we look at their apps, on the Google Play Store, IBKR gets a 4.8 score while Saxo gets a 3.9. On the Apple App Store, Interactive Brokers gets a 4.5 and Saxo a 4.6. Overall, it looks like apps from Interactive Brokers fare slightly better.

From what I am hearing in Switzerland, Interactive Brokers has a better reputation than Saxo. But Saxo is becoming quite popular since they changed their fees in 2024.

Overall, regarding the reputation of Saxo vs Interactive Brokers, I would say that both brokers have a decent reputation.

We can make a summary of Saxo vs Interactive Brokers:

Cheapest Swiss Broker	The best broker
Saxo Bank	Interactive Brokers
Primary Rating: 4.5	Primary Rating: 5.0
Extremely affordable	No custody fees
Pros: Good execution Good range of investing instruments Swiss broker Easy to use	Pros: Good execution Wide range of investing instruments No custody fees Very low currency conversion fees
Cons: Custody fees Not the cheapest currency conversions	Cons: Not always easy to use
Invest with Saxo	Invest your money
Our review	Read My Review
: (Swiss residents using my link get 200 CHF in trading credits)	:

Cheapest Swiss Broker

Saxo Bank

Primary Rating:

4.5

Extremely affordable

Pros:

• Good execution
• Good range of investing instruments
• Swiss broker
• Easy to use

Cons:

• Custody fees
• Not the cheapest currency conversions

Invest with Saxo

Our review

:

(Swiss residents using my link get 200 CHF in trading credits)

The best broker

Interactive Brokers

Primary Rating:

5.0

No custody fees

Pros:

• Good execution
• Wide range of investing instruments
• No custody fees
• Very low currency conversion fees

Cons:

• Not always easy to use

Invest your money

Read My Review

:

We can draw a few conclusions for Saxo vs Interactive Brokers:

• Interactive Brokers is cheaper in almost all cases
• Saxo can be cheaper for small portfolios
• Interactive Brokers is a foreign broker
• Saxo is a Swiss broker
• Both brokers have all the instruments we need
• Both brokers are really good options