Good E-Banking and apps. Free cash withdrawals from any ATM in Switzerland.
I also don’t get why anybody could use Salt over Swisscom and Sunrise. Their network is garbage.
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Use the mobile app or webinterface. If those are still to complicated they may be better off with a hands-off solution like truewealth.
Fair enough, however there are not that many of those here.
Unless some other broker has a way to directly import the transactions into the tax declaration and you have an unholy ammount of transactions, I do not see how you would be able to save more than a couple minutes per year on that. Printing the statements takes longer than inputing the transactions. I am genuinely interrested how this could be even easier.
At least we are on the same page on this one XD.
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I’m still on Degiro because IB looks so complicated. I mean I know how to write in Java and stuff…but this interface is just unusable for me. I’m afraid that one wrong button will destroy all my assets. It’s like a MS DOS program with mouse support.
I know I’m paying more fees. I know I’m losing on dividends with IE ETFs. But it’s not all about that. Investing with IB isn’t fun. It’s a pain in the ass.
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Hello,
I saw quite a few people mentioned that they still use Swissquote, instead of IB. Can anybody point me to any price comparison between those 2 brokers, with some example case of person with ETF buy & hold main strategy?
Nope. I do use IB because there’s little value add at my current levels of wealth. If/when I get closer to retirement I would consider repatriating my funds for better protection (at least the portions that I’m going to hold as opposed to selling to cover my lifestyle costs).
I do buy Swiss meat/milk/eggs etc. for a complicated variety of reasons. (I may not eat meat all too often, but I’d rather make sure it’s good when I do.)
I even fly business class if I do fly.
I don’t feel that I have “an unholy amount of transactions”, but it certainly takes quite some time if you (correctly) report them all individually. Manual input only seems reasonable if you really just buy the same ETFs once per month, else it becomes a burden.
Quoting myself from this thread you may want to look into:
Swissquote fees to be precise:
- Account fee of 0.1077%/year on securities (min. 64.64 CHF/year, max. 215.40 CHF/year)
- Trading cost for ETFs are…
- 9.85 CHF/trade fixed
- 0.075% (CH) / 0.150% (foreign) Swiss stamp duty
- 1.50 CHF/trade + 0.015% SIX exchange fees (min. 2 CHF, max. 150 CHF)
- = for example 27.85 CHF for a 10’000 CHF trade of a foreign ETF
- FX spread is 1.7 PIPS (0.017%) for a forex account. Might be higher for a trading account, e.g. for selling received USD dividends.
USD CHF FX fee is 1%
Their smartphone app (IB) is quite straightforward and nicer to use than the one from degiro in my opinion. I never used their java app and I don’t think I would ever need it. (I tried both degiro and IB and switched everything to IB)
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And with swissquote you can import them?
Would you even need to do that?
Doesn’t Swissquote issue a tax reports for Swiss tax purposes that you could use as-is?
Exactly as @San_Francisco just said: No import possibility, but don’t have to. Simply have one line on your tax form that is referencing to the automated report they hand over for 100 CHF.
Everybody has its own preferences what is cheap or not. For me convenience is really high on my priority list. So coming from UBS, Swissquote is really “cheap” 
with most of the services that I expect to receive from a Swiss Bank. But yes, it has its price - I pay probably around CHF 10-30 per month now, depending where I do invest my monthly 4k.
So after 20y the SQ expenses would cost me projected around 23k (6%, CHF 50.-* p.m.). On the other hand, with the same projected calculation I should receive around CHF 1,857m after 20y. So this ratio for having my convenience goals in place is acceptable to me.
*put CHF 50.- average as my monthly investment will grow with time, so the expenses.
Well what service don’t you receive from IB that you get from Swissquote?
Does Swissquote set you up with the WB8 form so you get 15% of the witholding taxes on US securities back? That is around 0.3% per year or around 64’000 chf in your example.
How easy is it to buy securities with USD from a cheap forex trade?
I have to say that the IB web interface is also very easy to use and you can change the language to German or French
Hi @xorfish, we are all on similar paths and have similar goals, which is great as this forum shows every day. There is for sure enough room for our individual preferences to reach FIRE.
Yeah I don’t think you understand how this works.
Swissquote is configured for 15% withholding, but will also withhold an extra 15% for Swiss taxes, both of which are counted for Swiss taxes. It’s actually SAFER than IB where people keep selecting the wrong options on the W-8BEN and therefore getting 30% withholding of which only half is counted towards Swiss taxes, and which requires and end-of-year US tax filing to claim back (did I mention: refund in the form of a USD cheque which is difficult and expensive to cash in Switzerland).
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Because I was still not sure about the W-8BEN, I opened a ticket with Swissquote. Ask them where to find the W-8BEN for signing and what else I need to do when owning US ETF’s. Here the answer in German:
"Gerne informieren wir Sie, dass die offizielle US Quellensteuer 30 % beträgt. Für Schweizer Bürger mit Wohnsitz in der Schweiz kommt eine reduzierte Quellensteuer von 15% zur Anwendung, wobei gemäss Doppelbesteuerungsabkommen zwischen der Schweiz und den U.S.A. der Ausgleich mit zusätzlichen 15% auf total 30% stattfindet.
Diese zusätzliche Steuer von 15% können Sie wiederum bei der jährlichen Steuerdeklaration zurückfordern. Somit können Sie sich leider nicht vollständig vom Quellensteuerabzug befreien. Das IRS W-8BEN Formular muss zudem nur eingereicht werden, wenn Ihre Nationalität von Ihrem Wohnsitzland abweicht, was bei Ihnen nicht der Fall ist."
That means for me, that I have to put those ETF’s into the tax “Wertschriftenverzeichnis” and … that’s it?
Yes, and make sure the dividends have ended up on 2 further sheets, namely DA-1 and “zusätzlicher US Rückbehalt”. That way 15% is credited towards your tax bill & 15% is refunded. But using the software should be automatic.
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This is a supremely unclear answer. I would ask them, if they are a “qualified intermediary”. Otherwise, you risk losing 15% of dividends.
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The answer is a bit long and unclear, yes. But SQ is a QI.
See US vs. IE based funds if you dont qualify for W8BEN - #37 by rolandinho
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Big thanks @rolandinho, was searching here in the forum, but misses your professional introduction and explanation to the W8BEN topic. Is all clear for me now… again thanks and thumbs up!