Sharing what exactly did you burn your money on might be helpful.
What OP is exploring here will most certainly(*) not go to literal 0.
(*) Yeah nothing in life is, but let’s say “very highly unlikely” then.
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Sure. I invested in Switzerland. In a FINMA regulated private equity fund.
My point is to be careful, even more than you think you are already being, even when completed your due diligence, even in Switzerland, or Germany - highly regulated, well trusted investment environments.
Beyond that, I have no obligation to share my personal details, thank you dbu.
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So I guess the mistake to avoid is “private equity fund” when looking for something safe (and thinking CH + FINMA make it less risky).
Thanks for sharing and wish you the very best recovery, success happens!!
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For my curiosity: why not a Swiss Degiro account?
Actually, I have both (and IB).
The German one is a custody account I already had. I use it only for some static accumulating ETFs at Xetra, where I put some Euros I had available. And I save the €2.50 per year for a second exchange 
.
You can´t open custody accounts anymore so I wanted to keep it. I basically just sits there and that makes it easy for me to ignore it and keep myself from tinkering.
The Swiss DeGiro account has a few home bias distributing assets in CHF, on the SWX. I don´t really touch that either, apart from once a year rebalancing with the dividends.
The rest and clearly larger part is IBKR.
I have been eying Saxo, but with the percentage based costs and stamp tax I hesistate to use it for larger amounts, altough the e-Tax document is attractive. As long as most changes take place at IBKR it’s easy to record the dividends though.
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Thanks for the answer. It all makes sense to me. Even the €2.50 savings 
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And the exchange fees, and in the custody account, any paid dividend they charge for.
If I choose VT on IBKR, how much extra work am I going to have each year with filing the tax return compared to the SPYY at the German broker?
Hmm, it takes less than 2 minutes to make a report that includes assets, dividends and withholding taxes for the tax year. Another minute to enter those values to the tax tool and attach a PDF. But you’ll have to do this for with a German broker, as well.
Don’t think the IB reports include accumulating dividends as income. If SPYY is accumulating, that’s actually more work as you need to look up the distributions or enter the individual transactions.
Maybe you overestimate the effort of doing your annual taxes?
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You’ll have to do the same kind of work I described with ICtax whatever you are choosing, if not using a Swiss platform with (e)tax statement, where you’ll be provided with the right documentation automatically.
@Brndete is also missing the DA-1 stuff to deal with the tax authorities in case of VT.
Since you are hesitating:
Open an account at IBKR, fill in your profile and (tax) profile so withholding taxes are set accordingly for US securities, setup a recurring buy order (if you want to DCA) and automatic reinvestment of dividends, try out the report module and number fillings in tax reports. Oh, wait, are you IBKR Lite or Pro? Margin or standard account? Will you use IBKR web, desktop, tws, mobile App? Then do not forget to educate yourself about inheritance estate tax on US securities and document that for your heirs.
All this costs no money until orders are filled. You’ll see how comfortable you are.
Be ready to review any change in regulation whether related to foreign broker or US ETFs.
You’re on your own, IBKR may not warn you if changes apply.
Also review regular T&C changes at IBKR, how it impacts (/ or doesn’t) your situation. At the moment, nothing critical ever happened.
Honestly for someone looking to keep it simple you may as well find that the first steps (open an account and understanding the platform) are already cumbersome, but if you go through and like it, you have the cheapest option and will save a few dollars.
TL;DR:
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VT adds a bit of complexity tax (DA-1 and potential inheritance). Swiss brokers warn you about that, some refuse to trade them, but YMMV.
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IBKR is a lot more “powerful” than any other trading platform, but with features comes complexity. You have to feel confident managing your assets through a US company, US online-only platform. For a beginner, I don’t find it straightforward, but it’s a personal opinion.
It takes a few minutes to manage everything once you know what you are doing and how to do it. You’ll find people here ready to share their experience.
Lump sum in an acc ucits fund (a one-time thing), optionally with a Swiss platform providing you with etax statement to save a few more clicks, is miles away in terms of simplicity imho, and can still be cheap.
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You’re on a roll, obviously, and I admit, I didn’t really grok the point of your post, but last I checked, I had to buy this documenation – (e)tax statement – from Swiss platform Swissquote that you claim is provided automatically?
CHF 85.- is the last quoted price I see on this.
I must have misunderstood the point of your post. Apologies in advance.
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Which stuff is that?
Obviously, the first time takes a bit longer. I wanted to make it sound trivial for dramatic effect. 
Make it an hour including trial and error for the report or looking for help.
And yet, the info for DA-1 is literally the same as for the regular securities form, plus the WTH you want to reclaim. And your bank account where the tax office should send the money to.
I put all assets in there for years. Only recently they asked me to split my assets between DA-1 and non-DA-1 (or rather corrected it themselves), which takes some more minutes in a spreadsheet (which I even enjoy doing, personally 
). But that’s for a different setup, and doesn’t apply if you hold VT, only.
But you learn something and it saves you hundreds or thousands year by year.
It’s even optional to reclaim those 15% WTH.
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My point is that not everybody here is a geeky investor and so confident with whatever foreign online services to manage huge amounts of money. Op can get a feeling of that just by starting their IBKR subscription process.
I support the fact we want to advise people to save as much as possible, I also think it’s not a sin to pay more if it fits our profile better, and not keep trying to make every user feel bad about paying stamp duty or more fees at whatever Swiss broker.
When I read op first post, that they seem to contradict themself afterwards, they look for simplicity over cost saving and have little if no experience in investing.
Telling IBKR is easy and takes a few minutes to manage is not honest, at least it is not to make a general statement, for every person, every situation. We may not be on the same side of “easy”. IMHO even the reporting stuff is “complicated”.
I have no doubt that it takes a few minutes for you or Brndete to manage your PF without any stress, but customer profiles may vary.
It’s not a comfortable platform for beginners, it’s not a comfortable platform for Swiss people who want to feel “at home” and have someone to call in case of questions or problems, it’s not comfortable having to monitor international regulations and every move and change long term. I mean, I even read here OP suggesting “having VT in CH with IBKR”, and the least everyone must know is where their money is.
To answer you question, last time I checked, automatically does not mean free; I highlighted op’s concern about time spent in tax reporting, and that Swiss platforms provide means to tend to 0.
And I think I’ve read some of them provide it for free.
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Op does not have other securities or stock investments and wants to invest a one-time extra money 10 years before they retire and spend as little time as possible to manage it: orders, dividends, tax reporting.
I did post a how-to report an Acc ETF with ICTax just to illustrate how that works, and the discussion shifted on how it would be different to report a Dis ETF. Well, none, that was not the point of my example.
Op has the very right not to know a lot of things, but don’t advise him to use a platform where they MUST know. Only if they are ok to learn, trial and error incl., which was really not the initial specs of the demand.
Edit: don’t assume everybody likes to manage spreadsheets, learn about finance and taxes or that’s good thing to get skilled at this. Is DA-1 easy? Filling the form, not that hard, but if you consider as a prerequisite to grasp at least a bit of what it stands for, tax treaty (that may very well evolve), taxations rules etc. I know close people having ugly management of their tax reporting with international involvement and quite huge assets (cross borders not in CH). Their (professional) advisor completely failed and tens of thousands of extra taxes were paid for nothing. Lack of competence and interest in tax rules and over confidence in third parties lead to this situation, and they are well aware of that. I would have thought it’s a good lesson for them to learn. Has this situation change anything in their interest, involvement and skills on the matter? Absolutely not. They have other interests and/or abilities, I don’t judge about that. They just hope new third-parties will be better at it (and possibly have people like me make a comment about it).
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Thanks everyone, I’m fascinated by how much more you know than me.
JEPG makes a strong argument for my case scenario, which is my plan to retire in 10 years, hence do not bother with learning new platforms, filling out DA-1 forms etc., all in pursuit of marginal returns.
This discussion made me realize that it’s going to have to be my personal decision, as there won’t be much difference in total returns in 10 years’ time for these 200k between VT and SPYY, so I’ll have to decide based on simplicity and peace of mind.
Having said that, to be able to finally make a decision and be at peace with it, I’d like to kindly ask someone smarter than me to calculate or rather estimate the difference in total returns in 10 years’ time for these €200k between VT at IBKR (reinvested dividends, reclaimed WTH) and SPYY (accumulating, German broker). How much more or less money will I have with either of these ETFs?
The tax credit is for foreign withholding taxes on dividends, mainly from US-stocks (happy to be corrected, if it applies to other countries as well)
If we take VT
- it has a distribution yield of about 2%
- it contains 63.5% US stocks
- the tax credit will be 15% of that
So for 200k € (187k CHF), it would be
187k x 2% x 63.5% x 15% = 356 CHF of tax credit (~0.19% per year)
Do this for 10 years (at a rate of return of 5% p.a.) and we’re looking at about 4’500 CHF worth of tax credits.
Reinvest this tax credit each year and we may be looking at a bit more 
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Here you should take the dividend yield of US stocks only, not of the whole VT. Conservatively I took 1.8%, although it should be lower nowadays, and arrived to 0.17% p.a. or 320 CHF.
This forum is a hot spot of hardcore DIY investors, so we have difficult time to recognize that someone might not like to do this kind of things. But we should recognize that not everyone is like this and, most importantly, you don’t have to squeeze out the last bp to succeed in your financial journey.
@rexleonis I suggest you: if you are interesting in learning, spend time on it. If not, do it a simple way.
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This. Among other answers and remarks and questions. With all due respect. People here who answer have a responsibility of what op will be doing while OP is clearly not at the required level.
@rexleonis Do your own research, experience, simulation or go the simplest way. We are not talking a Migros-like discount by just switching shops here…
I’d also estimate the money lost by misusage and misunderstanding of using a platform if you want to be real.
First lesson about investment is knowing what you are doing, and while you can learn it here, asking people to think for you is very risky.
Don’t forget the tax credit only applies totally if your finances fit. ( Tax refund via DA-1 denied )
Having said that, I think I said everything (at least twice).
You do make valid points, even when we don’t argue from the same direction. But here you meant no responsibility, right?
OP asked for German broker vs. IB. Both abroad. Both require you or your tax consultant to fill some numbers in your tax return. And I assumed with German broker he’d rather meant some direct or mobile bank, rather than some century-old trusted private institution.
I’m not an IB sales person person and don’t even care what broker others use. But any of those easy-to-sign-up neo-brokers I came across look easy enough for getting started, but the apps encourages careless trading, bordering to gambling.
This is slightly off-topic I’m responsding to you, OP will do fine enough.
A bit exaggerating, but no, I really think it’s not smart to answer this way.
The valid answer to someone asking “can people smarter than me compute my tax savings using the platform and product you advise, because I can’t and don’t want to do it” is certainly not “of course, that’s x * y * z makes zillions bucks, just go with the flow and use IBKR just like us, that’s so easy and money saving it would be a dumb thing not to do it, could be even more money saved if I add expected return on the tax credit reinvested! Only noobs go with Swiss brokers, pay high fees and pay for their etax statements. Be smart, that’s not so complicated.”
I mean, someone asking this very question should not be answered like that. We’re encouraging a route that imho is really not the right one for OP and make them feel bad because money’s at stake and money can be saved. I’m not telling we can’t share, advise, teach and learn, but when someone clearly delegates a complexity they don’t feel like handling themself to anonymous forum users, if you want to answer something right, just don’t answer that.
@rexleonis Compute by yourself by understanding tax treaty, tax processing and tax rules applied to your very personal situation (btw you’ll find a lot of ressource on this very forum about all of it) and if that’s too much to ask, skip it and make it simpler, don’t rely on forum users to guide you with your finance optimization step by step.
Also there is absolutely no shame not investing time in DIY investing and tax reporting, and it’s certainly not a proof of intelligence or being smart. Just either you do it by yourself and commit, or don’t, and that can be a very smart move as well.