Switching from CornerTrader to IBKR

Investing / Brokers
1

Hi All,

First post here but long time enjoyer of this blog and forum, thanks for having me :slight_smile:

I have around 200K CHF on CornerTrader split between VT, VOO & CHSPI. I do a handful of trades per year, not especially dilligently, and typically get hit with CT’s 35CHF inactivity fee 1-2 times per year. I understand I’d also save a CHF or two on transaction fees if I were to switch.

Costs aside, while I’ve been quite happy with customer service at CT, it seems like a bit of a weird shop to me, between not having 2FA by default and having to call them if you want to withdraw funds…

Around the time I opened my account, CT was still lauded as a favourite, or at least equivalent to IBKR. These days though it seems consensus here that IBKR is the way to go. I’m posting here to check whether I understood that correctly, and whether it would make sense for me to switch to IBKR, as someone who’s already using CT?

+Bonus question: Hassle aside, what would be the cheapest way to switch? I would have both accounts in CHF.

2

I can’t speak for IBKR. Regarding CornèrTrader, I share your thoughts. The recent implementation of their new login platform has also been rather cumbersome in my case. I’ve closed my account also for other reasons but I wouldn’t advise using CornèrTrader going forward, even though I have in the past (mostly because I didn’t know them enough then, I think).

3

According to Pricing: Our commissions and fees | Cornèrtrader | Cornèrtrader outgoing transfers are 50.- per position.

According to https://brokerchooser.com/broker-reviews/interactive-brokers-review/portfolio-transfer incoming transfers to IBKR are free.

Option 1: Transfer using the transfer forms → can take some time and might include some hassle when forms are not filled out correctly.

Option 2: Sell securities on CT → Transfer funds to personal account → Transfer funds to IBKR → buy securities

If sell fee CT + funds withdrawal fee CT + buy fee IBKR < 150.- choose option 2 else option 1.

Alternatively you can call and request a free or reduced outgoing transfer as 200k and the fees you generated is not small.

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4

But you stay invested and don’t really care how long the transfer takes place. What you should care in this case are fees.

You might also want to take it as an opportunity to consolidate your positions, like “all in VT”.

Or maybe not if selling and buying is more expensive than transferring.

Or you do it partially: transfer USD positions and sell CHF positions.

Get the numbers at take a look at them.

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5

i also have my portfolio with cornertrader and have now switched to interactive brokers for similar reasons as you. for reasons of risk diversification, however, i will simply leave the portfolio with cornertrader running and build up my new positions with IB. fortunately, cornertrader has reduced its inactivity fee to CHF 10 per quarter for a few weeks now. I think CHF 40 per year is reasonable if you do nothing.

if you want to change all your positions i would prefer a transfer and not sell and buy again. however, i am not sure whether cross-border securities transfers only cost CHF 50 per position? with CT there are relatively high sales fees and an additional 0.5% currency exchange fee. it is also important that funds or shares in a specific currency have also been debited from the account of the respective currency; otherwise an automatic conversion with fees to CHF is made to the CHF account when selling.

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