I would like to know the best way to buy an S&P500 Tracker Fund (or similar) outside of a pension.
I think this question has been asked before, but I could not find a perfect answer. (there were quite varied responses)
If I look on the Vanguard website it says you have to buy via your Pension, and online broker or your bank.
Could it be worth doing through your bank? or better something like DEGIRO (which was recommended in another thread)
I have a UK trading account which I have registered to my Swiss Address (Charles Stanley). Maybe I could use an account in a different country? (the UK, I am a British Citizen)
You can open an account with Interactive Brokers and buy one such ETF. There are some options to choose from like SPY and VOO. I prefer VOO as it comes with lower fees but it is a bit less liquid than SPY, however, I do not think this is gonna be a problem.
IB is really cheap, I bought 50 shares of VOO (c. 22k USD) and I paid 0.36 USD or 0.16 bps. I am not sure about other brokers, but if you do not intend to execute trades frequently, this is a reasonable fee.
There is no perfect answer since it might depend on your particular situation and needs, but the consensus out there is quite clear: the best default choice (by a huge margin) is Interactive Brokers, unless there are reasons it does not work for you. See also https://www.mustachianpost.com/best-…n-switzerland/
I've not done a price comparison, however we have an account with Swissquote through which we've purchased such ETFs and we've generally been happy with them.
Also pay attention to the tracker’s fees. I saw you mentioned Vanguard so I guess you’ll go with VOO which is an excellent choice for someone with a buy and hold strategy. 1% of difference in fees is detrimental over a long-term horizon.
The first two are properties of funds and the third of the broker, so these are normally separate things (unless you are talking about niche funds supported by few merchants).
Re inheritance tax: you are not exposed to US inheritance tax if your total net worth is below 13M USD (in 2026 it will be half of that) - if this is an issue for you, you should probably be paying someone to help you manage your portfolio and let them take care of it
Regarding the first two, I am not familiar with the subject so I can't make any comments, but with regards to the 3rd one, I can say that on the Interactive Brokers website, you can easily create a report at the end of the calendar year which clearly states positions, trades, dividends etc. I have been doing this for a couple of years now and submitting this report with my tax declaration to the authorities. My accountant accepted it, and so did the tax authorities, I never had any issue.
I am not sure if the situation is any different if you are classified as a professional trader, but for regular buy and hold positions, I never had any problems with that report.
The "eSteuerauszug" allows you to simply drag and drop it into the tax declaration without having to fill out anything yourself... maybe I am just lazy (or have better things to do). My pet gripe is that Postfinance (de facto state bank) has not adopted the eSteuerauszug, despite having 2.5m customers. One would expect the government to have an incentive that (i) its tax payers do not waste time better spent productively on filling out tax forms, (ii) avoids the potential of tax payers omitting an account or two when filling out the tax forms...
For USA non-resident non-citizens the exemption on estate taxes is only US$60,000.
If you have more than that in stocks listed on NYSE then your estate will have to pay taxes.
If you buy the same index in the LSE then those would be under UK law and the exemption goes up to £325,000.
If you buy the same index in the SIX then you will have Swiss inheritance exemptions apply.
I fully agree that the first two are properties of the funds/assets. However, it would be a value-add if the broker gives you information on those two quite relevant properties. Considering that the broker has the underlying information on each fund (i.e. domicile, etc.) it would be easy to serve up this information (possibly with a whole list of caveats, i.e. at your own risk, blablabla)...
... indeed chasing a cheap discount broker to only get hit with US inheritance tax in a worst case scenario is a bad way to save money (again I know it is a property of the funds/assets, but truly who has it on the radar that owning some Coca-Cola, Apple, and Tesla stock alongside a US domiciled ETF or two, will expose yourself to US estate tax (which I understand can be anywhere between 18% to 40%...ouch))
There is a treaty between US and Switzerland that results in the fact that dead Swiss residents (who are not US citizens) with US assets are liable for the inheritance tax only if and only if their worldwide estate is more than 12.92M USD