I have only an USD account with them and don't feel like experimenting
Isn't that what you said you did?
Some complaints I have against ADRs: price premium compared to native exchanges, additional dividend fees, 15% non-reclaimable tax, and last but not least they're probably subject to US inheritance taxes unlike original stocks if you have someone to inherit them to.
No stamp duty seems to be the main benefit (besides buying in USD), but that's relevant just for certain exchanges. Swiss stocks bought through a non-Swiss broker won't have it.
I don't think that ADR's carry a premium as the spread is tiny. Remember dealers like GS will buy on 1 exchange & sell on another if there is any arbitrage to be done.
The ADR's I held had ZERO withholding tax, as they were not US Assets. These included Vodaphone, Royal Dutch Shell, China Mobile. I believe they fall outside US inheritance tax being non US assets. ADR's of UK companies avoid UK stamp Duty, so it's way better to buy as ADR's.
I only have a US account with them however they provide instructions for foreign currencies. You get a very good rate of exchange . Historically the had an account in CH for CHF, however that seems to have changed. http://international.schwab.com/publ...tructions.html
I am leaning towards Schwab or td ameritrade but what about witholding tax and US estate tax? Are US based brokers also better to buy international stocks. For ex - Vanguard also has ETFs listed in Ireland that mirror the ones in the US. Any advantage/ disadvantage to buy the ones listed in US=
I will have a look at captrader as well.
Ideally the broker should allow in-payments in CHF and not charge absurd amounts like banks for conversion and out payments should also be flexible (even though I am not looking at cashing out in the near future)
Any idea how the debit cards work from either of the these traders. Can I withdraw anywhere in the world without any crazy charges (every time I think about charges from swiss banks I get a shock, normally baking services should be free but that is another topic)
@ fatmanfilms - do you still think fundsmith is a good option today with its current valuation and is the 1.27% fee on their euro traded fund not high?
With a Schwab debit card you pay zero charges using an ATM.
I still have well in excess of 50% of net worth in Fundsmith, more than half in the Euro fund. I don't expect that to change very much in the next 25-35 years (I will be 90 years old by then if still alive). The lack of trading by Terry Smith & hidden costs that entails makes the fund better value than it looks. Many funds waste 1.5-3 % by overtrading, it does not form part of charges.
Filing W8-BEN with the broker should reduce US dividend withholding rate to 15%. You can't get this money back, but you can get the swiss tax office to subtract it from your swiss taxes to avoid double taxation. US estate tax is a concern for your next of kin if you die. It's better to hold european funds to avoid getting hit by it.
Differences are in trading fees (it's more expensive to buy on european exchanges), taxation, dividend withholding rates, US estate tax, and also european funds are allowed to reinvest dividends unlike US. You can get raw data to evaluate end-to-end efficiency of different funds from the swiss tax perpective on https://www.ictax.admin.ch/extern/en.html#/search
Most brokers don't offer any cards, it's not a core part of their business. Schwab does - you can get a visa debit card backed by your trading account balance, and it works like that yes, free worldwide withdrawals at intrabank rates or very close, it's pretty good. They even reimburse some ATM fees.
I don't know what permit you have but this is incorrect. As a C permit holder in ZH I received all withholding tax claimed back as CREDIT to my bank within 6 weeks of submitting my return. Final tax payable would be agreed 9 - 36 months later.
Schwab operates as a bank as well as a broker, which is why they have a card. Mt Schwab Checkes are still valid where TDA stopped foreign residents using then about 5 years ago.
I am tired of Swissquote, their depot charges are ridiculous. I want to stay in Europe and trade 100% ETFs, any fee is my enemy. Any advice? How about Degiro, they now have a Swiss site. How about their documentation for my Swiss tax return? Any exprience?
Take a look at Saxobank. FX, futures, options, stocks, CFDs. The charges should be compared to other brokers. I trade only futures and get quite low commitions rates since I traded more than 1000 contracts a month. After that they keep the rates for long even if you don't trade that amount of contracts next months.
I would like to know how if we can transfer CHF to their accounts instead of Euros to avoid the bank conversion fees? And what exchange rate do they give as they do their accounting in Euros.
It's a shame you waited, the fund has been very strong recently after a few disappointing months, of course people are only motivated to buy after a strong run, which is the wrong way to look at investing.
Unfortunately you can't, I would have rather sent them USD but it was not an option, strange as over 60% of the fund is traded as USD.
With Currency fair the cost is tiny, so thats what I have done, however you will need a Euro account yourself. This is easy as Swiss banks will open Euro accounts without any issue.
I did not wait just the time it took me to get the paperwork going. I don't have sufficient time to be on top of my investments so would look to systematically invest into fundsmith.
They did not ask for any Euro account for the moment..I think that will only be when I would like to sell my allocation. But that could also come to the Swiss account by converting it into chf ?
Is there an online portal where I can track my portfolio?
Normally this should be provided by the fund but haven't received any response to the queries I sent them.