Best brokers in South Africa

1

IG

4.5

The most complete leveraged-trading operation in Europe — and it prices like it knows that.

• Experienced CFD and spread bet traders
• Multi-asset traders who want one account

• Pros: Around 17,000 tradable markets in a single account — shares, indices, FX, commodities, bonds, ETFs, turbo warrants and crypto CFDs, subject to regional restrictions
• Cons: The 0.8% currency conversion mark-up on foreign-currency CFD and spread bet trades is where much of the real cost hides — on a USD position round-trip it comfortably exceeds the spread

2

Interactive Brokers

4.5

The cheapest serious route to almost every market on earth — if you can live with the learning curve.

• Active and professional traders
• Multi-currency investors

• Pros: US stocks from USD 0.0035 per share on the Tiered plan, minimum USD 0.35 per order and capped at 1% of trade value
• Cons: Customer support is the most common complaint: many requests go through the ticket system, and public reviews (e.g. on Trustpilot) often cite slow replies and template answers

3

CMC Markets

4.4

One of the best charting packages in retail CFD trading, wrapped around a narrower product range than the market count suggests.

• Technical and chart-driven traders
• UK and Irish spread betting

• Pros: Next Generation is one of the strongest charting suites bundled with a retail CFD account —115+ indicators, 70 chart patterns, 12 chart types and pattern-recognition scanners, at no extra cost
• Cons: None of CMC's derivatives is exchange-traded: the options it quotes are OTC and cash-settled, and there are no cleared futures at all, so CMC is the counterparty on every derivative contract and no clearing house stands behind it

Raw spreads and five platforms for traders who care about execution cost, not about owning the asset.

• Active FX traders
• Scalping and day trading

• Pros: Razor all-in EUR/USD cost of about 0.8 pips - a 0.0 to 0.1 pip raw spread plus USD 3.50 per lot per side
• Cons: Everything is a CFD. You never own the share or ETF, so there are no voting rights, no transferable holdings and no dividend tax reclaim

5

XTB

4.3

One of the strongest trading platforms in the commission-free bracket - xStation 5 is a professional workspace attached to a zero-commission share account.

• Serious charting on a budget
• Commission-free European stocks

• Pros: xStation 5 is one of the strongest platforms in the commission-free bracket - a real screener, market heat map, sentiment data, economic calendar and news in one workspace, on web, desktop and mobile with near-identical features.
• Cons: The 0.5% currency conversion charge (0.8% at weekends and on public holidays) applies whenever the instrument currency differs from your account currency. For a EUR investor buying US stocks it is charged on the way in and again on the way out, and it dwarfs the commission it replaces.

6

CapTrader

4.2

Interactive Brokers' market access wrapped in German regulation, German support and a German phone number.

• German-speaking options and futures traders
• Active traders who want IBKR pricing with German support

• Pros: BaFin-supervised German investment firm (institution number 10156708) with a Düsseldorf address, German contract law and a free German hotline until 20:00
• Cons: No Abgeltungsteuer is withheld. German investors gain a compounding advantage but must declare everything themselves via Anlage KAP, and a Freistellungsauftrag is not possible — for many people that alone rules CapTrader out

One of the cheapest routes to raw institutional FX pricing - as long as you check which entity you are signing with.

• Algorithmic and EA traders
• Scalping and high-frequency FX

• Pros: All-in EUR/USD cost of roughly 0.6 to 0.8 pips on Raw Spread - a 0.0 to 0.1 pip raw spread plus USD 3.50 per lot per side
• Cons: Most non-EU, non-Australian clients contract with Raw Trading Ltd under Seychelles licence SD018 - an offshore regulator with no investor compensation scheme behind it

8

Admirals (Admiral Markets)

4.1

The rare CFD broker that also settles real shares — broad, well-priced and unusually forgiving about dormant accounts.

• Real share investing
• MetaTrader users

• Pros: Real share and ETF ownership through Invest.MT5 — roughly 4,800 listed companies and 200-plus ETFs from USD 0.02 per share with a USD 1.00 minimum, with no custody or platform fee.
• Cons: Support is weekday office hours only, with no weekend desk — a genuine gap for anyone holding crypto CFDs over a Saturday.

9

Kraken

4.1

The most heavily licensed venue in crypto — and the only one that is also a chartered US bank.

• Traders who prioritise regulatory quality
• Crypto derivatives and margin traders

• Pros: Wyoming SPDI bank charter through Kraken Financial — a full-reserve institution required to hold 100% unencumbered liquid assets against customer fiat, with a Federal Reserve limited-purpose master account
• Cons: Entry-tier spot pricing of 0.40% maker and 0.80% taker is the most expensive base rate among major regulated venues, and you need USD 10,000 of 30-day volume before it drops below 0.40% taker

Thirty years, six top-tier licences and one of the strongest mobile apps in FX - attached to spreads you have to work around.

• Beginners
• Mobile-first traders

• Pros: Regulated by six tier-1 authorities - CFTC/NFA, FCA (542574), CIRO, ASIC (AFSL 412981), MAS and the JFSA - a licence footprint almost nobody in retail FX matches
• Cons: The default spread-only account is expensive: EUR/USD has been measured at 1.4 to 1.7 pips against roughly 0.8 pips all-in at raw-spread competitors

Raw-spread pricing, six licences and a strong mobile app - held back by its withdrawal record.

• Active FX traders
• Mobile-first traders

• Pros: ThinkZero all-in EUR/USD cost of about 0.8 pips - raw spreads from 0.0 pips plus USD 3.50 per lot per side on forex and metals
• Cons: 75 percent of ThinkMarkets UK retail accounts lose money trading CFDs, and disclosures across the group's entities have ranged from roughly 68 percent to 89 percent

A desktop-grade trading terminal wrapped in a zero-commission app — with a support desk that lags badly behind the software.

• US options traders
• Chart-driven active traders

• Pros: USD 0 commission on US-listed stocks, ETFs and equity options, with no per-contract fee — index options are the only equity-derivative exception at USD 0.50 per contract
• Cons: Customer support is the standing complaint: Trustpilot sits at roughly 1.3–1.4 out of 5, with transfers and account access the most common themes