Buy and sell spreads for invest

Does buy and sell spreads exist on invest? Is there a way to see the values of each, or is it so small you wouldnā€™t notice. Thank you

On the desktop platform both buy and sell prices are shown. On the phone app the buy price is shown, and then the sell price once you own a share to sell.

The spread differs by instrument, current volatility, time of day, and activity of market. Smallest spread is on popular US shares. Can be as small as $0.01 or $0.02 for APPL, whose price is $310, so less than 0.01%, Larger spread like 0.6% even 1% on instruments where there are only a few trades each day. The spread is determined by the prices offered by market makers on the exchanges, not by Trading 212. On some exchanges there is a financial transaction tax and this, rather than spread, is the main obstacle to frequent buy and sell. The lack of such a tax when buying US shares and ETFs contributes to their popularity.

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Appreciate it thanks

Hi all,

New to this trading game. Just recently opened up accounts for T212, Revolut, IB, and DG.

One thing Iā€™m trying to understand is why all platforms have different purchase prices listed for the same share. Todayā€™s Saturday so nothing is moving up or down today.

Tesla for example;

Trading 212; buy - 1548.05.
Revolut; buy - 1541.02.
IB; buy - 1542.00

The price on Yahoo finance is somewhere in the middle - 1,544.65 but not sure if this is buy or sell price.

Granted T212 is a sell at 1544.91 (0.22% difference to the buy) which is higher than the cost to buy on the other two and which is only a few cents difference to the Yahoo listed price.

So how does it all work? Why different prices per platform? Shouldnā€™t there be a universal price?

What is the share and on which exchange does it trade? Brokers have different feeds. But there will be a last price at which AAPL traded. That should be unambiguous.

Digression: interesting to know is that precise values of closing prices are important when valuing a large estate for division amongst beneficiaries and inheritance tax.

For UK taxpayers, HMRC says that to value shares on the day of someoneā€™s death for inheritance tax it is:
"the quarter up price at the date of the chargeable event. The quarter up price is the figure a quarter of the way up from the lowest to the highest closing prices of the day, as listed by the various market makers.

Example. Klaus owned 1,250 10p ordinary shares in a listed company. He died on 25 January. You should be able to find the prices for the shares of the company in question on the internet. The end of day quotation for this company on the date of death was ā€˜p1091 - 1101ā€™.

To work out the value of the shares, multiply the number of shares by the ā€˜quarter upā€™ price. This is the lower price (1091) plus 1/4 of the difference between the two prices (quarter of 10p = 2.5p). The ā€˜quarter -up priceā€™ is 1091 + 2.5 = 1093.5p per share. The total holding will be 1093.5 x 1,250 = Ā£13,668.75."
[reference]

"If the death falls on a Bank Holiday or a weekend (when the Stock Exchange is closed) you can use the figures from either the previous or next working day. So if a person died on Sunday, you could use the values from Friday or Monday (using Monday or Tuesdayā€™s FT), whichever is most favourable to the taxpayer." [reference]

ā€œxdā€™ (ex-dividend) - the dividend that is due remains payable to the deceased/transferor.ā€ So the dividend is taxed in the deceased last tax return, rather than in the tax return of the one who inherits the shares. [reference]

Hi Richard,

I was referring to the price to buy 1 share of Tesla.

Trading 212 - 1548.05.
Revolut - 1541.02.
IB - 1542.00.

Yahoo Finance state 1544.65 which is very close to the T212 sell price of 1544.91.

So T212 have a spread of 0.22%, not sure if this is good or bad but Iā€™m happy that T212 display a sell price so Iā€™m still inclined to go with T212, but Iā€™m curious about why the broker differences in price?

It is therefore likely that the last transaction of the day was a sale.

Merrill Lynch and Charles Schwab state 1,544.65, which is the same price as given by Yahoo finance and Google finance and the exchange Nasdaq. That is the correct closing price. I think the others are giving you values from their particular price feeds.

Itā€™s weird because now the T212 buy price for Tesla has dropped to 1,547.17 - dropped almost 1 dollar in the last hour. I thought the price couldnā€™t change on weekends?!

So how is it possible to buy on Revolut for 1541.02 - thatā€™s a fairly large difference compared to elsewhere even with a delayed feed.

This can only be taken as indicative of what you will get with a market order. It is not guaranteed. My understanding is that trades are subject to Best Execution, so you will achieve essentially the same price for a trade, independently of the broker.

I think, whatever the price difference, it not significant, because you sell on the same platform that you buy from. If the buy price is higher, the sell price will be also higher.

On the new app it isnt very easy to see in INVEST the buy and sell price and it isnt on the charts