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DEGIRO ReviewCapital.com Review
Written by Steve Miley, Blain Reinkensmeyer
Edited by Carolyn Kimball
Fact-checked by Steven Hatzakis
Although previously better known for its CFD trading platform, Capital.com has branched out to offer direct investing and trading in shares. They offer the lowest fees on our in-depth analysis with zero commissions and no “hidden” charges either. Although this is clearly attractive to many investors and particularly more active traders, the limited offering of investment options and the absence of a web-based or desktop trading platform means that Capital.com falls short for any investor or trader looking for the complete package.
-
Minimum Deposit:
£0.0 -
ISA:
No -
SIPP:
No
Capital.com pros & cons
Pros:
- Stock trading with no commissions or fees.
- An extremely easy, user-friendly mobile offering for charting, trade execution and position monitoring.
- Robust education and research videos and articles, particularly impressive given the zero fees.
Cons:
- Limited availability of investments in shares; no government bonds or funds are on offer.
- No web-based/desktop trading platform; all trading and charting is done through the app.
- For U.K. residents who are looking for tax advantages there are no SIPP or ISA account options.
Overall summary
| Feature |
Capital.com
|
| Overall Rating |
|
| Commissions & Fees |
|
| Offering of Investments |
|
| Mobile Trading |
|
| Platforms & Tools |
|
| Research |
|
| Ease of Use |
|
| Education |
|
Commissions & fees
There are no fees or commissions for stock trading and investing trading at Capital.com. Usually, after such a statement, we would go on to point out the “hidden” fees, such as withdrawal and/or deposit charges, inactivity fees or even that the spread between the buy and sell price is much wider than with other brokers. But this is not the case with share dealing at Capital.com. There are no fees for deposits and withdrawals, no inactivity fee, and the bid/offer spread is very competitive with market leaders in our testing.
Note that should you decide to trade CFDs with Capital.com, there are fees for holding positions overnight and for guaranteed stop losses.
| Feature |
Capital.com
|
| Minimum Deposit | £0.0 |
| Share Trading: 0-9 Deals/ Month | £0 |
| Share Trading: 10-19 Deals/ Month | £0 |
| Share Trading: 20+ Deals/ Month | £0 |
| Annual Custody Fee: £0 - £250,000 | £0 |
| Annual Custody Fee: £250K-£500K | £0 |
| Annual Custody Fee: £500,000 - £1m | £0 |
| Annual Custody Fee: £1m and over | £0 |
| Bonds - Corporate - Fee | N/A |
| Bonds - Government (Gilts) - Fee | N/A |
| ETFs - Fee | N/A |
| Investment Trusts - Fee | N/A |
| Telephone Dealing Fee | N/A |
| Visit Site |
Mobile trading apps
Overall, Capital.com provides one of the more user-friendly, though limited mobile experiences in our annual review.
Two apps are available at Capital.com, a stock trading app and a CFD trading app, and you can switch between accounts from within both. For our review, we’ve focused on the stock trading app. The app is available on both the Apple App Store and Google Play.
Capital.com also has a stand-alone app, Investmate, which houses educational content.
Stock trading app: All stock trading at Capital.com must be done via the app. If it were an addition to a solid or even basic web-based or desktop trading platform, we would be okay with what’s on offer. Viewed on its own merits, the app lands toward the bottom end of our analysis, with standard functionality such as a watchlist and a decent charting package; it also has the ability to view current news and analysis. But given that all interaction with your stock trading account is done via the app, we feel it is too basic and therefore somewhat disappointing. (See our picks for Best Mobile Trading Apps.)
| Feature |
Capital.com
|
| Web Platform | No |
| iPhone App | Yes |
| Android App | Yes |
| Stock Alerts | Yes |
| Charting - Indicators / Studies | 76 |
| Charting - Drawing Tools | 17 |
| Charting - Notes | No |
| Charting - Display Corporate Events | No |
| Charting - Stock Overlays | No |
| Charting - Index Overlays | No |
Other platforms & tools
There is no desktop or web-based trading platform for the share dealing account. Yes, there is a trading platform for the CFD account, but this does not currently link to the share trading account. So, while you can do some analysis on this platform, the actual shares are not available on this platform; only the CFDs on the shares.
Similarly, within the CFD account Capital.com also provides the ability to link to the increasingly popular TradingView web-based charting and trading platform. Again, however, this is not an option with the share dealing account.
The only charting and execution available for the share dealing account is via the mobile apps. The integration of the CFD charting and trading platform to allow for share trading and the ability to use the TradingView platform will be key developments for Capital.com going forward.
Research
The Capital.com research offering for share dealing is mixed. On the one hand, there is very little — practically nothing, in truth — with regard to the microeconomic details of the individual companies, such as financials, ratios or ownership. On this front, Captial.com is below par.
But they do offer video and written reports and analysis on stocks in the news, such as AMC or Tesla in the U.S. and RightMove and Rolls Royce in the U.K. Research on the bigger-picture, macroeconomic outlook for the global and national economies, as well as for broader markets, is of a good standard. The news section has in-house commentary and a section on upcoming IPOs. The firm’s YouTube channel has regular video analysis on oil, gold and forex, and, less frequently, on individual stocks. There are also weekly webinars, mostly focussed on macroeconomic and bigger fundamental themes.
Overall, Capital.com has a decent offering of research that would benefit from more depth to the individual stock financials and metrics.
| Feature |
Capital.com
|
| Research - Shares | Yes |
| Research - CFDs | Yes |
| Research - Funds | No |
| Fund Research - Research Reports | No |
| Research - ETFs | Yes |
| Portfolio Allocation Breakdown | No |
Offering of investments
Capital.com provides a limited offering of stocks; there are over 1,000 stocks available, but this is far from exhaustive, particularly when compared to market leaders such as Saxo Markets and Hargreaves Lansdown. Furthermore, there is no option to invest or trade in funds or government bonds. This means that investors and traders looking for a one-stop shop for all their investing needs may find that Capital.com falls short.
The CFD and spread betting offerings from Capital.com are far more complete. We would like to see Capital.com add to the funds, investment trust, ETF and bond offerings in future.
| Feature |
Capital.com
|
| Share Trading | Yes |
| CFD Trading | Yes |
| Funds | No |
| Research - ETFs | Yes |
| Bonds - Corporate | No |
| Bonds - Government (Gilts) | No |
| Investment Trusts | No |
| Spread Betting | Yes |
| Crypto Trading | No |
| Advisor Services | No |
Education
Wide-ranging, in-depth and well-presented educational content in both written and video format places Capital.com’s offering significantly above the average in our review of brokers, which we applaud.
Investmate: This stand-alone, in-house educational app, which is available to download by anyone, houses over 30 segmented courses, with goals spanning “Learn the ABCs of finance” through “Become an expert on CFD trading” to “Learn how to predict trends.” Each learning section and goal is broken down into bite-sized lessons and presented in a gamified way, which makes learning more user-friendly.
There are regular quizzes along the way to check your understanding of key concepts. Your progress is monitored and you can set daily goal targets. The education is offered in four languages: English, Russian, Spanish and German. Overall the app is a solid addition to an already healthy educational section.
Further educational offerings include:
- Written and video guides: A series of guides covers trading different products and asset classes such as shares, commodities, forex, commodities and ETFs, as well as trading strategies and psychology.
- Capital.com TV: A detailed and far-reaching catalogue of video educational content is bannered under Capital.com TV, housed on the website and at its YouTube channel. Playlists are divided into market outlooks (more research), essentials (covering market basics), strategies, psychology and broader education.
- Online finance courses on trading: There are five written courses, incorporating between four and eight lessons each, covering basic topics such as “What is the bid/ask spread?” through to the more complex “What is an IPO?”
- Glossary: An extremely comprehensive glossary of terms with hundreds of terms, described in significant detail.
| Feature |
Capital.com
|
| Education (Share Trading) | Yes |
| Education (Funds) | No |
| Education (Retirement) | No |
| Client Webinars | Yes |
| Client Webinars (Archived) | Yes |
Final thoughts
Having only ventured into offering stock trading in 2021, the overall package from Capital.com is mixed. Clearly, zero fees and commissions is going to grab the attention of more regular traders and investors, though the limited offering of assets to trade and invest in will disappoint many. The absence of a web or desktop platform may put off the charting addicts, whilst the lack of company fundamentals could frustrate those looking to do deep research.
The solid news and analysis section alongside a robust educational area are certainly significant positives. We look forward to watching Capital.com build out its stock trading offering going forward.
About Capital.com
Capital.com is a privately owned company licensed by the FCA, ASIC and CySEC and boasts over 1.8 million clients worldwide. With offices in London, Cyprus, Gibraltar, Belarus and Melbourne and support for 24 languages, it’s truly a global offering.
Methodology
For the 2022 StockBrokers.com U.K. Review, we assessed, rated, and ranked 11 U.K. share dealing platforms over a 10-week time period. Each broker was exhaustively tested on all available platforms and graded on 53 different variables. In total, over 17,000 words of research were produced.
Our rigorous data validation process yields an error rate of less than .001% each year, providing site visitors with quality data they can trust. Our team.
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Show allAbout the Editorial Team
With 30 years of experience in institutional financial markets, Steve has won multiple awards from Technical Analyst Magazine, including "Best Independent Fixed Income" and "Best FX Research." In addition to his work with StockBrokers.com, Steve is the founder of The Market Chartist, where he provides market research for institutional clients; and is editor-in-chief for FXExplained.co.uk.
Blain Reinkensmeyer has 20 years of trading experience with over 2,500 trades placed during that time. He heads research for all U.S.-based brokerages on StockBrokers.com and is respected by executives as the leading expert covering the online broker industry. Blain’s insights have been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and the Chicago Tribune, among other media outlets.
Carolyn Kimball is managing editor for Reink Media and the lead editor for the StockBrokers.com Annual Review. Carolyn has more than 20 years of writing and editing experience at major media outlets including NerdWallet, the Los Angeles Times and the San Jose Mercury News. She specializes in coverage of personal financial products and services, wielding her editing skills to clarify complex (some might say befuddling) topics to help consumers make informed decisions about their money.
Steven Hatzakis is the Global Director of Research for ForexBrokers.com. Steven previously served as an Editor for Finance Magnates, where he authored over 1,000 published articles about the online finance industry. Steven is an active fintech and crypto industry researcher and advises blockchain companies at the board level. Over the past 20 years, Steven has held numerous positions within the international forex markets, from writing to consulting to serving as a registered commodity futures representative.