Estably

Almost every mistake made about Estably comes from treating it as one product. It is two.

The discretionary side runs from estably.com. You sign a management mandate, the assets sit at a custodian bank of your choosing, and Estably trades the portfolio under a power of attorney. Pricing is an annual management fee on a sliding scale: 1.19% from EUR 20,000, 1.09% from EUR 250,000, 0.99% from EUR 500,000, 0.89% from EUR 750,000 and 0.79% from EUR 1m, with anything above EUR 5m negotiated. On top sits 0.30% in bank charges — covering custody, account maintenance, transaction costs, annual tax reports and cross-border fees — plus a performance fee on gains above a high-water mark. The strategies are Modern Value (hand-picked equities plus bonds, from EUR 20,000), Best of Funds (from EUR 50,000, plus 0.50%–0.80% underlying product cost), Asset Protect (physical gold and silver, from EUR 50,000, plus 0%–0.45% product cost depending on the silver ETF weighting) and a fixed and overnight deposit mandate priced far lower at 0.69% down to 0.13%.

The self-directed side runs from estably.broker. Estably introduces you to Interactive Brokers, the account is opened in your name at IBKR, and you trade it yourself. Pricing is per order: Xetra at 0.14% with a EUR 3.90 minimum and a EUR 99.00 cap, US shares at USD 0.01 per share with a USD 3.00 minimum, Eurex options at EUR 2.00 per contract, US options at USD 3.50, Mini-DAX futures at EUR 1.00 and CME Micro E-minis at USD 1.25. Minimum deposit EUR 5,000, no custody fee.

The one number that is missing matters. Estably does not publish the performance fee percentage anywhere on its cost page — the high-water-mark mechanic is explained in a video, but the rate is not stated. On a page headed "Transparente Kosten", that is a gap worth raising before you sign anything.

Estably, CapTrader and LYNX all resell the same Interactive Brokers execution, so the comparison is unusually clean.

German equities. Estably charges 0.14% with a EUR 3.90 minimum on Xetra; CapTrader 0.10% with a EUR 4.00 minimum; LYNX 0.14% with a EUR 5.80 minimum. Below about EUR 2,860 of order value Estably is the cheapest of the three — its EUR 3.90 minimum binds up to EUR 2,786, and from there to EUR 2,857 it still wins on the percentage. Above roughly EUR 2,860 CapTrader's lower percentage takes over: a EUR 10,000 Xetra order costs EUR 14.00 at Estably against EUR 10.00 at CapTrader and EUR 14.00 at LYNX. All three cap at EUR 99.00. Frankfurt costs EUR 4.90 minimum here, Stuttgart EUR 5.90, Tradegate and gettex EUR 5.00, Chi-X and Turquoise DE EUR 5.50 — note that unlike CapTrader, Estably does not make the alternative German venues cheaper than Xetra.

US equities. USD 0.01 per share with a USD 3.00 minimum, capped at 1.0%. CapTrader is USD 2.00, LYNX USD 5.00. Estably sits in the middle.

Derivatives. EUR 2.00 per Eurex contract, USD 3.50 per US option, EUR 2.00 per Eurex future with the Mini-DAX at EUR 1.00, USD 3.50 per US future with Micro E-minis at USD 1.25. Clients who sign up through an Estably partner site with a EUR 5,000 first deposit can be granted EUR 1.80 on German options and USD 3.00 on US options — a discount Estably publishes openly in its partner programme terms, which is worth asking about directly.

Currency conversion is 0.4 basis points with a EUR 4.00 minimum. CapTrader charges 0.3 bp / EUR 3.75, LYNX 0.5 bp / EUR 5.00, and Interactive Brokers direct 0.2 bp / USD 2.00. Every one of these intermediaries roughly doubles what IBKR charges its own clients, and Estably is squarely in the middle.

Bonds follow a volume ladder — 0.15% up to EUR 50,000, 0.05% to EUR 5m, 0.03% above, minimum EUR 5.00 — plus external exchange costs of 0.0425% and EUR 0.10 clearing per trade. US mutual funds cost USD 14.95 per transaction. Market data is billed monthly: German equities Level I EUR 16.25, Level II EUR 21.75, Eurex Equity Derivatives Level I EUR 8.75, US options OPRA Level I USD 1.50 with a waiver above USD 20 of monthly commissions.

This is the single most consequential difference between Estably's two businesses, and Estably documents both sides clearly.

On the self-directed brokerage account, no Abgeltungsteuer is withheld. Estably's own page is unambiguous: because the account is held at Interactive Brokers rather than at a German institution, tax is not settled trade by trade. Gains are credited in full, the cumulative amount stays available for reinvestment all year, and you declare it the following year by attaching the transaction report to your income tax return. Foreign withholding tax on dividends is still deducted at source; a W-8 form removes the excess US portion. Loss offsetting follows German rules per asset class — equity losses only offset equity gains, while forex losses can be netted against other capital income such as interest and dividends.

On a managed portfolio custodied at Baader Bank, the opposite is true. Estably states that for clients resident in Germany, Baader Bank automatically deducts taxable income and operates a Verlustverrechnungstopf — the German loss-offset pot. That is the conventional, low-effort arrangement most German investors expect, and it is the reason Baader is offered as the entry-level custodian from EUR 20,000. The Liechtensteinische Landesbank option starts at EUR 50,000 and the St. Galler Kantonalbank at EUR 100,000; both put your assets outside the EU, which is the point for some clients and a complication for others. Annual tax reports are included in the 0.30% bank charge on all three.

So the practical rule is simple. If you want a hands-off account where German tax is handled for you, the managed mandate at Baader Bank is the only Estably product that delivers it. If you want the compounding benefit of deferred taxation and you are willing to do the annual work, the self-directed brokerage account gives you that — with exactly the same administrative burden as CapTrader or LYNX. Estably does not provide tax advice in either case.

Estably Vermögensverwaltung AG is registered at Schaanerstrasse 29, 9490 Vaduz, in the Liechtenstein commercial register under FL-0002.625.340-1, with the earliest register filings dating to December 2019. It is a licensed asset-management company supervised by the Finanzmarktaufsicht Liechtenstein (FMA), audited annually by Grant Thornton, an affiliated participant in the Einlagensicherungs- und Anlegerentschädigungs-Stiftung SV (EAS) investor compensation system, and a member of the VUVL association of independent Liechtenstein asset managers.

The structural safeguard that matters most is stated plainly on Estably's own security page: as an asset manager, Estably is not permitted to accept client money or to acquire ownership of client assets. Cash and securities are booked at the custodian bank. Estably holds only a power of attorney to place buy and sell orders and to debit the agreed fee. Deposits and withdrawals run exclusively through a pre-registered reference account in the client's own name, which closes off the most common route to fraud in the independent-asset-manager model.

Protection then depends on where the assets sit:

• Baader Bank (Germany) — cash covered to EUR 100,000 by the German statutory scheme
• Liechtensteinische Landesbank — cash covered to CHF 100,000; founded 1861, group equity around CHF 2.24bn, entirely common equity tier 1
• St. Galler Kantonalbank (Switzerland) — cash covered to CHF 100,000 under the esisuisse arrangement, and 51% owned by the Canton of St. Gallen, which stands behind obligations beyond that
• Interactive Brokers Ireland for self-directed accounts — the Irish Investor Compensation Scheme, 90% of an eligible net loss capped at EUR 20,000

Securities at all four are held segregated from the institution's own assets and are not part of its estate in an insolvency, which is the protection that actually matters for a portfolio; the deposit guarantee only covers uninvested cash. None of this is a guarantee against market losses, and Estably itself is privately held with a share capital that grew from CHF 100,000 at founding to CHF 2.845m by the end of 2022.

On the self-directed side Estably is a pure Interactive Brokers front end, and it does not pretend otherwise.

Trader Workstation is the primary platform, with more than 60 order types, the Combo Selection tool and ComboTrader for multi-leg options construction, and full Eurex access. Client Portal covers account management, reporting and simpler order entry, and IBKR Mobile Trader covers mobile. There is no Estably-branded app and no proprietary web platform — a clear gap against LYNX, which sells LYNX+ as the reason to choose it. What Estably adds instead is documentation and teaching: a German TWS and Client Portal handbook, structured training sessions, an options handbook, a wheel-strategy guide for beginners, a margin-requirements explainer and a Börsenlexikon.

The market access is Interactive Brokers': more than 150 exchange venues across 33 countries and over 1.2 million instruments, covering shares, ETFs and ETCs, options, futures, warrants and certificates, forex, bonds and precious metals, with SmartRouting and ECN-style execution with no dealing desk. Estably highlights Eurex and Tradegate access specifically, which fits its German-speaking, options-oriented client base.

Two account types exist on the self-directed side and the difference is material. The Margin-Depot requires a minimum age of 21, permits short selling and leverage, releases freed funds immediately after a transaction and unlocks options and futures. The Cash-Depot is available from 18, trades only settled cash, releases funds two days after a transaction and cannot trade options or futures at all. Both require a EUR 5,000 minimum deposit or an incoming transfer of equivalent value, and both are available as individual, joint or corporate accounts. Trading permissions and commissions are identical across account types; only market-data packages cost more for corporate accounts.

The gap on the self-directed side is spot crypto — EEA clients get futures and exchange-traded products only. Estably does offer a discretionary Miller Krypto-Strategie within its managed range, but that is a mandate, not a trading account.

The eligibility rules are stricter than at most brokers and are published up front: you must be at least 18 (21 for a margin account), you must be trading on your own account, and you must not be resident in the United States, Canada, Iran or Australia. In practice Estably's marketing, documentation, phone lines and adviser team are aimed squarely at Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Liechtenstein, and the whole service runs in German.

Opening a self-directed account is a digital application with Estably's support, funded with EUR 5,000 in cash or an equivalent incoming portfolio transfer. A managed mandate starts instead with a questionnaire about investment preferences, a proposed strategy, and a transfer of the investment amount — EUR 20,000 for Modern Value, EUR 50,000 for Best of Funds or Asset Protect, EUR 100,000 for St. Galler Kantonalbank custody and EUR 1m for Estably Select. There are no lock-in or notice periods on the management contract.

Funding on the brokerage account is bank transfer only, in line with Interactive Brokers' rules; SEPA credits typically land in one to two business days. One withdrawal per calendar month is free before the standard IBKR charges of EUR 1.00 SEPA and EUR 8.00 wire apply. Managed-portfolio flows run only through the registered reference account.

Support is the personal-adviser model rather than a 24/5 trading desk. Estably publishes a Liechtenstein number (+423 222 29 70), a German number for the brokerage arm and dedicated email addresses, and promises technical help, training, market and instrument information and general problem-solving. Reviewers consistently mention advisers taking time on the phone, and the Trustpilot rating is 4.6 from more than 420 reviews — good, though a smaller sample than CapTrader's 800-plus or LYNX's 760-plus, and skewed by the wealth-management side of the business rather than the brokerage.

One thing worth naming: Estably markets heavily through media partnerships and named public figures, including a joint "Sicherungsstrategie" with author Marc Friedrich. Content built around a crisis narrative is a marketing strategy, not an investment case, and should be read as such when you assess the discretionary mandates.