Al Rajhi Capital vs Consorsbank — which broker is better?

Pros

• Licensed by Saudi Arabia's CMA since 19 June 2007 (licence 07068-37) and shown on the CMA's list of financial market institutions for dealing, custody, advising, arranging and fund management
• Wholly owned by Al Rajhi Bank, founded in 1957 and listed on the Saudi Exchange under 1120; Al Rajhi Capital's 2025 annual report includes an independent auditors' report
• One app for Saudi shares, international brokerage and Al Rajhi funds from SAR 10, rated 4.6 from 217,057 ratings on the Saudi App Store (read on 2 November 2026)
• Wide foreign reach in the published schedule: the US, seven Gulf and MENA exchanges, 14 European markets and 11 in Asia-Pacific and Turkey, plus sukuk
• US shares via the IBKR route at USD 0.01 per share with a USD 1 minimum per order
• Sharia governance in the provider's own words: a named three-member Shariah Board, a published Sharia list of Saudi Main Market companies, and Murabaha financing for Saudi shares that it describes as complying with Shariah
• Human help on the ground: 16 offices in the Kingdom, walk-in investment centres and a phone trading desk

Cons

• No published commission for Saudi Exchange (Tadawul) trades on the pages we read; the Saudi Exchange page linked for ETF and rights commissions returned an access error, so the home-market price is unknown
• High minimums abroad: EUR 18 per European order at 0.18% plus 0.05% a year in custody, AED 130 in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, and VAT on top of every commission
• Online opening only with an Al Rajhi Bank ATM card; otherwise, and for international brokerage, a visit to an investment centre in Saudi Arabia
• Aimed at Saudi residents: we found no offer for other countries, and online opening and the international-brokerage FAQ both route through an Al Rajhi Bank account
• No general investor compensation scheme found in Saudi Arabia, and client-asset segregation is not described on the pages we read
• Real-time prices on the international platform cost extra at an unstated fee, and education material is thin

Pros

• All ETF savings plans run at 0% of the savings rate on more than 1,700 ETFs, permanently — the partners cover the fee, replacing the old 1.50% charge
• The deepest derivatives access of any German retail bank: Eurex options and futures with volume rebates down to EUR 2.00 per contract, plus CME, CBOT and OCC options and futures on a dedicated Margin account
• ActiveTrader professional software and the Trading API are both free, with real-time monitoring, one-click ordering and Iceberg orders on Xetra in the Pro version
• Free depot, free Verrechnungskonto, free sub-accounts and free depot transfers, with no inactivity fee
• Transparent, published FX conversion margins — Bloomberg BFIX plus USD 0.0030, GBP 0.0020, CHF 0.0030 — roughly 0.26% on the dollar (0.30% if the price page's percentage margin applies to securities trades), better than flatex's 0.35% and more transparent than comdirect, which publishes no percentage at all
• Free foreign-currency sub-accounts in eleven currencies plus EUR, so US or Swiss proceeds do not have to be converted back at a spread
• Backed by BNP Paribas S.A. under ECB, BaFin, ACPR and AMF supervision, with the voluntary BdB fund protecting private individuals up to EUR 3 million
• From the second partial execution only the percentage commission applies — base fee and venue cost drop away, which materially cuts the cost of large orders that fill in pieces

Cons

• The tiered pricing starts unremarkable and the cheaper tiers demand real activity: Gold starts at 26 orders in a calendar year, Platinum at 501 and the six-star tier above 5,000, so an occasional investor pays Silver prices
• Direct foreign exchange access is priced punitively: EUR 34 for London, EUR 41 for Zurich, EUR 72 for Tokyo, EUR 121 for Singapore and EUR 136 for Wellington in venue costs per order, plus a EUR 21 USA Smart Order fee and EUR 69 for Canada
• Customer service scores 1.6 out of 5 on Trustpilot across 300 reviews, with reviewers reporting online-banking failures that blocked access to accounts and depots for weeks, and slow, unhelpful responses
• Share, certificate and ETC savings plans still cost 1.50% of the rate, so only the ETF plans are genuinely free once the twelve-month new-customer promotion expires
• ActiveTrader Pro costs up to EUR 119 a month for standard-status customers, and US derivatives market data adds EUR 5–29 a month — the professional tooling is only free once you are already trading heavily
• No CFDs, no spot forex and no spot crypto, and the Tagesgeld pays 1.00% p.a. outside promotional periods