IG vs Tickmill — which broker is better?

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
• Six top-tier licences — FCA (FRN 195355), BaFin, FINMA, ASIC (AFSL 515106), MAS and JFSA — plus a mid-tier DFSA licence in Dubai; the FINMA licence among those six is a full Swiss banking licence at IG Bank S.A., which puts Swiss cash under esisuisse protection
• Zero commission on UK and international shares, and the GBP 24 quarterly custody fee was scrapped outright in January 2026 rather than merely waived for active traders
• Platform stack that scales with the trader: web and mobile for most, ProRealTime for charting and backtesting, L2 Dealer for full order-book DMA, plus MT4, TradingView and documented REST/streaming APIs
• US-listed options from USD 1.00 per contract to open with nothing to close, and futures at USD 1.00 per contract per side (USD 0.75 on micros) — rare for a European retail broker
• No inactivity fee at all, where most rivals start charging after three to twelve dormant months, and no minimum deposit on any account
• Weekend dealing on the FTSE 100 and Wall Street, plus published client-sentiment data showing how IG's own book is positioned

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
• EUR/USD at roughly 0.9 pips is mid-table; raw-spread brokers quote 0.1–0.3 pips plus a small commission and work out cheaper for anyone trading FX frequently
• The 0.49% share dealing conversion rate is a discretionary discount rather than a contractual one — IG has committed to it only until 4 September 2026 and can raise it afterwards
• No fractional shares on IG's own platform, which creates real cash drag when drip-feeding small sums into high-priced US stocks
• Pricing genuinely differs by entity and account type — UK GBP share dealing, multi-currency share dealing, IG Europe and IG Bank all run separate schedules, and the published tables are hard to reconcile
• Crypto CFDs are unavailable to UK retail clients under the FCA ban, so the headline market count overstates what a UK resident can actually trade

Pros

• Raw account priced at USD 3 per lot per side with EUR/USD spreads measured at 0.1 pips — roughly USD 7 all-in per standard-lot round turn
• No deposit fee, no withdrawal fee, and a currency conversion mark-up measured at about 0.01%, an order of magnitude below typical retail brokers
• Real exchange-traded futures and options on CME, NYMEX, COMEX, CBOT and EUREX from USD 0.85 per micro contract with a USD 0.00 minimum ticket fee
• IBKR Multi-Asset Account added in July 2026 brings genuine share, ETF, bond and fund ownership at USD 0.35 per US order, with fractional trading
• FCA authorisation (register number 717270) with GBP 85,000 FSCS cover on the UK entity, plus CySEC 278/15 for EEA clients
• Fully digital onboarding that clears in about a day, a 100 minimum deposit, and five base currencies including CHF and PLN
• Pays 1.8% interest on idle USD and GBP cash for accounts that stay active — rare among CFD brokers
• Every strategy allowed on both accounts: scalping, hedging and Expert Advisors, with FIX connectivity and VPS for automated systems

Cons

• The entire retail offering runs on MetaTrader 4 and 5 — dated design, a thin news feed, and no two-step or biometric login on the mobile app
• Research is licensed in rather than produced: Acuity, Signal Centre and calendar widgets, with no house analyst view of any substance
• Protection varies enormously by entity, and clients booked with Tickmill Ltd in the Seychelles get no investor compensation scheme at all
• Privately held with no public financials and no banking licence, so the capital position behind your account is not independently visible
• Aggregated public sentiment through mid-2026 repeatedly flags withdrawal delays, extra verification demands and slippage around news events
• No German or Austrian tax withholding: Tickmill is not an Abgeltungsteuer or KESt agent, so DACH clients must declare every gain themselves