What is the added advantage of a broker being a member of NFA in addition to IIROC
"This shows that in each market (US and Canada) the company is registered with the appropriate regulatory organization. OANDA is registered in the US with the National Futures Association which is a ""self-regulatory organization for the U.S. derivatives industry"". OANDA Canada is registered in Canada with IIROC which is the ""Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada"".  The company does business in both the US and in Canada so the US arm is registered with the US regulatory organization and the Canadian arm is registered with the Canadian regulatory organization."
"I also don't know the specific details for Finland and/or Belgium, however many countries have tax treaties, which generally prevent double taxation (i.e., paying tax in both countries on the same base income). Being that both Finland and Belgium are EU member states, I'm quite certain there's a provision that covers this, and the same would apply: You pay taxes on what you earn while in Finland to Finland, and to Belgium what you earn while in Belgium. All of this is similar to what you presented, however there's also a section where you'd declare how much taxes were paid in other countries. One other thing to note, which will be the determining factor in the above, is whether EU law requires you to change residence to BE for the time you're there. If not  then you'll be paying taxes in Finland the entire time on the entire amount. This comes from an Irish governmental site: ""By working in another member state and by transferring your residence there, you are likely to become ""resident for tax purposes"" there. The definition of fiscal residence varies from one member state to another. You must comply with the laws of the country where you have established your residence. The laws on personal taxation vary considerably from one member state to another and you may be liable for taxation in more than one country. In general, you are subject to income tax in the country where you are living but this may not be the case if you are a “posted worker” – see below. In general, property is taxed in the country in which it is situated but, again, there are variations. Tax agreements have been concluded between most of the member states of the EU, which are intended to avoid double taxation, if you derive income from different countries. In general, national fiscal rules must respect the fundamental principle of non-discrimination against nationals of another EU country.""" "I have received a response from SIPC, confirming littleadv's answer: For a brief background, the protections available under the Securities   Investor Protection Act (""SIPA""), are only available in the context of   a liquidation proceeding of a SIPC member broker-dealer and relate to   the ""custody"" of securities and related cash at the SIPC member   broker-dealer. Thus, if a SIPC member broker-dealer were to fail at a   time when a customer had securities and/or cash in the custody of the   SIPC member broker-dealer, in most instances it would be SIPC's   obligation to restore those securities and cash to the customer,   within statutory limits. That does not mean, however, that the   customer would necessarily receive the original value of his or her   purchase. Rather, the customer receives the security itself and/or the   value of the customer's account as of the day that the liquidation   commenced. SIPC does not protect against the decline in value of any   security. In a liquidation proceeding under the SIPA, SIPC may advance   up to $500,000 per customer (including a $250,000 limit on cash in the   account). Please note that this protection only applies to the extent that you   entrust cash or securities to a U.S. SIPC member. Foreign broker   dealer subsidiaries are not SIPC members. However, to the extent that   any assets, including foreign securities, are being held by the U.S.   broker dealer, the assets are protected by SIPC. Stocks listed on the   LSE are protected by SIPC to the extent they are held with a SIPC   member broker dealer, up to the statutory limit of $500,000 per   customer. As I mentioned in the comments, in the case of IB, indeed they have a foreign subsidiary, which is why SIPC does not cover it (rather they are insured by Lloyds of London for such cases)." I don't know where your trade figures are from. ETrade, TD Ameritrade, Fidelity, etc all have trading costs under 10 USD per share, so I'm not sure where your costs are coming from. I doubt currency conversion or anything like that will double the cost. As for your question, the answer is: It depends How much trading will you do? In what types of investments? For example, Schwab charges no commission on ETF purchases, but this is not an advantage if you wont buy ETFs. Consider minimums. Different brokers have different minimum cash balance/deposit requirements, so make sure you can meet those. It's true that you can get real time quotes anywhere, but consider the other services. For example, TD Ameritrade pools research reports for many publicly traded companies which are nice to read about what analysts have to say. Different brokers given different research tools, so read about offerings and see what's most useful to you. You can open different brokerage accounts, but it's much more convenient to have a one-stop place where you can do all you trading. Pick a broker which is low cost and offers a variety of investments as well as good customer support and a straightforward system. "SIPC is a corporation - a legal entity separate from its owners. In the case of SIPC, it is funded through the fees paid by its members. All the US brokers are required to be members and to contribute to SIPC funds. Can it go bankrupt? Of course. Any legal entity can go bankrupt. A person can go bankrupt. A country can go bankrupt. And so can anything in between. However, looking at the history of things, there are certain assumptions that can be made. These are mere guesses, as there's no law about any of these things (to the best of my knowledge), but seeing how things were - we can try and guess that they will also be like this in the future. I would guess, that in case of a problem for the SIPC to meet its obligation, any of the following would happen (or combinations): Too big to fail - large insurance companies had been bailed out before by the governments since it was considered that their failure would be more destructive to the economy than the bailout. AIG as an example in the US. SIPC is in essence is an insurance company. So is Lloyd's of London. Breach of trust of the individual investors that can lead to a significant market crash. That's what happened in the US to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They're now ""officially"" backed by the US government. If SIPC is incapable of meeting its obligation, I would definitely expect the US government to step in, even though there's no such obligation. Raising funds through charging other members. If the actuary calculations were incorrect, the insurance companies adjust them and raise premiums. That is what should happen in this case as well. While may not necessarily solve a cashflow issue, in the long term it will allow SIPC to balance, so that bridge loans (from the US government/Feds/public bonds) could be used in between. Not meeting obligations, i.e.: bankruptcy. That is an option, and insurance companies have gone bankrupt before. Not unheard of, but from the past experience - again, I'd expect the US government to step in. In general, I don't see any significant difference between SIPC in the US and a ""generic"" insurance coverage elsewhere. Except that in the US SIPC is mandatory, well regulated, and the coverage is uniform across brokerages, which is a benefit to the consumer." No, there is no real advantage. The discrepancies in how they track the index will (generally) be so small that this provides very, very limited diversification, while increasing the complexity of your investments. Ok, that's totally different then.  The legislation that you were mentioning doesn't apply to prop shops that trade derivatives.   If you want to end up in the equities world, then a place that requires those licenses that will pay for it doesn't seem like a bad deal. "As the other answer said, the person who owns the lent stock does not benefit directly.  They may benefit indirectly in that brokers can use the short lending profits to reduce their fees or in that they have the option to short other stocks at the same terms.   Follow-up question: what prevents the broker lending the shares for a very short time (less than a day), pocketing the interest and returning the lenders their shares without much change in share price (because borrowing period was very short). What prevents them from doing that many times a day ? Lack of market.   Short selling for short periods of time isn't so common as to allow for ""many"" times a day.  Some day traders may do it occasionally, but I don't know that it would be a reliable business model to supply them.  If there are enough people interested in shorting the stock, they will probably want to hold onto it long enough for the anticipated movement to happen.   There are transaction costs here.  Both fees for trading at all and the extra charges for short sale borrowing and interest.  Most stocks do not move down by large enough amounts ""many"" times a day.  Their fluctuations are smaller.  If the stock doesn't move enough to cover the transaction fees, then that seller lost money overall.  Over time, sellers like that will stop trading, as they will lose all their money.   All that said, there are no legal blocks to loaning the stock out many times, just practical ones.  If a stock was varying wildly for some bizarre reason, it could happen." "So, the term ""ready market"" simply means that a market exists in which there are legitimate buy/sell offers, meaning there are investors willing to own or trade in the security. A ""spot market"" means that the security/commodity is being delivered immediately, rather at some predetermined date in the future (hence the term ""futures market"").  So if you buy oil on the spot market, you'd better be prepared to take immediate delivery, where as when you buy a futures contract, the transaction doesn't happen until some later date.  The advantage for futures contract sellers is the ability to lock in the price of what they're selling as a hedge against the possibility of a price drop between now and when they can/will deliver the commodity.  In other words, a farmer can pre-sell his grain at a set price for some future delivery date so he can know what he's going to get regardless of the price of grain at the time he delivers it.  The downside to the farmer is that if grain prices rise higher than what he sold them for as futures contracts then he loses that additional money.  That's the advantage to the buyer, who expects the price to rise so he can resell what he bought from the farmer at a profit. When you trade on margin, you're basically borrowing the money to make a trade, whether you're trading long (buying) or short (selling) on a security.  It isn't uncommon for traders to pledge securities they already own as collateral for a margin account, and if they are unable to cover a margin call then those securities can be liquidated or confiscated to satisfy the debt.  There still may even be a balance due after such a liquidation if the pledged securities don't cover the margin call. Most of the time you pay a fee (or interest rate) on whatever you borrow on margin, just like taking out a bank loan, so if you're going to trade on margin, you have to include those costs in your calculations as to what you need to earn from your investment to make a profit. When I short trade, I'm selling something I don't own in the expectation I can buy it back later at a lower price and keep the difference.  For instance, if I think Apple shares are going to take a steep drop at some point soon, I can short them.  So imagine I short-sell 1000 shares of AAPL at the current price of $112.  That means my brokerage account is credited with the proceeds of the sale ($112,000), and I now owe my broker 1000 shares of AAPL stock.  If the stock drops to $100 and I ""cover my short"" (buy the shares back to repay the 1000 I borrowed) then I pay $100,000 for them and give them to my broker.  I keep the difference ($12,000) between what I sold them for and what I paid to buy them back, minus any brokerage fees and fees the broker may charge me for short-selling. In conclusion, a margin trade is using someone else's money to make a trade, whether it's to buy more or to sell short.  A short trade is selling shares I don't even own because I think I can make money in the process. I hope this helps."