• Home
• Benefits
  • For active spread betters
  • Interested in spread betting?
  • Not sure about spread betting? »
• About us
• About spread betting
• 

Even for the experienced equity investor, financial spread betting can look quite daunting. With Marketmaker:Investor Edition, you can put your investing know-how to work in an exciting new environment. And there are some pretty sizable benefits to spread betting…

Tax free, commission free profits

With no Capital Gains Tax (CGT) on profits and no stamp duty to pay on trades*, financial spread betting already starts to look enticing. Should you make a £500 profit from selling equities in the traditional way, you could be liable to a £200 CGT bill (using the current CGT rate of 40%). Add your broker’s commission of £9.95 for example and stamp duty at 0.5% and you could be making net profit of only £287.55.

With spread betting, all you pay is the interest on your position for as many nights as you keep it open – it might only be a few pence (see a full example in our Introduction to Spread Betting).

Of course, financial spread betting doesn’t always lead to profit. One of the biggest causes of spread betting losses lies in not having a fully thought-out plan. With award winning research and analysis tools from Digital Look embedded within CMC Markets’ spread betting platform, you’re in a better position to create and trade from that plan.

Profit on a falling market

Click to see the full image

Markets are volatile right now. There are strong reactions to each new Sub-Prime write-down announcement, to rogue traders and to US interest rate cuts. Taking a profitable position through traditional share trading can be difficult.

Spread betting enables investors to ‘sell’ (or ‘go short’) on markets, stocks and indices.

The Investor Edition’s research platform enables you to take advantage of your analysis of – say – overnight losses in the Asian markets and take a position regarding their affect on the FTSE or Wall Street.

Start trading with a small cash outlay

Spread betting doesn’t have to replace your standard equity investments, but its low-cost entry point can provide a great means of supplementing it. You can open an account with Marketmaker:Investor Edition with as little as £200 and immediately be able to take positions.

Spread betting is all about ‘leverage’ and trading on margin. So, provided you manage your stop-loss plan effectively, you could take a sizable position on an expensive stock like Rio Tinto from day one.

Expose yourself to new markets and new investment opportunities

Most UK equity investors tend to place most of their trades in the domestic market – partly because it’s too expensive to invest internationally and partly because they don’t have easy access to research and analysis on foreign markets.

Spread betting with Marketmaker:Investor Edition enables you to balance your investments by taking positions on 15 international markets without paying high broker commissions.

Click to see the full image

Not only that, but have you ever felt like taking a position (either long or short) in oil? Gold? Google? The Yen? CMC Markets offers you international, currency and commodity opportunities you may never have had before. And backed-up with Digital Look’s award-winning research and analysis tools, you’ve never been in a better position to take advantage.

In short, the Investor Edition enables you to extend your equity investment strategy to spread betting – giving you potentially higher profits, new investing opportunities and the ability to trade from a low capital base.

Find out more

You can find out more about financial spread betting by reading our About spread betting section.

Risk Warning

Please remember that Spread Betting is a leveraged product and carries a high level of risk to your capital. It is possible to incur losses that exceed your initial investment. This product may not be suitable for all investors, therefore ensure you fully understand the risks involved and seek independent advice if necessary. You and CMC Markets, and not Digital Look, will be the counterparties to each Transaction. CMC Markets (i) executes transactions with you solely as principal and (ii) deals on an execution only basis - therefore CMC Markets is not under any obligation to provide any advice on the merits of any transaction. CMC Spreadbet Plc is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. *Tax laws can change.