Broker advice

[quendidil]

I've been working in my first job since graduating for slightly after one year now.

I've saved about $30K in my UOB One Account. I'm currently thinking of more ways to invest my money.

I'm thinking that I mostly just want to invest in US index-linked ETFs. QQQ, MDY.

I have an old Interactive Brokers account I set up before I was 25 years old, the fees are still $3 per month even though I don't trade actively. I'm not sure if this was an error and they will reset it if they know I'm older than 25 now or if you started the account early they will keep the fees that way. Anyway, I have about $3,000 in there. I put it in when I thought I could make money from options, but thankfully didn't lose too much.

I'm not sure if I should keep this account if I just want to buy and hold ETFs. Interactive Brokers offers the widest variety of products, so in the future if I want to, I can invest in Japanese stocks, Singaporean stocks etc. On the other hand, their fee structure seems to be designed for active traders, which I don't think I will be any time soon.

Any advice?

Thanks

 

[Shiny Things]

I've been working in my first job since graduating for slightly after one year now.

I've saved about $30K in my UOB One Account. I'm currently thinking of more ways to invest my money.

I'm thinking that I mostly just want to invest in US index-linked ETFs. QQQ, MDY.

I have an old Interactive Brokers account I set up before I was 25 years old, the fees are still $3 per month even though I don't trade actively. I'm not sure if this was an error and they will reset it if they know I'm older than 25 now or if you started the account early they will keep the fees that way. Anyway, I have about $3,000 in there. I put it in when I thought I could make money from options, but thankfully didn't lose too much.

I'm not sure if I should keep this account if I just want to buy and hold ETFs. Interactive Brokers offers the widest variety of products, so in the future if I want to, I can invest in Japanese stocks, Singaporean stocks etc. On the other hand, their fee structure seems to be designed for active traders, which I don't think I will be any time soon.

Any advice?

Thanks

So, couple of things going on here:
1) Keep your IB account! Even if you're not an active trader, it's still a pretty solid broker (though you should be aware, they won't let you trade Singaporean stocks if you're a Singaporean resident, because ~reasons~).
2) Look outside the US. There are plenty of good investments outside the States: Europe, Japan, Australia, etc. etc. etc. (Or you can just buy the whole world in one hit, with something like IWDA.)
3) Don't look at US-listed ETFs; look at their UK-listed equivalents. The US listed ETFs have pretty hefty taxes on their dividends, compared to the exact same thing listed in the UK; this might seem odd, but you can save a fair bit by buying the UK-listed equivalent ETFs.