Trade Republic: Review (2024 Update)

Trade Republic is an investment platform with a goal of making investments easy. Trade Republic gives new and experienced retail investors extreme convenience when trade a variety of assets, including stocks & ETFs, cryptocurrencies and derivatives. Founded in 2015 through a startup incubator, Trade Republic is based on Germany and is available in 16 other European markets including Austria, France, Italy, Netherlands and Spain.

What made the German savings app explode in popularity? The company has captivated the attention of savers and investors alike by offering a massive 4% interest rate on user deposits, a figure that starkly outpaces traditional banking options and places it at the forefront of the industry's most generous offerings. Adding to its allure, Trade Republic recently unveiled its own bank card, ingeniously designed to blend everyday spending with saving incentives. This card offers an attractive 1% cashback on purchases, seamlessly integrating the concept of earning while spending, all at no monthly cost to the user.

Similar to other investment platforms, such as the "all-in-one" investments app BUX (which we previously compared to Trade Republic side-by-side), Trade Republic maintains a very clear and transparent fee structure for using its services. It is available through both iOS and Android apps as well as in your web browser.

Despite being one of the youngest investment apps on the market, Trade Republic quickly hit a milestone of over 1 million customers and managed to quadruple that number in just two years, reaching a milestone of 4 million users by early 2024. That is an impressive milestone as the platform was only operating in a handful of European markets until the rapid expansion all over Europe recently.

The company also claims that about one third of its users had never invested in stocks or ETFs prior to finding their way the platform, which is a solid testimony to the beginner-friendliness of its applications. One of the rarer investment products available at Trade Republic is derivatives, it’s a relatively advanced asset you don’t typically find in an "all-in-one" investment apps.

To prepare this detailed review, we had 3 digital finance and banking professionals download Trade Republic app, spend a week using it extensively and provide us with their expert assessment of the platform. In this article, we present a summary of their most important critique and all the crucial information about Trade Republic you need to know. Our goal here is to inform an average retail investor well enough so you are comfortable deciding whether Trade Republic is a platform that fits your unique needs and circumstances.

UPDATE: As of 01.02.2024, the German platform now offers an additional benefit to all users: all Trade Republic customers now receive 4% annual interest rate on all cash balances of up to €50'000, paid out monthly.

But before we begin, we invite you to explore our selection of content created to help both beginner investors and seasoned traders:

It is no surprise that you will find all of the most common and popular asset types on Trade Republic. In addition to classic stocks & ETFs, you can buy, sell and store cryptocurrencies and invest in derivatives to further diversify your portfolio. In this section we’ll dive into some specifics on each of the investment products Trade Republic offers, including their availability, fees and key information to keep in mind.

Taking it one level beyond competitors like the famous Dutch investment app BUX, Trade Republic offers a wide selection of global stocks & ETFs beyond Europe & US, giving customers easy access to stocks such as Nintendo. The standard options of buying and selling securities are available with market order (executed at the best available price), limit order (executed at or higher a predetermined price) and stop order (executed at a predetermined lower price). Trade Republic charges no variable fees on orders, however there’s a €1 charge to cover settlement per trade, unless you make an order through the Savings Plan (more on that feature below), which is free of charge. Surprisingly, it is also possible to place an order by post, which comes with a hefty €25 fee per order execution.

An additional benefit is an ability to buy fractional shares, meaning you do not have to commit to purchasing a whole share of your choice. This is great as some shares can cost over €1000 each, and having an ability to only purchase €10 worth of this stock allows for greater flexibility when assembling your portfolio.

Trade Republic has over 50 cryptocurrencies available for purchase. Similar to stock & ETF orders, crypto trades are commission-free with a flat €1 fee on single orders to cover settlement costs. Buying Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP and many more can be done 24/7 and your trades (which can be as small in value as €1!) are protected as the platform is regulated by German financial authorities. An additional benefit is that crypto you hold with Trade Republic are stored in a cold wallet storage offline. Granted, the selection of coins and tokens available is not exactly impressive if you compare it with "crypto-first" specialized exchanges like the social crypto trading powerhouse eToro or the wildly popular US-based Gemini crypto exchange. However, the added convenience and simplicity combined with very low fees make Trade Republic an excellent choice for anyone who is not a professional trader.

Confused about the crypto terminology? Check out our "Beginner's Guide to Crypto & Blockchain" to learn more!

NOTE: Cryptocurrency trading via Trade Republic is currently only available in Germany, Spain and Italy.

Thanks to Trade Republic partnering with Société Générale, CITI and HSBC, you can access countless warrants, knock-outs and factor certificates through Trade Republic on European and US companies. This is a relatively advanced investment product for general retail investor population, we recommend to go through some resources first and experiment with orders of small amounts. The fee schedule for orders is consistent with other assets - zero commission on all orders and a flat €1 fee per trade to cover Trade Republic's costs.

NOTE: Derivatives trading is currently only available in Belgium, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Austria, Portugal and Finland.

One of the biggest benefits of Trade Republic is a straightforward and transparent fee structure with reasonably low trading fees. In fact, there is no variable commission for executing trades - only a flat €1 fee per trade to cover the platforms' costs for processing users' payments. Below you will find a table listing all Trade Republic usage fees and other costs applicable (excluding fees for custodial account services provided to corporations and financial institutions).

Please note: Fintech Compass is committed to keeping pricing information up-to-date at all times, however we still advise exploring theplatform's official website or information in the mobile apps in case of unexpected changes.

With an abundance of innovative and powerful investment platforms and apps available today, consumers are right to expect something extra. Below, we will go over the features and benefits that set Trade Republic apart from competing savings and investment platforms.

Trade Republic Savings Plan feature gives users an ability to set up recurring purchases of any investment products. Creating a "fire and forget" holiday or retirement fund for yourself is extremely simple. Just choose how frequently you want to invest, which specific assets you want to buy and put in a desired amount for each share or coin. The best part, however, is that purchasing assets as part of your Trading Plan comes at no cost at all!

Want to buy €100 of Bitcoin and €100 of Apple stock every time your salary hits the bank account? With Trade Republic, setting this up for years to come only takes a minute or two. And you can, of course, stop your plan at any time. This feature is more-or-less an exact replica of Bitpanda "all-in-one" investment platform's savings plan feature (and yes, they both have the exact same name).

Want to invest in cutting-edge Web3 companies or a specific industry but do not have the time required to always be up-to-date on the best performers and all the news in that space? With "Trending Topics", it's easy to invest in certain industries or business types, for example, Metaverse startups or sustainability-first companies. That way, you make use of professional traders' expertise without any hassle or time investment on your side.

To explore the selection of topics available, open the app and navigate to the "Order Manager" tab. You can find an overview of all active Savings Plans and when the next time they executed are. Worth noting: your pending limit and stop orders are also listed here.

For most retail investors, the biggest benefit of Trade Republic is the wide range of investment products you can have in your portfolio, all in one app. A truly rich selection of assets is available for trading: over 50 cryptocurrencies, more than 10'000 stocks and ETFs, plus derivatives to top it off. This means you can sufficiently diversify your portfolio using various instruments traded on different markets and exchanges, all in one app at a very low cost.

Security is undoubtedly the №1 concern when it comes to storing your money at any third party. Trade Republic is a fully licensed German financial institution that is supervised by the Federal Bank of Germany and BaFin (Federal Financial Supervisory Authority). This means that all customer deposits held by Trade Republic are subject to Deposits Protection Scheme for an amount of up to €100,000 and the company undergoes regular financial, security and operations audits by the regulators.

The platform also stores your crypto in a cold wallet offline, which is the most secure method of storing crypto. This makes Trade Republic as reliable as world's most reputable stock brokers like DEGIRO or the biggest and most reputable cryptocurrency exchanges with industry-leading security like the US-based Kraken Digital Assets.

Coming soon! You can sign up for the Trade Republic bank card waitlist by following this link. What we know already is:

• It's a stylish glossy metal card (not clear if Visa or Mastercard yet)
• Users get 1% cashback on purchases made using their TR card
• Your account balance automatically gets 4% interest rate, paid out monthly

We will make sure to update this review once the team behind this article gets their shiny new card. Meanwhile, it's worth taking a look at other great metal cards available in Europe today!

Looking for an alternative to Trade Republic? We carefully selected these three platforms based on preferences and feedback of thousands of users and opinions of our experts in financial services industry. Looking for more? Make sure to explore our curated list of investment platforms and apps or explore our collection of ratings and reviews.

Summarizing everything we mentioned in our in-depth review, Trade Republic is a great choice for retail investors who do not want the hassle of the more complex instruments. The platform can be positioned at a convenient intersection where it has simple user interface that’s easy to get started with, while offering more advanced investment products like ETFs and derivatives.

Therefore, we view Trade Republic as an investment app you can realistically stay with in the long run, considering both the portfolio of investment products and security aspects. While there are some gaps present right now, we do see great things on the horizon for Trade Republic.

The investment platform application, scoring a great 4.2 stars on Trustpilot, is available on mobile (iOS and Android) as well as on desktop through web browser login. The apps have a clear minimalist design and it should take you almost no time to start feeling confident when navigating them.

If you're keen to explore different types of investment products or plan to develop a habit of investing long-term, we certainly recommend you give Trade Republic a go. There’s no learning curve to the platform and no setup fees are required to get started either. At the time of review, Trade Republic awards new customers in Germany a free share when they sign up.