Taking the leap with ETFs

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Sagit

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So, following on from this thread where I narrowly escaped a high-fee, long-term, expensive managed pension plan, I've decided to go the ETF route.

Some basics:
  • I'm Irish but non-resident for tax purposes
  • I live in Dubai
  • I get paid in UAE dirhams, which is tied to the US dollar
  • I plan to open a Saxo account, located in the UAE (but Saxo tell me the account would be domiciled in Denmark)

I want a portfolio of ETFs that's roughly as follows:

  • 33% European index
  • 33% All world index
  • 33% short term first world government bonds

My questions are:

  1. Do I need to specify to Saxo a particular exchange that I want to trade on (for example, New York or Frankfurt or Amsterdam?
  2. Given that I get paid in US dollar-pegged dirhams, should I specify the Saxo account in the US dollar currency?
  3. Or, because I'm European and will probably settle in Europe some day, should I specify euro as the currency of my account?

Would appreciate some tips!
 
Sagit said:
My questions are:

  1. Do I need to specify to Saxo a particular exchange that I want to trade on (for example, New York or Frankfurt or Amsterdam?
  2. Given that I get paid in US dollar-pegged dirhams, should I specify the Saxo account in the US dollar currency?
  3. Or, because I'm European and will probably settle in Europe some day, should I specify euro as the currency of my account?

Would appreciate some tips!
Click to expand...

I only have a Saxo (UK) account for less than six months, so treat these answers as completely non-expert:

1. You can buy shares on any exchange that Saxo give you access to from a single account.
2. I presume you're not going to leave a lot of cash lying idle in a trading account, as opposed to actively invested. So your money will de facto be converted to whatever currency the shares are denominated in. If you are going to be buying shares denominated in dollars and your income is in dollars, it doesn't make sense to convert it to euro on the way into your account and back to dollars on purchasing shares. Saxo UK charge 0.5% for each currency conversion (and the same on selling the shares again). If you are able to transfer dollars, a dollar account sounds the most sensible since that is one conversion less, but check with Saxo if there are any gotchas.

This thread from the other day probably doesn't answer many questions in your case, but let me know if you find out anything that could be usefully added to it.
 
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