Saxo Bank, the Danish-based firm,
expects its

UK business to grow by 60 per cent this year as its trading platform exploits an expected continuation of volatile markets with a new spread-betting business venture.

The bank has partnered with London Capital Group, a provider of spread trading services, to launch a new service called Saxo Bank Financial Spreads. The platform gives

UK clients access to equity indices such as the S&P 500, commodities such as gold and oil and a number of heavily-traded foreign exchange currency pairs such as sterling-dollar.

Spread-betting, which in the UK is exempt from capital gains tax and stamp duty tax on transactions, has grown rapidly in recent years as a relatively low-cost way for people to trade financial markets. Firms operating in this segment include IG Index, Cantor and GFI.

“Our main competitors here generate up to 80 per cent of their revenues from spread trading and with this in mind it makes perfect sense for Saxo Bank UK to compete for a share of this market as well,” said Albert Maasland, chief executive of Saxo Bank in London.

“We are witnessing a huge increase in the demand for additional trading services, such as spread trading, from clients who want to take advantage of trading opportunities in volatile markets,” he said.

“Demand is further fuelled by increasing numbers of private investors moving away from professional money managers to looking after their own portfolios. The Saxo Bank Financial Spreads service offers tighter spreads than many of our competitors and, with a low minimum stake size, ensures we can offer spread trading to a much wider audience than ever,” Mr Maasland said.

He added that his typical client’s multi-asset accounts range from £10,000 to tens of millions of pounds, but as a result of the spread-trading initiative, clients with smaller sums will be able to join Saxo’s client base.