Barclays Stockbrokers has launched a financial spread-betting service for retail investors to trade on upwards and downwards movements in share prices.
The retail stockbroking arm of Barclays Bank says it has launched the service in response to research which shows that 40% of its customer base are currently using or plan to use a financial spread trading service.
The service offers investors the facility to speculate on the direction of future price movements of various underlying financial instruments including indices, currencies, commodities, equities and their associated options – by indicating the amount they wish to bet on each point movement.
The bank is promising fully interactive online dealing and instant execution, with guaranteed stop loss orders and a minimum stake size of £3 per point.
Barclays says it will complement the service with the forthcoming launch of a 'Professional Trader Platform', feautring an integrated suite of expert-grade financial tools designed to help traders to predict and analyse market movements. The service provides free level two data for investors that trade on average more than seventy five times in a calendar quarter.