Conflicts of interest

To continue to be as transparent as we can about how we do business, we have established systems and processes that allow us to identify, prevent or manage any conflicts of interest which may arise when we provide services to our customers. Our Risk & Compliance team monitor the effectiveness of these systems and processes on an ongoing basis.

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What do we mean by conflicts of interest?

Conflicts of interest can arise where our interests or the interests of our staff might conflict with our customers’ interests. They can also happen where our staff’s interests come into potential conflict with Freetrade’s interests.

Some examples of potential conflicts that could occur would be where we could:

• try to make a financial gain (or avoid a financial loss) at the expense of our customers;
• receive a benefit from a third party / intermediary, whether financial or non-financial, to use that  third party / intermediary for execution of customer orders or otherwise providing services to our customers
• have a financial, or other incentive to favour the interest of one customer, or group of customers, over the interests of another

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How do we prevent or manage conflicts of interest?

Firstly, by design. We’re building Freetrade for our customers and that remains our priority. That’s why we always try our very best to design and develop our product and operations in such a way that conflicts of interest are avoided.

Secondly, we establish policies and procedures to ensure conflicts of interest are identified, managed and mitigated. We keep a record of all identified conflicts of interest and monitor these to ensure that they are managed correctly. Where we are unable to put in place controls that are sufficient to mitigate the material risk or damage to a customer’s interests, we will disclose this conflict to the customer before carrying out any business on their behalf.

Order execution

We execute your orders in accordance with our Order Execution Policy.

We do not receive financial or non-financial benefit from any trade execution venues or counterparties in return for sending our customers’ orders to them (sometimes known as ‘payment for order flow’).

We do not make money from taking our own positions in the securities that we offer. We execute all customer orders as your agent. In future, we will offer fractional share investment to our customers, which will require us to hold a portion of the shares. However, we will not seek to make money from this and will provide further details on how this will work before we launch.

Investments offered

We offer stocks, ETFs and investment trusts, which are traded on trading venues. We do not receive any financial or non-financial benefit for offering or promoting products.

Gifts and hospitality and personal account dealing

All Freetrade staff are subject to policies and procedures on the giving and receiving of gifts and hospitality, as well as personal account dealing. Employees are not permitted to accept gifts, hospitality or other benefits that might cause conflict with our obligation to act in the best interests of our customers.