Selfwealth Review: Fees, CHESS and Who It Actually Suits

This review is for anyone weighing Selfwealth against the cheaper brokers. It does not end in a recommendation. It ends in arithmetic: published fees, read at source on 19 September 2026 and dated, plus a plain statement of who those fees fit. Where Selfwealth does not publish something, this page says so instead of guessing.

The short version

• ASX brokerage: A$9.50 flat per order, whatever the size. The dearest flat ASX fee of the nine platforms we track.
• US brokerage: US$9.50 flat per order, about A$13.33 at the RBA rate of 0.7126 on 18 September 2026, plus 0.60% currency conversion. All in, A$16.33 on a A$500 order and A$133.33 on A$20,000.
• Account fee: A$0. Nothing to open the account, nothing for inactivity, nothing to close it.
• Ownership: CHESS sponsored on the ASX, so shares sit under your own HIN.
• Premium plan: A$29 a month or A$240 a year, including ten free trades a year. Those ten trades are worth A$95.
• Ten years at A$1,000 a month: A$1,140 buying ASX only, A$1,730 split half and half, A$2,320 buying US only. Stake does the ASX-only version for A$360.

What Selfwealth costs

The pricing page is short, which makes it easy to check. There is no account fee, and deposits, dividends coming in and transfers are not charged. Brokerage is A$9.50 flat per ASX order, and US$9.50 flat per US order, plus 0.60% conversion on the US side. That structure is simple, which is part of the appeal. It is also the whole problem once you compare it with anyone else.

Order size, all in

The ASX column does not move. The US column does, because conversion is a percentage and brokerage is not.

Ten years, A$1,000 a month

The ASX-only figure is 120 orders at A$9.50. Split it half and half and 60 of those orders pick up the conversion charge. Go US only and all 120 do, at the A$19.33 all-in cost of a A$1,000 US order.

One gap worth flagging: we could not confirm a minimum investment, and fractional US shares are not confirmed on the pages we read either. Treat both as unverified rather than as absent.

The 0.60% conversion rate, and where it hides

The 0.60% sits on the US trading page. It is not on the pricing page. Anyone who reads the pricing page alone sees A$9.50 and US$9.50 and stops there, and the conversion line is what decides most of the US cost.

Take a A$20,000 US purchase. Brokerage is A$13.33 in Australian dollars. Conversion at 0.60% is A$120. The percentage line is nine times the flat fee, and it is the one you have to go looking for. Selfwealth's 0.60% is also the highest conversion rate of the platforms we track: Pearler publishes 0.50% and Stake publishes 0.55%.

One nuance runs in Selfwealth's favour, and it is a real one. The 0.60% is applied when money moves into the US account, not as a separate charge on every order. Fund the account once and place several US buys from that balance, and you have paid the conversion once rather than once per trade.

Our own table assumes conversion on every order, so it overstates the cost for that pattern. That model is right for someone funding each US purchase separately, which is how the other eight platforms work and how most people actually buy. If you convert a lump sum and draw down on it, read the US column as a ceiling rather than a bill.

Is Premium at A$240 a year worth it?

Premium is published at A$29 a month, or A$240 a year, and includes ten free trades a year. At A$9.50 a trade, ten free trades are worth A$95 against a A$240 fee. The free trades cover about 40% of the subscription, and you would need roughly 26 trades a year for that single inclusion to pay for the rest. Only ten of them are free, so on brokerage alone the plan cannot close the gap.

To be fair to Selfwealth, we have not verified what else the plan includes. The pricing we read shows the fee and the ten free trades, and this review attributes nothing further to it. Whether the other inclusions justify A$240 is a question we cannot price, so we are not pretending the brokerage arithmetic settles it.

Is Selfwealth safe?

Whether Selfwealth is safe is a different question from whether it is cheap, and it deserves a factual answer rather than reassurance.

CHESS sponsorship and your HIN

On the ASX side, yes: holdings are registered on the CHESS subregister under your own HIN, a holder identification number. The ASX describes CHESS sponsored holdings as those where the investor is the registered holder, with the HIN as the record of that holding. In practice your ASX shares sit in your name rather than the platform's, and the holdings can be moved to another sponsoring broker. CHESS is an ASX system, so this applies to ASX holdings only.

The AFSL, held directly

SelfWealth Pty Ltd, ABN 52 154 324 428, holds its own Australian Financial Services Licence, AFSL 421789. That is worth noting because of how common the alternative is: many brokers operate as an authorised representative of another licensee rather than holding a licence themselves. Pearler, for one, is an authorised representative under Sanlam Private Wealth's licence. Neither structure is better on its face, but a directly held licence means the compliance obligation sits with Selfwealth.

An AFSL is the licence ASIC requires before a business can deal in financial products or give financial product advice. Holding one means meeting conduct and compliance obligations, and only providing the services listed on the licence. It is not a promise of returns, not a performance rating, and not a government guarantee behind your shares.

What the Financial Claims Scheme covers, and what it does not

The Financial Claims Scheme is run by APRA and covers deposits with Australian banks, building societies and credit unions, up to A$250,000 per account holder per institution. It covers deposits. It does not cover shares. That applies to every broker, not just this one: shares held through any platform, CHESS sponsored or custodial, sit outside the scheme. A broker failing and a company you own failing are separate events, and CHESS sponsorship only speaks to the first.

Where Selfwealth wins and where it loses

Where it wins

• CHESS sponsorship with your own HIN. Your ASX shares are registered in your name and can move to another sponsoring broker. Interactive Brokers and Superhero both run custodian models instead, so the difference is real.
• Flat pricing at any size. A$9.50 does not scale with order value, so a large ASX parcel costs the same as a small one.
• No account fee. Nothing to open, hold or close the account, and no charge on deposits, dividends or transfers.

Where it loses

• ASX price. A$9.50 is the dearest flat ASX fee of the nine we track. Stake charges A$3 flat up to A$30,000, and CMC Invest charges A$0 on ASX buys under A$1,000. Over ten years of A$1,000 monthly ASX buys, Selfwealth costs A$1,140 against A$360 at Stake.
• Small ASX orders. CommSec charges A$5 up to A$1,000, then A$19.95, then A$29.95. Selfwealth is beaten on the first tier and through most of the middle one.
• The US combination. US$9.50 per order plus 0.60% conversion is the dearest published US combination in our set. Pearler is A$6.50 flat plus 0.50%, Stake is US$3 plus 0.55%, and Interactive Brokers comes in at A$6.17 all in on a A$20,000 US order against Selfwealth's A$133.33.
• Frequent buying. A flat fee rewards large, rare orders. Buy small and often and you pay it on every one of them.

Who Selfwealth suits and who it does not

This describes who the published fees fit, not advice. Check the shape of your own orders against the numbers above.

It suits

• Investors buying ASX shares in large, infrequent parcels, where a flat A$9.50 sits well under a percentage fee.
• People who want CHESS sponsored ASX shares under their own HIN, from a company holding its own licence, and will pay a premium for that.
• Investors who trade US shares rarely and fund the US account in one go.

It does not suit

• Small ASX orders, where CommSec, Stake and CMC Invest are all published cheaper.
• Anyone buying ASX shares monthly, where A$9.50 a trade builds fast against Stake's A$3.
• Regular US buyers who convert a fresh amount every time.
• Investors whose only criterion is the lowest published cost.

If the flat-fee shape is what appeals but the price is not, the Pearler vs Stake comparison covers the same structure at A$6.50 and A$3.