Stake Review: A$3 ASX Orders, CHESS Custody and the 0.55% Funding Charge

The short version

• A$3.00 flat per ASX order up to A$30,000 of trade value, then 0.01% above that.
• US orders cost US$3.00 flat, about A$4.21 at the RBA rate of 0.7126 for 18 September 2026, up to US$30,000, then 0.01%. Currency conversion adds 0.55%.
• Ten years of A$1,000 a month into ASX shares costs A$360. The same monthly amount into US shares costs A$1,165.
• The 0.55% is charged on money moved into the Wall St account. It is not charged per trade, and ASX trades never carry it.
• Custody is CHESS sponsored with your own HIN, and the account fee is A$0. Fractional US shares start at US$10.
• FastFunds and card funding fees exist and are not detailed on the pricing page. Automated investing and the minimum investment are not confirmed there either.

What it costs

Order size, all in

The ASX column is flat because the flat fee covers the whole trade up to A$30,000. The US column climbs because it carries the 0.55% conversion on top of the US$3.00 brokerage, and that charge scales with the order value.

Ten years, A$1,000 a month

The ASX-only figure is 120 purchases at A$3.00 each. The US-only figure is 120 purchases at A$9.71, which is the A$1,000 US order cost from the table above. The mixed figure splits the 120 purchases into 60 ASX buys and 60 US buys. These are buy-side costs only: selling is not modelled.

The cheapest CHESS broker, and why that wording matters

Cheapest gets thrown around in broker comparisons as though it settles the argument. It does not, unless you also say what you are buying for the price. Price and structure are two different things, and the cheapest number in a table is often attached to the weakest structure.

Superhero wins the price column outright. A$2.00 flat, A$120 cheaper than Stake over ten years. It also does not give you a holder identification number, because ASX shares sit in a custodial structure rather than on CHESS under your own name. If price is the only thing you are optimising, that is a fair answer to a different question.

moomoo matches Stake at A$360, and registers ASX shares under your own HIN by default, though an account opened with a custodian instruction is held on bare trust instead. Its conversion rate is also the dearest of the nine, which is a separate problem covered in the moomoo review.

So the claim worth carrying away is this. Stake is the best-priced way in this set to buy ASX shares and end up on the CHESS register with your own HIN. Every platform priced above it costs at least A$240 more across a decade, and CMC Invest costs A$960 more, a gap that comes entirely from the A$11 fee switching on at A$1,000. That is narrower than cheapest, and a lot more useful.

The 0.55% is charged on funding, not per trade

This is the finding that changes the arithmetic, so it is worth reading twice. Stake charges 0.55% to move money into the Wall St account, the account that holds US shares. It is not charged on ASX trades, because no currency changes hands. It is not charged on each US trade either. It is charged on the funding.

• Fund once, buy once. Identical to the per-trade arithmetic. You pay 0.55% on the money in, you place one order, done.
• Fund once a month, buy once a month. Also identical. Same total, arriving the same way. This is the pattern our ten-year figures above are built on.
• Fund a lump sum once, then buy several times. Here the per-trade tables overstate your cost. You pay 0.55% once on the lump sum, then place as many US orders as you like at about A$4.21 each.

Our own per-trade table, including the US column above, models the 0.55% against each order value. That is accurate for anyone funding each purchase separately, and it overstates the cost for anyone who funds once and buys often. We are saying so plainly because the table is ours. Selfwealth handles currency the same way. No other platform in the comparison does, which is exactly why lining up headline percentages across brokers can point you at the wrong conclusion.

The two crossovers

Both are on US shares. The ASX is a flat A$3.00 with no conversion, and below A$30,000 there is nothing to argue about.

Against Pearler: the line is A$4,580

Stake charges about A$4.21 brokerage plus 0.55% conversion. Pearler charges A$6.50 brokerage plus 0.50%. Pearler's brokerage is higher and its conversion is lower, so on small orders the A$2.29 saved on brokerage dominates, and on large orders half a percentage point of conversion dominates instead. The lines cross at about A$4,580 per purchase. Below that Stake is cheaper, above it Pearler is. The Pearler vs Stake comparison carries the curve out to A$20,000.

Against CMC Invest: the line is A$8,400

Stake charges about A$4.21 brokerage plus 0.55%. CMC Invest charges A$0 brokerage plus 0.60%. CMC takes nothing to place the order and five basis points more on conversion, so below about A$8,400 per US order CMC Invest is cheaper and above it Stake is. At the crossover both come to about A$50.52.

Two crossovers, two very different numbers, and neither is a rounding error if you are buying in A$10,000 parcels.

Is Stake safe?

Stake's Australian business is Stakeshop AFSL Pty Ltd, which holds AFSL 548196. You can check that licence yourself on ASIC's professional registers, and it is worth doing for any broker you are considering. A current licence means the business is authorised to provide the services listed on it. That is all it means.

An AFSL is not a guarantee. It does not promise your shares will rise, it does not promise the platform will still be trading in ten years, and it does not put a floor under your balance. What it does is show the provider is licensed, supervised and obliged to follow conduct and disclosure rules, and it gives you a regulator to escalate to when it does not. That is real, and it is less than many people assume.

Custody is the other half of the question. Stake's ASX holdings are CHESS sponsored, so the shares sit on the CHESS subregister under your own HIN and can be transferred to another CHESS sponsored broker without selling. US shares cannot sit on CHESS, because CHESS is an ASX system, so those live in the Wall St account structure instead.

As for the government safety net, the Financial Claims Scheme covers eligible deposits with banks, building societies and credit unions up to A$250,000 per account holder per institution. It does not cover shares, at Stake or at any other broker. Nothing in the scheme turns a share portfolio into a protected deposit, and no AFSL changes that.

What is not on the pricing page

Two fees exist and are not detailed. FastFunds and card funding both get a mention, and neither carries a published rate on the pricing page as we read it on 19 September 2026. If you plan to use instant funding or a card, you cannot work the cost out from the page. Two features also sit outside what that page confirms: automated investing and the minimum investment. Do not assume either from how the app looks.

It is a short list, and that is a point in Stake's favour. But not published is not the same as free, and it is not the same as expensive either. It is unknown from the source we read, and that is all we can say.

Where it wins, where it loses, who it suits

Where it wins

• ASX orders at A$3.00 flat, the best-priced CHESS sponsored option in this set.
• US brokerage of about A$4.21 per order, with no account fee to carry.
• Your own HIN, so ASX shares can move with you without a sale.
• Small US parcels, where the low brokerage does most of the work.

Where it loses

• To Superhero on raw ASX price, if a HIN does not matter to you.
• To Pearler on US purchases above about A$4,580.
• To CMC Invest on US orders below about A$8,400.
• On transparency, around FastFunds and card funding.

It suits someone who buys ASX shares or ETFs regularly, wants a HIN, and would rather not run brokerage arithmetic every time they place an order. Someone who buys US shares in small to medium parcels, or who funds once and buys several times. Someone who wants a flat fee they can predict.

It does not suit someone chasing the lowest possible ASX fee for whom custody is not a factor. Someone placing very large US orders who wants the cheapest conversion on the market. Or someone who needs automated investing confirmed before committing a dollar.