Spread betting for beginners: five trading tips

A short-term trading strategy with spread betting can complement a long-term investment portfolio, but it can be costly for the unwary and reckless

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Leveraged trading with spread betting and contracts for difference (CFDs) isn’t for everyone. It certainly won’t form the core of a strategy for most MoneyWeek readers. However, for some people, short-term trading can be a useful supplement to your longer-term investments. Gains can be tax-free with spread betting, although not with CFDs. Stronger regulation, especially around leverage and negative balance protection for retail investors (so you can’t end up losing more than is in your account), have also reduced the risks of some of the horror stories of traders suffering large losses that were more common during the early days of these markets. 

However, leveraged trading is still risky. It is called “spread betting”, not “spread investing” for a reason. When I was spread betting before I joined MoneyWeek, I ended up learning some hard lessons about the importance of controlling losses. 

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Dr Matthew Partridge
Shares editor, MoneyWeek

Matthew graduated from the University of Durham in 2004; he then gained an MSc, followed by a PhD at the London School of Economics.

He has previously written for a wide range of publications, including the Guardian and the Economist, and also helped to run a newsletter on terrorism. He has spent time at Lehman Brothers, Citigroup and the consultancy Lombard Street Research.

Matthew is the author of Superinvestors: Lessons from the greatest investors in history, published by Harriman House, which has been translated into several languages. His second book, Investing Explained: The Accessible Guide to Building an Investment Portfolio, is published by Kogan Page.

As senior writer, he writes the shares and politics & economics pages, as well as weekly Blowing It and Great Frauds in History columns He also writes a fortnightly reviews page and trading tips, as well as regular cover stories and multi-page investment focus features.

Follow Matthew on Twitter: @DrMatthewPartri