Raw spread plus commission is not automatically cheaper
Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2026 8:30 am
Everyone repeats that commission accounts are cheaper for scalpers. Sometimes true, sometimes a rounding error, and occasionally the opposite.
Rough example on a major pair. Spread-only account: 1.0 pip typical, so $10 per standard lot round turn. Commission account: 0.1 pip raw spread plus $7 per lot round turn, so about $8 total. Saving of $2 per lot, which is 20 percent. At 40 lots a month that is $80. Real money on a small account, noise on a big one.
Things that change the answer:
- Commission quoted per side vs per round turn. Doubling it by mistake makes the comparison meaningless.
- Whether the raw spread shown is the average or the best case. Check the average during your actual trading hours, not the daily figure.
- Whether the spread-only account has a much wider typical spread in quiet hours. Often the markup is flat, so the gap shrinks when raw spreads widen and grows when they tighten.
- Minimum commission per ticket if partial closes are used.
The cleanest method is a week of identical trades on both account types, or an export of tick data for the hours traded, then cost per lot computed for each. Guessing from marketing pages is how people pay extra for months.
Has anyone measured both on the same pair and found the gap smaller than advertised, or bigger?
Rough example on a major pair. Spread-only account: 1.0 pip typical, so $10 per standard lot round turn. Commission account: 0.1 pip raw spread plus $7 per lot round turn, so about $8 total. Saving of $2 per lot, which is 20 percent. At 40 lots a month that is $80. Real money on a small account, noise on a big one.
Things that change the answer:
- Commission quoted per side vs per round turn. Doubling it by mistake makes the comparison meaningless.
- Whether the raw spread shown is the average or the best case. Check the average during your actual trading hours, not the daily figure.
- Whether the spread-only account has a much wider typical spread in quiet hours. Often the markup is flat, so the gap shrinks when raw spreads widen and grows when they tighten.
- Minimum commission per ticket if partial closes are used.
The cleanest method is a week of identical trades on both account types, or an export of tick data for the hours traded, then cost per lot computed for each. Guessing from marketing pages is how people pay extra for months.
Has anyone measured both on the same pair and found the gap smaller than advertised, or bigger?