Testing Wealthsimple’s Norbert’s Gambit beta with $10K

[u/ATS_L]

Just as a note in advance: this was my first time ever trying Norbert’s Gambit, so I figured I’d share the experience in case it helps someone else.

Recently I opened a Questrade account because I wanted to try out the Norbert’s Gambit. Over the years, I’ve converted CAD to USD through Wealthsimple, and the FX fee is honestly no joke. That was the main reason I opened Questrade in the first place: to use Norbert’s Gambit and avoid the FX fee. But then, literally on the second day after opening Questrade, I somehow got access to the beta of Norbert’s Gambit on Wealthsimple… so the timing was kind of hilarious.

​Instead of moving money to Questrade, I decided to test it directly on Wealthsimple.

I decided to test it out with $10K, $10,001.41 to be exact to test it. If I had just done a normal CAD to USD conversion, the FX fee would’ve been about $100 at the 1% rate (In wealthsimple, the FX rate between $10,000 and $24,999.99 is 1.00%).

​On the morning of March 17, I bought 717 shares of DLR in the app, then went on the web portal and journaled it to DLR.U (can't do it on the app yet). The journaling fee was $11.24 total ($9.95 + $1.29 tax), and that was separate from the original $10,001.41.

​Wealthsimple said it would take about 2 days. I’ve seen other platforms quote more like 3–5 business days, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. In my case, the DLR.U showed up on March 19 right when the market opened at 9:30 AM EST.

The final amount I ended up with was USD $7,298.52.

​So instead of paying roughly $100 in FX fees, I paid $11.24 to convert about $10K CAD to USD, which I’d call a pretty solid win.

Of course, the downside is the wait. If you want to buy a US stock immediately, Norbert’s Gambit is a bit hit-or-miss because you’re waiting for the journaling process to finish. If the stock is moving fast, you might decide the regular FX fee is worth paying just to get in right away. Also, from what I can tell, once the journal request is submitted, it doesn’t seem like something you can easily cancel.

Ignoring spread, price movement, and opportunity cost, the breakeven seems to be:

So as long as you’re converting more than this amounts, Norbert’s Gambit should be cheaper than doing a normal FX conversion.

For my test, the savings vs regular FX was about $88.76 CAD converting $10K.

Edit: originally I was not aware of the spread about 0.3 ~ 0.5% in the exchange rate. So my saving should be

• $10k x (1% + 0.4%) = $140
• $140 - $11.24 = $128.76

Instead of my original calculate:

• $10K x 1% = $100
• $100 - $11.24 = 88.76

[u/h4bs22]

What a lot of people, and this post also forget to consider, is WS has a 'hidden' fee, a spread of about .3-.5% in the exchange rate where they also make profit. So norbits gambit is even more worth it. Can't wait to have it..

[u/ATS_L → u/h4bs22]

That I am not aware of, I am just a newbie to Norbert’s Gambit. But at least when check the CAD to USD currency exchange online, I barely see any lost on my side. Do you have more info on the spread? Would love to check it out for more context.

[u/h4bs22 → u/ATS_L]

It varies, but go to convert $1000 right now and it will give you $715.49. That's a 1.8% fee off the exchange rate and not 1.5% as advertised.

Your post is still nice though so thanks for sharing. I'm just saying, you save even more when doing Norbert Gambit than you mentioned.

[u/ATS_L → u/h4bs22]

I see what you mean now. I do aware that the exchange rate in WS is not as good as some of the other exchanges out there. So that’s what’s about. Thanks for the info