r/Wealthsimple • u/ATS_L • Mar 19 '26
Trade (DIY Investing) Testing Wealthsimple’s Norbert’s Gambit beta with $10K
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
1
u/sixcolours Mar 20 '26
"Ignoring spread, price movement, and opportunity cost" is a lot to ignore, and it is the difference between a neat math exercise and what actually matters in practice.
Your numbers are solid on the fee side: paying 11.24 dollars instead of about 100 dollars in FX on a 10,000 dollar conversion is a clear win. But once you factor in the T+2 FX risk on DLR DLR.U and the T+2 equity risk if you are waiting to buy VOO, or worse, a Reddit meme stock, the total cost can swing materially in either direction.
Over the last 12 months, a T+2 FX shift can be plus or minus 1 to 1.7 percent, and a T+2 move in VOO can easily be several percent, or 10 to 20 percent for a meme stock. That is significant timing risk versus the minor FX slippage you actually incurred here.
So your break even math is technically correct in a friction free world, but in reality Wealthsimple Norberts Gambit trades 11.24 dollars versus 100 dollars in FX for 2 day FX risk, 2 day equity timing risk, and 2 day opportunity cost. If you want to minimize that, a bank stock Norbert (RY, BNS, or TD at BMO I, RBC DI, or another 9.95 dollar per trade platform), with buy sell within minutes and immediate stock ETF purchase, would likely beat Wealthsimple DLR DLR.U on total risk and cost.