Zerodha and ICICI Direct are reputed online brokers. The former started its operations in 2010. ICICI’s subsidiary was started in 1995. If you have shortlisted both of them to open your trading account but want to create an a/c with one broker only, this article will guide you.
ICICI Direct vs Zerodha
Type
ICICI Direct is a 3-in-1 broker. If you’ve an account with the ICICI bank and create a trading a/c with its subsidiary, you can transfer/send funds to/from the trading/bank account instantly. Zerodha is not a 3-in one broker. When you link your bank a/c with it, you can transfer funds to your trading a/c immediately. However, funds you withdraw from Zerodha to your bank a/c will not be deposited instantly. The process of withdrawal can take up to 24 hours to complete.
User interface
ICICI Direct user interface appears complicated as there are dozens of options available on the dashboard. There are two menus on the dashboard, each having 10+ items. If you click the gear icon, ICICI Direct will display 30+ items. Zerodha has a minimal interface. Instead of dumping links to all important pages of the site on one menu, the links are scattered on different pages. For example, on the Zerodha Console page, you will find all admin related menus.
Reports
Zerodha web/mobile application has the following reports pages:
- Tradebook, P&L.
- Tax P&L, tax-loss harvesting.
- 60-days challenge.
The Zerodha reports page has a calendar module which highlights the days on which you were profitable or incurred a loss. The ICICI Direct reports page isn’t very attractive but it offers everything you need i.e. You can see the annualized return of equities, mutual fund, short term/long term capital gains, etc with just a few clicks of a button. The two online brokers lets users download their reports to the PC.
Order placement
Zerodha has the most beautiful order placement form among the brokers I’ve used to date. The watchlist section is on the left side of the interface. When you move the mouse pointer on a scrip, the broker shows several icons in a row over the scrip. When you click the buy or sell icon, the application shows a popup to enter the quantity, price, select order type, set stoploss/target, etc.
ICICI Direct has several order placement modules. For example, you can place a buy/sell order via the Flash Trade module, One Click F&O module, etc.
Margin
ICICI Direct is the only broker I’m aware of that provides margin for buying and selling options. Although leverage sounds good, you must be careful while using it. Your entire capital may be wiped off in a single wrong trade.
ICICI Direct also has a special feature called eMargin that transfers money to your trading account immediately instead of T+1 day on selling shares. Zerodha doesn’t offer eMargin like feature yet.
If you have found a good investment opportunity and you’re short on funds, you can use ICICI Direct’s MTF (Margin Trading Facility) feature. The broker offers 4x margin and charges an interest of up to 26 Rs on each 1 lakh Rupees leverage it offers.
Charts
TradingView charts are integrated with the mobile/desktop application of every top broker in India. In addition to TradingView, Zerodha supports ChartIQ charts. ICICI Direct, like its counterpart, employs both charting libraries. However, it doesn’t provide an option like Zerodha to change the charting library.
Alerts and GTT
There are many users who would like to trade or invest their money in the stock market but can’t be in front of the screen all the time. For such users, Zerodha offers two cool features – alerts and GTT (Good till Trigger). The custom alert you create will get triggered when the last/high/open/low/close price or average volume, last traded/total buy/total sell quantity, etc of an instrument is greater/less than the price you specify.
Zerodha lets users create buy/sell GTT orders. While creating one, you must enter the trigger price, and the quantity of instruments you want to buy. The online broker supports two trigger types – single and OCO (one cancels the other).
ICICI Direct doesn’t let users create custom alerts like Zerodha but it sends alerts automatically when the stocks in your portfolio are up/down by 5% in a single day, have reached their 52 week high/low price, were traded by big players via block deals, etc. The broker doesn’t offer GTT like feature yet.
Brokerage
I have shared a short review of ICICI Direct Flast Trade feature. In the review, I have explained the brokerage charges when you sell or buy a future or option using Flash Trade. In case you don’t want to read the review, let me tell you that the fee you’ll charge per order is Rs 7. Zerodha doesn’t let you buy/sell scrips from the charts nor does its counterpart ICICI Direct do but you can quickly place an order with both of them.
Flash Trade, in my perspective, is simpler and more beneficial than its counterpart’s interface because it keeps the current position right in front of you. Although the positions page is just a few clicks away in Zerodha, wouldn’t it be great if the positions of your orders were in front of you all the time?
Zerodha charges Rs 20 per order. Its counterpart has launched several subscription plans.
If you are an expert trader/investor who doesn’t need any guidance or you have sufficient funds to buy and sell scrips and don’t want any leverage, Zerodha is for you. Else create an account with ICICI Direct.
