I follow Robin Hood on Facebook to keep track of them, in case...

I follow Robin Hood on Facebook to keep track of them, in case they do ever come to Australia in a cheap way, since they're the famous name that could quickly take market share with millennials (which is SWF's most important market, since those are the people joining a broker for the first time en masse).

I didn't see any firm plans by Robin Hood yet. They did announce a plan some years ago, but apparently they left it on the backburner for a long time.

I'd guess if Robin Hood came to Australia, they'd be more likely to offer free US trades than free local trades. So it'd be more of a risk to SWF's plan to offer US trading (for maybe US$9.50 flat brokerage). Though there's also the risk that they charge like $5 for local trades.

BW reported that they expect brokerage costs to fall gradually over time in Australia, and that the fall will not be a great problem for SWF.