I'll second that. Sydney's a shit hole. Hell, New South Wales is a shit hole. If you want climate, Queensland is the way to go. But more to the point, you'd be nutters to think you'll gain any benefit trading ETO's on the ASX if you live in the US. Personally, I gave ETO's up years ago and went with CFD's because of the liquidity, cost and diversity issues already discussed. That probably won't help your cause at all but I'm speaking from experience. If you do decide to go up the ETO path anyway, I was using Sanford Securities for some time and had no issues (they're now owned by Comsec which is Commonwealth Bank). As far as being a client of this mob and being a US Citizen or anywhere else for that matter, I have no idea. Nravo sounds like he's the go to man on this one.
Again, ditto, although shithole is an exaggeration; I've lived in some real shit holes -- Hartford, Conn, North New Jersey, et-cetera. Queensland, though, definitely is the place to go if you are looking for the American stereotype of Aussie beach life and climate, although the cities up there, like Brisbane, don't offer much culture, a la Florida, minus Miami. CFD are the hot thing in much of the world these days; I don't believe they are legal in the US -- yet. I have never seriously looked into them. I hear they are mostly for punters/speculators -- those who would buy options outright, rather than those looking to sell or spread. But I do hear of spreading strategies every now and then. Again, I plead ignorance on this one. Commonwealth Bank is the largest in AU; so, anything they own is legit and probably won't rip you off any more than any other Aussie bank, and if you lived here you'd be laughing at that statement. Again IB -- if you have an AU work visa, statement of temporary residence of some sort or maybe some AU corporate paperwork (btw, you'll love doing AU taxes, he said ironically) -- can get you up and running in a few days to a few months depending on the degree of ineptitude they show. Not sure of any other US broker who will do this, especially for equity options. BTW, make sure there are options on the secret stock you want to, I assume, speculate on. Most don't have listed options, especially the small ones. And let us know the day you make the buy; I'll look for the spike in volume. Good Luck -- you'll need it.