This is a good time for me to introduce myself briefly.
I have S. Korea passport who resides in US before for ten years. So with a valid Social Security Number and Drive License, I was able to open an account in Etrade few months ago and hold US equities now.
Only online credit check was required for Etrade account so that I can open it in Korea by internet. It might be because I manage good FICO score as high as 750 to 800. / However I had a chance to chat with the TradeKing to hear that I need current utility bill in US, before opening. It means TradeKing asks more document than Etrade. At least TradeKing is losing a lot of brokerage from me, for tlack of utility bill. How about IB?
Also during the last five-year stay in S Korea, I found steady winning (NOT high) logic in Korea market, so that I can transport same logic to other country, if they charge LESS tax in the long run than S. Korea. / For the frequent-buy traders like me, they charges too much tax at the time of execution, in Korea/HK. For the ONLY tax reason, I should prefer annual capital gain tax country, just for money. Also commission is second important factor to choose country, in addition to tax system.
My current logic allows only three times (roughly) of BUY amount in every months. For example, suppose 100K as seed, there SHOULD be ONLY 300K in total BUY every month. However there is some advatage in HK/Korea traders that I can slice to very very small amount, such as one time buy of 100K (one shot to one stock symbol all together) pays SAME tax and fee as 100 pieces of $100 each.
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In short for summary, if I stay in US for five years and run the same logic(trading) in US market, my profit is (by simulation) higher than in Korea (for 5 years), just for the tax difference. Of course, for the return amount before tax, it will be same in both US and Korea for the SAME logic. Most frequent buyer in trade is definitely dieying for the accumulating tax amount. But rare BUY traders like Warren Buffet, who invested some Korea company, do NOT pay any capital gain tax in the future. NEVER.
It is possible, for the two trader (A, B) with same logic and same profit curve before tax, A wins after tax in US and B lose after tax in Korea/HK.