Just FYI... There are a couple more options you can consider. There is an online brokerage based in Hong Kong called Boom. Go to boom.com to learn more. From Boom you can trade in almost all the Asian equity markets plus all the USA markets and Australia all from one account. So you can do that from overseas without having to bring funds directly into Thailand if you prefer not to. In addition, there is an iShares ETF Thai SET index fund listed on the NYSE where you can trade the Thai Index in USD via the NYSE and through Boom as well.

I have an account with Boom and initially used that account to trade Thai stocks. Then I realized just how high their commissions were for SET trades compared with the local brokerages and so I opened an account with KTZmico. No complaints so far...

I haven't found Boom's trade commissions high, but I also haven't traded the Thai stock market on there so you may be right. There will also be a currency exchange cost when trading on the SET from Boom because everything has to be converted from USD to Baht and then back to USD when you sell and then they make a bump on the FX rates. But if you just want to do a Thai SET index trade then that iShares Thai ETF which is traded on the NYSE is the best way to go. Gives a dividend of about 3% and you can keep your cash in USD without really having to put your money into Baht or into Thailand if you don't want to. The symbol on the NYSE if anyone is interested is THD. You can also simply trade it form a US based brokerage as well.

Going to give Tisco a try and see how good they are after looking around at the reccomendations, their opening balance for a cash deposit account is a lot less than SCB, 10% of what SCB need, only 30,000 to open the account, lets hope the rest is as friendly.

CGS = Country Group Securities. One of the oldest (#3 to be licensed - 48 years in business) and largest brokerage firms in Thailand. You can also trade European shares and maintain cash balances in EUR, CHF, GBP, etc. (but must convert to THB if transferring to Thailand).

CGS = Country Group Securities. One of the oldest (#3 to be licensed - 48 years in business) and largest brokerage firms in Thailand. You can also trade European shares and maintain cash balances in EUR, CHF, GBP, etc. (but must convert to THB if transferring to Thailand).

Interesting, that's great, only 10k to open a cash balance account too, clear and informative website

http://www1.cgsec.co.th/corpweb will look into this one further.

Whats to stop you using etrade.com and just funding it from a regular bangkok bank account?