RetireJapan

The wife already has a Monex account that I have gotten used to the interphase. I mean its not great, but I managed to go through with my transactions so thats fine. I am looking to open another account, under my name this time, and was wondering if I should stick with the familiar, or is there something similar to brokerages as in banks where you should not put all your eggs in one basket?

If its better to have a different second broker SBI seems to be the consensus here, but was wondering if there are new developments. I guess what I would really like is (though none at present), the potential to offer the platform in English (I mean Rakuten and monex/boom offers it in their overseas businesses!) or at least ease of use compared to Monex if possible. Any tips are appreciated.

I use Rakuten and find it fairly easy now that I am used to it. SBI seems similar. No one is doing English-language platforms in Japan yet.

Interactive Brokers is an option for offshore broker.

The main arguments for diversifying brokers would be security, both in terms of having your account hacked/frozen etc. and the broker going bankrupt etc. The former seems more likely than the latter. Arguments against are the hassle of having multiple accounts and dealing with different interfaces.

I have almost all our accounts with Rakuten at the moment (my broker, NISA, iDeCo, wife's broker, NISA) but will be spreading these out and opening accounts with SBI and Monex in the future.

Thanks. You wouldn't have a ranking of brokers in terms of length of name it accepts or at least accepts romaji?
I keep getting my name rejected!

Ha, ha, that would be some useful info!