Whether you are a buyer or a seller, with Contracts for Difference – or CFDs – you can optimise returns from major share price moves by trading using leverage, requiring you to only pay a fraction of the cost to open a position than traditional shares. UK 100 positions can be opened for as little as 5% of the position’s full value.

For example, if you had £10,000 to invest and you believe that AZN shares were to rally 10% from 4400p to 4840p, you could open a long position. Using traditional shares, that 10% rally would warrant £1000 of profit but would require the full £10,000 to be invested. What if you wanted to use some of that money for other purposes?

Using a CFD, to gain the same exposure to the stock you would have to pay just £500. If indeed the shares were to rally 10%, you would still receive £1000. Note, however, that you would also be exposed to losses of the same degree should the share price fall by the same amount.

But it’s not just the buyers that can benefit from using CFDs. Using Accendo Markets’ platform, you can also open short positions on a company. For example, again if you had £10,000 to invest but this time you believed that GSK shares were to fall 10% from 1500p to 1350p, you could open a short position.

Traditional shorting would require the full £10,000 to be invested. Using a CFD platform, that would cost you £500, however you would still receive the £1000 as if you had invested the full amount if the share price fell by 10%. Be aware that you would be subject to losses of the same size should the share price increase by 10%.

A comparison: Which stock is right for you?

While both AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline are giants of the UK Pharmaceutical sector, both companies have individual nuances that may make them more attractive to some investors than others. Some of the factors may be technical, some may be fundamental; some traders may look to invest over the short-term whilst others will look to hold on to the shares over a much longer time frame. Below, we break down both companies in order to help you to decide which stock may be best for you.

AstraZeneca was on the receiving end of some torrid news, seeing its pivotal lung cancer trial ‘Mystic’ failed at its test phase. Furthermore, having gone ex-dividend during a negative European trading session, its short-term prospects have not looked particularly attractive. With that said, however, with shares having traded as much as 7.5% off their lows after a string of other US drug approvals.

GlaxoSmithKline has also seen its drugs business come under pressure. Advair, the company’s primary generic inhaled lung drug, has so far fended off challenges from the US. However, that looks set to end by the middle of 2018 as US pharmaceutical companies race to receive approval for copies that would eat into market share.

Yet GSK’s new Chief Executive Emma Walmsley has endeavoured to begin a significant turnaround programme, endeavouring to bring about £1bn of savings by 2020 through a significant cost-cutting programme.

When looking at investing in either of the companies over a longer time frame, you could analyse the total dividend. GlaxoSmithKline has a projected dividend yield of 5.3%, slightly higher than AstraZeneca’s 4.8%.

On the following two pages, we look at what city analysts say about both AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline, including 12-month target prices, whilst also providing Accendo Markets’ own technical analysis on each stock.