Hey all im sure there are plenty of you savoy investors out there and was wondering what the general consenus was on the best brokerage site to use. Im kinda new to all this and I have a little money I can afford to play around and kinda learn with. Nothing to big for right now. Im thinkin about going with E*trade but am unsure. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
i have scottrade. i like them, $7 per trade, flat. no frills whatsoever, but they're reliable and they do OTC stocks too.
I'm a professional investor and have used all the major brokerages for personal use. Ameritrade has the most tools, best customer services and usually wins all the industry awards. I really didn't like my experience with Etrade, although they are rolling out new features such as international trading. Etrade and Ameritrade charge about $9.99 per trade, last time I checked. If you want the best value, go with Zecco. They offer free trades, meaning $0 commissions. It is up to 40 trades per month or a maximum of 10 trades per day. I recently set up an Zecco account for a friend of mine, who I trade his account for, and the product is pretty good. The only main problem I had was in setting up the account, it took them about 1-1.5 weeks to setup the account as opposed to Ameritrade which you can setup the account in 2-3 days. But after I got Zecco setup, the order execution is top notch.
Fidelity's more expensive but worth it in the long run. I'm so comfortable with Active Trader Pro,it isn't funny.
It really is all free. It might change later on, but for now its free. I know Bank of America has a free trading offer as well. Here is Zecco's answer to "whats the catch" question: * No commissions, what’s the catch? There is no catch. There are no hidden fees, penalties or charges. You get 40 stock trades a month and up to 10 trades a day for free. If you’re like most people, 40 trades is far more than you’ll do in a quarter. The odds are that you won’t pay a dime in commissions, ever. All on-line trades in excess of these limits are only $3.50 each. That’s one of the lowest rates in the business. Options trades are only $3.50 plus $.60 a contract. Please keep in mind that only the first account of any account type is eligible for our Free Trading program. The only fees you’ll ever get are clearly marked on our ‘What’s Not Free’ page. * How do you make money then? We make money from the interest on margin balances. It’s a small amount, about 3%, but on a large volume of customers it becomes a tidy sum. Secondly, we keep our costs low. We don’t spend $5 of every commission marketing to you. And we don’t spend $400 in advertising for every new account. We attract customers like you by having the best deal in the market. Lastly, we’re building an online financial community where investors can connect with investors. Where you can find all the tools and information you need to trade, plus gain access to financial blogs, forums, and up-to-the minute financial news. We think that’s a winning combination for advertisers.
I have never used Trade King, but I know another professional that does. Here are some things I've heard about Trade King: -Fee structure is good $4.95 per trade flat fee -Site is slow at times -Quote and execution prices are not the best But if you are not an active trader, execution price really wouldn't affect you as much, if you are placing limit orders and leaving it for the day.
