Online Trading

[KidViciou$]

hi all. ive recently setup an account wiht Ameritrade, but a friend told me about a website called BuyandHold.com

basically, my questions i this. i want to go to B&H because of $3 per trade, but is it reliable and safe? i dont have time right now to look myself, so i want to get others opinions. thanks

 

[RU482]

Never heard of it.

go to Motley Fool, maybe they will have some info on it.

 

[KidViciou$]

^

they didnt have too much info

 

[KidViciou$]

^

 

[KidViciou$]

^

 

[Midnight Rambler]

Don't know about B&H, but sounds shakey to me. And I wouldn't put too much faith in Fools either.

What to look for in any online broker is what their quoted trade charges really mean. ie., "X" might quote a price of $8.95/trade, but looking at the fine print it is only for a "market order", meaning whatever the market price is at the time of the trade. That is dangerous, you can end up paying more (or getting less on a sale) for your trade. You usually want to put a limit on a trade, that is, set the price you are willing to pay (or sell at). Many online brokers charge more for this type of trade, usually around $14.95-$19.95, or more. This is because they don't get to make any money on the "spread".

Check out Datek ...

 

[sandmanwake]

Yah, Datek is something like $9.95 for all the trades whether it be market or limit. With BuyandHold.com, I think they only place orders twice a day, so you may not get a good a price you want on a stock. If you're looking to invest in the long term, this might not be so bad, but I'd go with Datek or try Suretrade.com if you want to be able to trade faster. Suretrade is $7.95 for market and $2 more for limit orders, so they're pretty much comparable to Datek in broker's commissions. A friend of mine uses Suretrade and says the time of order execution with them pretty fast, not sure how fast though. Datek offers 60 sec execution time or your order is commission free. I'd go with either one of these companies, depending on what other options you want. For instance Suretrade offers DRIP and Datek doesn't.

 

[Fiddy]

Buy and Hold. Give me a freaking break. Let me tell you again how these cheap ass online broker/dealers break it off in your ass when you make a trade. ON THE SPREAD!!!! Say it with me, ON THE SPREAD!!! What does that mean to you, the person who trades with these scoundrels. It means you are paying or selling anywhere from a teeny to a point or more out of market for you order.
Example :
Say you buy 100 shares of STOK on BuyandRob.com
They want $50 1/2 for it.....100 x $50 1/2 = $550.00 even though the TRUE market price on ISLD is $50.00


+ Cheap $3.00 Commission
-------------------------
= $53.00 for your trade execution

Limit order with Datek: 100 shares of STOK x $50.00 = $500.00

+ $10.00 commission
-------------------------
= $10.00 for trade execution


So you really pay MORE for you trade execution plus the fact that you can only buy and sell at certain time of the day.
Yeah, right. Just open an account with Datek. You can use there streamer to look at the ISLD book and get filled pretty quick. If you need more control than that, try Protrader.com or CyberCorp for charts and direct execution. More expensive, but you get what you pay for.

 

[KidViciou$]

THANK YOU FOR ALL THE FEED BACK

this is exactly what i was looking for. i felt half and half about bandh because there website was too hard to use to find out about their policy. i didnt know that they carry out transactions 2 times a day.

as far as datek goes, is ameritrade good? im willing to cancel my account, and go with datek, but if ameritrade has the same features, i woudl rather stay with them. thanks again

 

[sandmanwake]

I think they're a bit more expensive than Datek, and charge extra for limit orders, but if you've been using them and know what you're doing and don't mind paying the extra cost, I don't see why you shouldn't stick with them. It's been a while since I researched online trading firms, so my memory on them isn't too clear, but if you do use any feature that they offer that Datek doesn't stick with them. Personally, I'm using Datek because of the lower brokerage fee, fast execution time, and streaming quotes. Check their website out, it's pretty easy to figure out what features they offer and their help desk is pretty good also. Probably the other big thing to keep in mind about whether or not to stick with Ameritrade is how satisfied are you with the resources they give you to research a company to buy stock in. The only things that Datek doesn't have that I'd like to have one of these days when I have more money to invest with are trading by wireless and a dividen reinvestment plan. Like I mentioned before though, you may also want to look into Suretrade.com, their fees are compareable to Datek and the do offer these two services. I haven't looked too much into them yet, but I do know someone who uses it and he's satisfied with it. Maybe later I'll open an account with them just to see which is better, Datek or Suretrade.

 

[ElFenix]

bah. i'm with schwab. market orders fly through. place it, hit the trade status page on the next link, and the trade is through. very little time passes, extremely fast execution. no float, spread, or whichever.

 

[KidViciou$]

maybe so, but how much per trade?

thanks for the info sandman

 

[KidViciou$]

well, i told my mom to cancel my ameritrade account, and im goign with datek. thanks for pointing it out to me.

good thing i didnt send money to ameritrade.

 

[loogie]

Be careful with your money. A lot of people go into online trading thinking they're going to make instant money...its not like that. You'd be better off with your money in a mutual fund or cd.

 

[KidViciou$]

thanks for the warning, but i have some investment strategies that have worked for me when i was in BT Alex Brown. i know that money wont instantly appear, but i do know which companies i should invest in. i understand the risk im taking, and am willing to take that risk.