Online Brokers

[broken_legs]

Hey doods


I just finished hooking up my online brokerage through TD Waterhouse and I saw that its 29.00/trade. It also takes more then a day for money transfered from my bank account to appear in my TD Waterhouse account - Is that normal?



What online broker are you guys using? What do you pay per trade?

Thanks

[black_2.5RS]

I use BMO Investorline. It also costs $29/trade.

when I transfer money from my CIBC to BMO account, it takes a couple of business days (usually 2-3) so, if your able to get money into your TD waterhouse account in a day, you should be happy with that.

[carson blocks]

Is there anything wrong with using E*Trade or Scottrade? Their commissions seem much, much lower.

[broken_legs]

Does it always take a day or more for your holding to appear once an order has been filled?

and ditto on the above question... Although if 30 dollars is killing my profit maybe im doing something wrong! :dunno:

[FishPoo]

There's nothing wrong with eTrade, Scottrade, although you must consider that the security and convenience of having it with a local big bank is probably your only advantage.

and yes, it is common in most brokerages for your holdings not to appear until a few days later.

Note: It takes 3 business days for trades to settle (i.e. when you buy a stock, it is not officially on the record as yours until after 3 business days)

If $60 (round-trip) is killing your profit, then you're not making wise investment decisions or you're using too little money to make purchases.

E.g. $500 purchase, Sell at $550, 10% gain which is decent, still leaves you in the hole by around $10

If that's how you want to trade, you may want to consider a discount brokerage like eTrade, etc.

[BigShow]

RBC is also at $29/trade

[RX_EVOLV]

I'm with BME investorline and its pretty normal for them to hold your deposite for ~ 3 business days. I like it ( vs etrade etc) is that I can transfer the money online immediately from my chequing to investorline( ie as soon as I get paid) or visa versa.

Apparently BMO has this active trader program that it would only cost you $9.99/trade, but you need to have at least 30 trades/quarter to qualify for it. $29 X 30 = $870 in commission in 4 months.

[broken_legs]

OK that 30 dollars a trade comment was a joke, but since i feel like hilighting my ignorance when it comes to trading I have some more silly questions

If it takes 1-3 days for a filled order to appear in your holdings, what would you do if you wanted to sell it the next day and it hasnt appeared in your holdings yet? (IE you bought into something and it starts crashing) Would that be a situation where you would use a stop or can you just turn around and sell your holdings even though they havent appeared in your account yet?


Is anyone using E*trade.ca ?

[FishPoo]

lol oops.. didn't realize that.

But yea, you can quickly sell those stocks.

If you do more than.. 3 round trips a week or something like that, you're classified as a day trader and your account can be suspended because you'd be free loading.

So yes, after you purchase a stock with SETTLED funds (meaning un-used cash in your brokerage account), you can sell it immediately after even though its not present in your holdings..

Realize when you sell there's a 3 day settlement period as well.

So for example, if you sold a stock, you'd have to wait 3 days for the funds to settle.

[Celica TVS3]

Is anybody using interactivebrokers.com ? They seem to have the lowest trade rates i've come across ($0.01/sh to a max. of 0.2% of trade value). Although you do have to pay the data fees - TSX level II for $35/month. You can opt out of real-time market data or choose a data vendor on your own.

[BigMass]

a $60 2 way trade can many times KILL your proffits if youre day, swing, momentum trading. While traders in the US will bail on a stock after they've made as little as $50-60 youre still holding the brick to try and sqeeze out more blood so you can make a proffit. This sucks in many ways when the day traders in the US paying $5/trade start selling off and dropping the stock price to the point of you actually having to take a loss on it.

Now, if youre buying and holding for days/weeks, it might be not be as bad, but for certrain types of trading it's unacceptable.

Back in 1998/99, i was paying $5/trade through a US broker since Canadian brokers were STONEAGE in comparisson. Charging $30/trade and making level 2 and streeming quotes seem like something sci-fi and crazy to ask for. It seems that after 8 years not much has changed. Way to go Canada! :rolleyes:

I think they changed some laws as well saying you cant use US brokers anymore.. Not sure it's been a while.

[harley11]

If you click sell and 5 mins later the stock drops...i still sold for the amount when i clicked right..? I dont have to wait for apporval or something....

[broken_legs]

Originally posted by harley11
If you click sell and 5 mins later the stock drops...i still sold for the amount when i clicked right..? I dont have to wait for apporval or something....

Correct me if I'm wrong but I think your stocks sell for the market price at the time someone else buys your stocks from you??? Meaning if there was no volume on that day, or if everyone was trying to sell and no one was buying you might be hooped?