What is the best platform for online stock trading? ETrade, Scottrade?

I don’t invest online or anything but I’ve never heard of Scottrade. That has to count for something right?

Scotttrade is reputable and reliable, but being your own investment adviser is akin to being your own lawyer…not a good idea, given today’s economic climate. ( See Blagojevich)

NaturalMineral: Sorry, it counts for very little.

@gailcalled stop being so serious

What; Natural; you don’t find Blagojevich hilarious?

If you know what you want to trade, go by cost and fees. I think the $6 trades are probably cheapest. As far as research and data on your portfolio and all that, it is hard to say. I’ve used tdameritrade, which is $10 per trade, but I don’t make that many trades and their info is pretty good.

@justin, If I am not being too nosy (which I might be), how are you doing in the present market. And, for the record, Scottrade charges $7 per trade. The only time I bought online, I had an idiot for a client (me). We got hosed.

It really depends on how you plan on trading, how frequently you will have transactions, how much research you are looking to do at your brokers site, If you are looking to day trade, or swing trade, the amount of data you will want from your brokers site will be higher.

The amount of money you will initially put in makes a huge difference too. A lot of brokers have minimums, and if you dip below it you get dinged with a monthly fee.

If you have a selection of stocks you want to invest in and do so on a regular basis, and don’t need a lot of research tools or L2 data, etc, than I would just go with sharebuilder. You can direct deposit itno the account, and they will automatically shift the money to the stocks you choose. Just like you would do with a company 401K. This costs $4 a trade.

It really depends on your needs, and how you will use it.