Online stock trading companies?

I use scottrade.com, and they are convenient for a simple startup cost ($500 minimum) and $7 a trade. I had a friend that was interested in one company and he took my suggestion up on sharebuilder.com, which had a $4 per trade cost, but you were expected to sign up for a stream of income, say, $20-50 (or more) each month. There were some real trading companies advertised on virtualstockexchange.com, a marketwatch product, which is run in conjunction (if not ownership) of the wall street journal and the dow jones company which owns the journal. Bear in mind, that to do options or "day-trading" you may need to meet some qualifications, which usually means depositing something upwards of $25,000 in the account and demonstrate that you have even more where that came from in case you really foul up. Good luck.

I used to have E-trade but they implemented a "minimum trade" requirement per quarter. This basically means that you'd have to pony up a $40 "account inactivity fee" just because you didn't make a trade in a quarter (small investors typically don't day trade, so this move was clearly made in favor of investors who have several thousand dollars invested).

I am searching for an online broker myself. You should see if they have what is known as an "account inactivity fee" and also other miscellaneous fees. The fees can add up, and if you don't have a lot invested to begin with, those fees can represent a high proportion of your total investment value.

To "Frank_Castle": Ever heard of shameless promotion?

Scottrade, TD Ameritrade.

Top 3 Answerer in Business & Finance. (Vote for me)