Best Online Brokerages

Posted by accountingweb on May 16 2001 124 printer friendly

If you're contemplating trading securities online, or if you already do online trading but want to compare the service you're getting with the rest of the players, this survey will be of interest. Money Magazine sent seven brokers out into the Internet with pockets full of money and the assignment to buy stocks from 24 Web brokers. Life doesn't get much tougher than this.

The brokers came back with their reports, rating the brokerage companies on the basis of four different types of investors: mainstream investors, wealth investors, frequent traders, and beginners.

Hundreds of factors were considered in the assessment, all of which fit into five major areas:

Customer service
Products and tools
Ease of use
System responsiveness
Cost

The top ten finishers, ranked from first to tenth, are:

Fidelity
Merrill Lynch
Charles Schwab
NDB
CSFBDirect
Ameritrade
TD Waterhouse
E-Trade
Datek Online
Muriel Siebert

Complete results of the survey are available on the Money Magazine Web site, and also in the June 2001 print issue of the magazine.

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E-Commerce

Technology

Voice of the Editor

Even though any accounting auditor would tell you it seems like there are an awful lot of tax accountants out there, surely one-third of the country isn't made up of tax preparers, so it's rather startling news to learn that one-third of Americans like to do their taxes. Who knew?

AccountingWEB