Buying Stocks

What company (etrade, etc.) do you use for doing your stock trades? and why?

 

Don't know if you still are interested in this but I use scottrade.
Works well
Relatively low commissions.

 

Depends what you are looking for. To buy funds and stocks I usually use Ameritrade. Low cost trades. But I also use Janus for their managed funds. Also, I use Charles Schwab.
Nomatter who you use I reccomend fundd, especially market tracked funds. Fidelity has some with the lowest fees aeound. Get one that tracks the S&P500. Buying individual stocks is risky. You won't have enough capital to be properly diversified.

 

I just started using the Robinhood app on my phone. Free stock trading

 

Wow, popular forum, years between replies lol.

I use eTrade, why? Cheap trades, as long as you're not buying a couple shares at a time of cheap stock. Full features unlike any other services that are cheaper. Research and analyst tabs, income estimator tab (shows incoming dividends for the year), portfolio analyzer tool (shows foreign and domestic, and market type in a pie chart).

Haven't tried anyone else, happy with them. My Dad switched to them when they came out, after using Charles Schwab for years. When he passed away I was in charge of his trust and eTrade's customer service was good to work with during the disbursement between my siblings.

 

Stocks are a little difficult and are inherently more risky than mutual funds, unless you know exactly what you are investing in, and are very familiar with the company's vision. You may consider a mutual fund instead if you are new to this.

I prefer mutual funds to stocks because they have fund managers to do all the research on the company stocks contained within the fund (this is their full time job). There is really a lot to this... If you are interested in a mutual fund, try to avoid load funds which entail fees for fund manager services among other things... Depending on your level of comfort with all this, you may consider (not joking) "Investing for Dummies" or another book on the basics.

Day trading, in my opinion is just a gamble.

 

I know it! It is a dry subject, but I wish I had looked into all this about 30 years ago. I didn't know any better though.

 

I only invest in real gold and silver, doesn't really matter who you deal with for that.

 

Fidelity has 4.95 trades.

 

eTrade lowered their commission to 6.95 per trade.

 

Ameritrade also just lowered theirs to $6 I believe. Didn't pay much attention to the email since I don't actively trade much.

 

Once Fidelity dropped to 4.95, several others lowered their prices as well. Competition can be good for the customer.

If I'm buying individual stocks, which I don't do often, I'll buy through Fidelity since I already have a taxable account there.

Now what Fidelity really needs to do is lower their transaction fees on transaction fee mutual funds. For example, if I wanted to buy PIMIX at Fidelity it will cost $49.95. For anyone with less than $1Mil at Vanguard it is $20-$35 to buy PIMIX.

 

I use a combo. Fidelity for some, Robinhood to mess around with since it's free. I do my own research so the investor advisory stuff on sites never is a factor for me.

 

Yeah, there is too much out there for free to be paying an advisor.

Want barney style and simple combined with some great discussion: https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Getting_started https://www.bogleheads.org/

Want a little bit more broad: http://www.morningstar.com/start-investing.html

Commentary and discussion on MFs: http://www.mutualfundobserver.com/

Get rich or poor quick: https://seekingalpha.com/

etc etc etc etc

 

The thing about paying for any of those services that people don't understand, is you have to have a large enough portfolio where you anticipate making the 200 bucks a year you spend on them back and then some. It's not for casual investors. If your portfolio with a 5% return (Average) will only kick you back 300 bucks in a year, not worth paying for those in my opinion. If you are big enough to where 200 is chump change compared to your return, then why not.

 

i just started the other day via robinhood. is it better to buy one expensive stock or many cheaper stocks. i dont have any real plans for this. just something i wanted to fool around with since i was bored.

 

Vanguard

 

i did buy a couple etfs; mainly two shares in vti and two shares in blv. also have some regular stocks scattered around. i dont really have a firm grasp on everything going on, but so far my investment is up 8.00 lol. also how exactly is expense ratio taken cared of? is it a bill i have to pay at the end of the year to carry these etfs or is the bill taken cared of whenever i decide to sell off these etfs? kinda confused on that part.

 

While playing with funny money can be OK for trial and error, I recommend you develop a plan of how you want to invest and for what goals. Figure out the portfolio you want, and then stick with it reassessing every year or so.

Some places to research: https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Getting_started
https://www.bogleheads.org/index.php

https://www.early-retirement.org/forums/

https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/

https://the-military-guide.com/

https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/

Regarding your last question-what does the prospectus say? What about the brokerage-how do they handle fees? For the most part it will come out of the fund's NAV and be semi transparent to you.