hi,
i used to trade online back in australia but am unsure how to go about it here in taiwan.
can anyone suggest an organisation/business that they use for online trading?
thanks for the help
j
I contacted Scottrade for trading in the U.S. They have just recently started allowing trades from R.O.C. and P.R.C. You can search online for scottrade.com They also have a downloadable application.
I use Scottrade. No problems.
Some discussion of various brokers at elitetrader.com/
I recommend Interactive Brokers. interactivebrokers.com
Lowest possible prices, with good execution. They are certainly
the most popular of the new breed of “Direct-Access Brokers”.
If you have enough experience, they even let you trade options
and futures in your IRA.
[quote=“Toe Tag”]Some discussion of various brokers at elitetrader.com/
I recommend Interactive Brokers. interactivebrokers.com
Lowest possible prices, with good execution. They are certainly
the most popular of the new breed of “Direct-Access Brokers”.
If you have enough experience, they even let you trade options
and futures in your IRA.[/quote]
The Interactive Brokers website mentions a monthly minimum fee if you do not meet a certain amount of activity in trade/market data/ other fees, but I could not find any information about how much it is. Any idea? Thanks!
I use Etrade. Easy set-up. I went through there HK office. Etrade also has a hotline in Taiwan. So there service has been great. If I have any questions I can call them right away.
[quote=“citizen k”]
The Interactive Brokers website mentions a monthly minimum fee if you do not meet a certain amount of activity in trade/market data/ other fees, but I could not find any information about how much it is. Any idea? Thanks![/quote]
I think its $10 a month. Also, there is a basic live data package that is cheap. That’s really your only commitment. If you do a handful of trades a month these fees go away and you don’t notice them. The trading fees are really minimal, $4.80 round trip for a futures contract, $1.00 for an options contract, etc. Its all on their web site somewhere. They also offer a pretty broad selection of international bourses.
US Stock, ETFs, and Warrants Commissions:
(all order types, exchange and regulatory fees included)
USD 0.005 per share; minimum: USD 1.00; maximum: .2% of trade value
Examples:
100 Shares @ USD 50 Share Price = USD 1.00
1,000 Shares @ USD 50 Share Price = USD 5.00
1,000 Shares @ USD 2 Share Price = USD 4.00
I think other discount brokers charge quite a bit more than that. Again, lots of comments at elitetrader.com. Their Traders WorkStation software is ok but a bit complex. They have email, phone, and web support (varies in quality). Its all quite workable, but if you need hand holding you might want to pay for it by using one of the larger brokers. One really cool feature is that they throw in a paper trading account on the side, so you can experiment and learn some of the wrinkles of both their software and the more exotic products (it does all US products including derivatives).
Any opinions on Ameritrade? I’ve used them for a while, but I wonder.
My account isn’t that big, so I don’t really see how I could IB or one of the more frequent trading broker services.
Kenneth
If you open an “international account” with Scottrade using your Taiwan address…You can’t buy mutual funds…
that may not be a bad thing given the expense ratios of some funds, but surely ETFs would be okay?
Can we buy mutual funds via international accounts on any broker?
Kenneth
Why does it have to be an international account?
Just use your parents address in the US or Canada.
I guess it depends how often and how you plan to
get money in and out of the account.
IB minimum is $2000 I think. You can also base
your trades in a couple other currencies.
But yes, they are basically oriented toward more
active traders. I guess you just have to add up
how many trades you might do and any monthly
fee and compare the different brokers.
Once you’re set up, you’re just on the internet
and they don’t care where you log in from.
And you can call their 800 number from Skype.
Now, if we could just do something about the
time zone difference…