I felt like it was time for a public service message about Scottrade. Never mind that their Elite software suffered from version upgrade problems on Vista (Vista has only been available for, what? 4 years now?). Let's just focus on executions. Occasionally, the execution times would be lightning fast. Of course, the bid/ask would show 23.81 and 23.82, and we would go short and get a price of 23.65, but who's counting. Yes, that actually happened. Yes, more than once. No, the bid and ask never went anywhere down there before or after our transaction, and the order size was, like 700 shares, so we sure weren't pushing it down. With our new broker we have never once seen the types of ridiculous prices we would regularly get from Scottrade. Of course, the execution prices were nothing to the execution speeds. Take a look at some of these gems (the account is now closed, so the account number has been left in). Look at the difference between the time the orders were sent and the time they were actually filled. http://sullux.homeip.net/scottrade/trades.jpg No wonder every trade was a loser. Think it was just a one-time thing? Here's another day: http://sullux.homeip.net/scottrade/more_trades.jpg Notice that many of the execution times are in the range of 30 to 60 seconds :eek:. The first time this happened, they said that if we hadn't seen any confirmation with a few seconds, we should go ahead and re-submit the order. Yeah, that was great advice. Now I know what you're thinking. It must have been a technical problem on our side. Well, these incidents happened on different versions of the Scottrade Elite software, on different physical computers, and since we moved in between, even with different ISPs (though always cable). During the problem times, our network metrics showed no problems. We are using a professional grade router, and in fact these incidents occurred with two different routers. Our computers are healthy and free of viruses/spyware, run Windows Vista Ultimate, and don't have any extraneous programs running (no torrent software or any of that nonsense). The computers themselves are strong and modern, with at least a gig of RAM each and a modern, multi-core processor. Even after seeing the two images I am providing here, the company still didn't give us anything. In fact, they wouldn't even refund us our $7 fees. I'm not suggesting any particular alternative, I just want everyone to know what kind of company they are. We have switched to MB Trading and are mostly pleased. We are back to making money now that we can get decent executions. For the record, we had used Scottrade for about 8 months, having problems over the last 3 months. We have been with MB Trading for about 2 months with our only problem being a couple of hiccups in the quote server.
No comment on Scottrade, but that looks like some really lousy trading. Better worry more about that then the broker.
I got filled 50 cents off the ask today closing a 1000 share QID short - and on the second attempt to send the order. Half the profit gone at the speed of light. My bad, I know, with a market order in a fast market, but disappointing nevertheless.
as far as scottrade, how easy is it to find shares to short of heavily shorted and/or unusual stocks? what's their inventory like?
Selecto, Very typical with them. Well, of course in a volatile market anything can happen, but I've seen it happen in fairly stable stocks during fairly non-volatile times, so it still may not be your fault. As to DataCruncher's question, I will say that Scottrade almost always had shares to short. I found it difficult to short some smaller issues like TTWO and INFA from time to time, but they usually have the shares to short.
You reallize Scottrade, TD Ameritrade are not direct access? That could make a big difference. As far as the give up of the fees, they are cheap, aren't theY?
Gee , I got hit on a small lot on a TANKER because I was 1/2 second slow cancelling. I don't bitch about it. 99% of the time, these complaints about fills are the users fault.
flytiger, actually Ameritrade's normal account has the option for direct routing for a few years. When I used thier direct routing, the executions were very fast. Scottrade, TradeKing, etc. are not known for good executions. There are worse brokers than Scottrade.
I was a daytrading piker in 99 - 00 with Scottrade back before they clamped down on PDT. 90% of the time I traded with limits, so execution time was not a problem with that. But even when I was trading at the market I did't usually have a problem with slow executions, and I was using the web based software. I usually had my execution before I got my finger off the mouse button. I wasn't hyperactive in my daytrading either, two or three trades per day was usual for me, so maybe I just didn't give them enough chances to screw me over. But if you're going to be daytrading with Scottrade, you gotta remember, most of your orders are going through NITE, and you may also be competing against NITE. NITE bodyslammed my ass one day and let me know who's boss. I will never again try to get in between the bid and ask on a Naz stock with Scottrade again.