Anyone using Scottrader Elite, any opions? I have been trading for about 6 months, and I like the interface and all, but was wondering if I was at a disadvantage using this broker. Thanks, Orion
How do you trade? Do you day-trade? Do you scale in or out? Would a per share commission better suit you? Do you need the convienence of their physical offices? Sorry for answering your question with all these questions.....This is a traders website....and generally the likes of E-Trade, AmeriTrade, Scottrade, Ab Watley, Fidelity, Charles S., and American Express are for the retail investor type of person who does not trade for a living. After reading a little about Scottrade Elite, you need to maintain a minumum of 25k and its for the active trader. You get charts for free, if you keep your volume up to their quota of 10 trades per month. (10 trades a month is an active trader?) Michael B.
I am doing some daytrading, but mostly swing type trades usually buying no more than 2500 shares at a time. I use limit orders almost exclusivly and pay 12.00 per trade.
Well, do the math....If you need the charts which you can get on MedVed quoteTracker.....why use elite? If you trade enough you might want to check other lower cost brokerages.....A lot of traders use IB(interactive brokers, find their link on this website) and I understand that Scotttrade has worse reliability issues than IB has. Michael B.
I guess I'm basically looking for lower commission costs and best execution. I will check out IB. From an execution stand point am I on the same playing field when I place my limit order with Scottrade as other direct access brokers? Thanks for the input thus far.
Orion: I use IB for day trading and Scottrade for intermediate trading. You are in no way on a level playing field when day trading IB vs. Scottrade. >IB is direct access to the ECN's; ST trades/clears thru Night securities, a major market maker. >IB's executions are virtually instantaneous with immediate confirmation; ST's aren't; >With commissions, IB is cut -n- dry--what you see is what you get; since ST clears thru Knight, they grab a piece of the spread from you, and you don't see it. >ST has more restrictions as far as what types of stock, price of stock, exchange you can trade, and shorting rules/limitations. >Order entry is fast with IB; cumbersome with ST. Now, on the plus side, Scottrade Elite has some pretty good charting tools and their data feed is pretty stable/accurate (in fact, more so than IB). Also, they have a Top-Ten List and New Highs/Lows tool that can be useful. You can use some of these tools from ST and still trade with IB. Scottrade has some useful research tools on their website. You can get the website resources and data feed with 20 symbols for opening a $500 account, but you need a $25K account for ST Elite. If you have enough to put in ST for investing/intermediate trading, the Elite package might be a nice side benefit. Here's my setup: I have ST feed QuoteTracker with 20 indices/symbols and use their charting. I log into ST Elite and have an additional 20 symbols going (yes, ST for some reason allows simultaneous logins...cool). And then I day trade thru IB. All the while, I have intermediate positions with ST in the 'background'. This is not a recommendation, but just how I've ended up configuring my setup. I hope this has more enlightening than confusing. Stang
5R08ASTANG Thanks so much for the post, thats explanation I was looking for. I was looking into IB last night and I think I might set-up the same way you have yours. Your right about ST Elite you can log in multiple times and have your different charts and level II stuff going, thats why I like it so much. Thanks again for your post it was very insightful and helpful. Orion