Is interactive Brokers the Best Platform Considering Trade Fee's / Account Annual Charges?
Hello RFD,
I presently have a questrade account that I set up over 4 years ago. While the platform was fine back then I feel that there fee structure is no longer as competitive as it used to be so I am looking around for the best platform right now. (I really felt that when it cost me over 100 dollars just to sell off my positions at the start of the crash. )
Edit - removed allot of the original post to make this more readable. What I have learned:
IB is good for someone who 1. Has large holdings and 2. Only purchases large value stocks. They charge 10 USD a month which is waived if your holding 100,000USD minimum per account you have. So if you have a TFSA and and or RRSP, Margin etc. Its 100 K per account, USD. (OOF on that now). So now you have to have a total holdings have 100,200,300 K USD across all accounts to get the monthly fee waved. AND that monthly fee multiplies the more accounts you have open. So 2 accounts is 20 USD a month etc. The monthly fee used as a credit against trading fees for any given month. So if you say bought and sold 2 positions in a month you would likely break even if you had IB vs another Canadian brokerage. If you traded more you would start getting ahead if you traded less you would fall behind. If your account has over 100,000 USD you are likely ahead compared to any other Canadian brokerage UNLESS your buying / selling penny stocks in moderate volumes (if you sold in large volumes they have different offerings which would reduce your fees)
So looking at the above interactive brokers will be a better account for certain kinds of people but not broadly a better deal depending on your holdings and what you are investing in. In general, if your holdings is over 100,000 USD per account they would be broadly better. If you are under that threshold and only change positions 2-3 times a year they are probably worst.
No other firms from as far as I can tell are largely different from what is in TD, CIBC etc offer. The brokerages are competing with sign up bonuses but are largely not competing in terms of fees. Similar to what cell phone companies looked like a decade ago. There are multiple articles with Industry representatives actually acknowledging they are aware Canada has worst fees then other countries but there is no market pressure for them to move so they are keeping their structures as is. So probably no one is going to change how they operate in the near future.
I presently have a questrade account that I set up over 4 years ago. While the platform was fine back then I feel that there fee structure is no longer as competitive as it used to be so I am looking around for the best platform right now. (I really felt that when it cost me over 100 dollars just to sell off my positions at the start of the crash. )
Edit - removed allot of the original post to make this more readable. What I have learned:
IB is good for someone who 1. Has large holdings and 2. Only purchases large value stocks. They charge 10 USD a month which is waived if your holding 100,000USD minimum per account you have. So if you have a TFSA and and or RRSP, Margin etc. Its 100 K per account, USD. (OOF on that now). So now you have to have a total holdings have 100,200,300 K USD across all accounts to get the monthly fee waved. AND that monthly fee multiplies the more accounts you have open. So 2 accounts is 20 USD a month etc. The monthly fee used as a credit against trading fees for any given month. So if you say bought and sold 2 positions in a month you would likely break even if you had IB vs another Canadian brokerage. If you traded more you would start getting ahead if you traded less you would fall behind. If your account has over 100,000 USD you are likely ahead compared to any other Canadian brokerage UNLESS your buying / selling penny stocks in moderate volumes (if you sold in large volumes they have different offerings which would reduce your fees)
So looking at the above interactive brokers will be a better account for certain kinds of people but not broadly a better deal depending on your holdings and what you are investing in. In general, if your holdings is over 100,000 USD per account they would be broadly better. If you are under that threshold and only change positions 2-3 times a year they are probably worst.
No other firms from as far as I can tell are largely different from what is in TD, CIBC etc offer. The brokerages are competing with sign up bonuses but are largely not competing in terms of fees. Similar to what cell phone companies looked like a decade ago. There are multiple articles with Industry representatives actually acknowledging they are aware Canada has worst fees then other countries but there is no market pressure for them to move so they are keeping their structures as is. So probably no one is going to change how they operate in the near future.
Last edited by OmgDrake on Apr 28th, 2020 10:57 pm, edited 2 times in total.
(from what I can see). There was some articles on firms looking into moving into Canada that have better fee structures but nothing confirmed yet. Its like cell phone plans a decade ago all the companies have high fees and no incentive to lower them. Oh well it was useful to learn looking into the stuff.