Questrade

logo_questrade

Ques­trade

I've been using Ques­trade Inc as my bro­ker since Jan 2009. Of all the stock bro­kers in Canada, in my opi­nion, Ques­trade is the best solu­tion for the tra­der that has assets less that $100,000. The only other ser­vice that comes close in pri­cing is the CIBC Inves­tors Edge.

Bene­fits:

  1. It offers a Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA) that can be mana­ged in US dollars (USD).  This eli­mi­na­tes the need to con­vert from USD to Cana­dian dollars (CAD) after every trade. You also put in and with­draw funds in USD. This is par­ti­cu­larly use­ful if most of your port­fo­lio is in USD.
  2. It has a very affor­da­ble com­mis­sion struc­ture with no mini­mums (see below). As a result, your break even point for most tra­des are dras­ti­cally redu­ced, and if so inc­li­ned, day tra­ding beco­mes easier.

Draw­backs:

  1. Their online port­fo­lio mana­ge­ment plat­form isn't the best out there. It is basic and pro­vi­des you with suf­fi­cient infor­ma­tion to make tra­des. Howe­ver, one click-trading isn't pos­si­ble on their basic plat­form. They do have other plat­forms for which you pay a pre­mium and/or have mini­mum purchase requirements.

Cost Struc­ture:

Stocks: 1 cents per share purcha­sed: $4.95 min and $9.95max
Options: $9.95 plus $1 per contract

Ques­trade

Write a comment