Ask HN: What do you use to buy and sell stocks?

[mschaecher]

I signed up for sharebuilder a long time ago and it pretty much sucks. I've only been using it because of inertia while waiting for Robinhood to finally launch. My personal needs aren't huge, but I'm just sick of dealing with Sharebuilder.

What do you use and what do you like most about it?

[andymoe]

Meh. What sucks about it? I just use Schwab and their web interface and sometimes their mobile app. It's fine. If you are an active trader (but why?) you can get desktop software from them. If you have issues you can always get someone on the phone and you can file paperwork via their sites messaging system. I like them better than e-trade and have been a customer for a long time.

[mschaecher]

Not super active. Few trades a month. Mostly for fun and to get skin in companies I believe in.

Sharebuilder is horrible. Will check out Schwab thanks!

[byoung2]

I have sharebuilder and it is great for automatic investing. What don't you like about it?

[mschaecher]

Everything. Researching is horrible. Purchase flows suck. Fees suck.

Portfolio analysis terrible – For example on a stocks page there isn't even an easy way to see existing positions, let alone my historical purchases like when, how much and what price. It's just "here's this stocks history" not "here's this stocks history including YOU'RE history with this stock.

And on and on like that.

I'm just sick of using software that feels like it stopped improving 5-10 years ago....and figured that has to be more out there.

[Muted]

Well it depends very much on what kind of trader/investor you are. If you are an active trader you want something with a very low cost per trade while a monthly fee is not such a big deal. Interactive Brokers (IB) immediately comes to mind then. If you are located in Europe no taxes on dividends are withheld by IB and should be declared by yourself. That is if you want to declare them. Not sure if this is the same in US.

If you are an infrequent trader the cost per transaction is less important, you just don't want any monthly fees. I personally use thinkorswim (which is part of TD Ameritrade). But I'm sure scottrade, fidelity, etrade would be fine too.

Finally there is always the question if you want to pick stocks yourself. As Warren Buffett has often said, if you don't want to dedicate the time and effort you should buy an s&p 500 index fund. He recommends vanguards VFIAX or you could buy the ETF VOO. For most people this will do a lot better over time than picking stocks yourself!

[pptr1]

I would use Merrill Edge with a Bank of America Account.

It's super easy and fast to transfer money between BOA account and the Merrill Edge. This is the killer feature. There are limits but its faster than other brokerage accounts to get money in and out of your brokerage accounts.

Depending on how much money you have in your combined BOA account + Merril Edge accounts. They will give X number of free trades a month. The highest is 100 free trades a month.

If you have over 100k combined (brokerage + checking + savings), they upgrade you to preferred rewards platinum. Biggest benefit you can use any non-BOA atm in the US with no fees.

[cyberjunkie]

Slightly off-topic.

I quite like Google Finance for monitoring stocks and the portfolios, but god, what an awful, completely ignored mobile app! It won't even sync data. The desktop version is so simplistic and nicer in comparison.

Anyone know of third-party apps that read Google Finance data?

[kolev]

Robinhood, of course! Just kidding. What's going on with that? It's been months and I haven't heard of them. It really doesn't make sense to make all that noise and then go offline for months so that people totally forget about you.

[camillomiller]

I checked just yesterday and I'm like 24k-th in line--I was 300k-th when I signed up. That means tens of thousand of people should have already been granted access. Even with that potential user base I still can't find a single review of the service online.

[kolev]

Maybe you invited others and moved up. When I joined, my place was 30K-something, now I'm about 8K behind, i.e. people cut me in line.

[t0]

Interactivebrokers is the cheapest at about $1/trade. Thinkorswim has the best software.

[noname123]

Second this. Use IB API to trade. Use ToS for option analytics.

[mschaecher]

Thanks never checked out either but will now!

[mcv]

I'm using Binck.nl. They've got several different tools with tons of data. Can't tell you much more, because I'm still figuring it out. Not sure how to buy index stocks (is that even possible?).

[Muted]

Yes, but as far as I know you can't buy indexs directly. You need to buy them via an ETF or fund that tracks a certain index. For instance the ticker VOO and VUSA are Vanguard's ETF's that track the s&p 500 in respectively dollars and euros. I'm sure if you google a bit you can find a lot more index trackers.

[chambo622]

Vanguard. Website works well enough. Rarely find a need to use the Android app - I use Mint primarily to keep an eye on my accounts, and Google Now for timely updates of certain stocks/funds.

[caw]

I use Vanguard as well, most of my trades with them are their ETFs or Mutual Funds so it's no fee (I don't trade very often, maybe every 6 months to rebalance).

My stocks are predominantly in Fidelity because I have their 2%-back-on-everything AMEX, which rolls into my Fidelity Brokerage account. $7.95 trades which I think is pretty standard for mega-bank retail trades without trade volume or account balance discounts.

[iends]

I've been thinking about switching to the Fiedlity Amex but it has terrible reviews. Have you had and problems with the customer service?

[caw]

No, but at the same time I've never needed their CS. The one time I've called was to inform of international travel. Total time spent on the call was less than 5 minutes. Did the same thing for my Visa card and that took over 15.

My only other interaction with them is when they send me new cards to activate, like if my card is going to expire or they want to issue me a new number. Activation is all automated and takes 2 minutes.

Fidelity brokerage I think is a separate service organization, and have had no problems with them either about account questions.

[pdovy]

Same here, although I primarily use it because trading Vanguard ETFs is free, which is mostly what's in my portfolio. Other brokers probably provide better tools, Vanguard's views are adequate but nothing special really. They do have pretty great customer service though, the few times I have had to call the person on the other end was always very knowledgeable.

[Maven911]

This is for Canadiens: I personally use Questrade, though virtual brokers is much better in terms of low transaction costs.

[curiousDog]

Might be too mainstream but I use Scottrade to manage a fairly large portfolio and love it so far.

[dave1619]

OptionsHouse has a decent platform and decent fees if you're not trading that much.