Review of TradeKing |
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In terms of its research tools, TradeKing does not have as many as other bigger sites do. These are sites such as E-Trade, Fidelity, TD Ameritrade, and Scottrade. They have analyst reports that are a lot more comprehensive and come from various investment houses. One of the things lacking in TradeKing is that it does not have those portfolio planning features that are really needed to help build them up.
On the subject of mutual funds and penny stock, TradeKing has fees on the former that are quite higher than the rest of their offerings. For instance, a mutual fund can be purchased for no less than $14.85. Clients do not have to pay this fee if they do their purchases directly coming from the fund family. A penny stock is priced at .01 for each share. If you are thinking of purchasing thousands of these shares, this can add up to a lot. Some sites have penny stocks that can be purchased for a flat fee.
TradeKing also has an automatic service called dividend reinvestment. This allows you to also buy fractional shares. You can set this feature for all the stocks you own or limit it to certain ones. It is good if you own ETFs and wish to reinvest the dividends the same way you do with the mutual funds.
In the money market sweep feature of TradeKing, the default is that just 1% of the interest is charged for cash balances. There are three accounts for the money market sweep and you can register for one of your choice. These are the treasury, taxable, and tax-exempt accounts. The taxable account pays 4.22% and is insured by the FDIC. This is something that is recommended. You simply have to send an email to TradeKing and you will be registered right away. There is no need to mail or fax any forms.
TradeKing is a service company so they place a lot of importance in their customer service team. They have one of the best teams amongst all discount brokerage firms. They got the number one spot for customer service in Kiplinger's magazine and in Smart Money, both in 2008. They have live-chat capability which allows you to talk to a customer service representative anytime between 8am and 6pm from Monday to Friday. You can easily find their email address as opposed to other brokers that make it as hard as possible for you to reach them. There are also short response times for either email or phone inquiries.
TradeKing also has an options calculator which is helpful especially for those that are not really familiar with options trading. You simply put in the stock ticker symbol of the company and the calculator will tell you its stock price. You can also choose from strike prices as well as expiration dates which will be the basis of your choice of option to get.
TradeKing is the right tool for you if you are looking for the things mentioned above. They have lower fees compared to others and you get superb customer service.