Merrill Edge

[benbuffett]

Platforms been down all morning. Anyone use Merrill Edge?

[benbuffett]

Platform back up. Not sure what the problem was.

[ratiman]

I was thinking of shifting my account over there but noticed no trailing stops. How do you find it?

[Spekulatius]

Why would you want to deal with Merrill Edge instead if Schwab, Fidelity or Interactive Brokers? I see no benefit of using Merrill Edge (I have never used it, but used Wells Fargo brokerage).

The dedicated investment brokerage offerings are far superior in terms of platform and customer service, imo.

 

Back in the day, Merrill Edge and Wells Fargo gave free trades when you had other products with them, which was worth something. Now everyone has free trades, so that point is moot.

[longlake95]

Are all of you guys in the US getting zero commission trades? Up here in Canada I still pay 6.95per trade on North American equities. If you buy a stock on a European borse, yes the major exchanges, we pay upwards of $200. Totally archaic. Typical Canada, roaring into the 1980's, we are always way behind the US. Our big bank monopolies just love that so they can just collect fees...

 

 

[ratiman]

I buy a lot of crappy $2 stocks and the commissions at IBKR are killing me. Second, IBKR will nickel and dime you and the platform is too hard to understand. Second, these brokerages put a ton of money into things I don't need like charting or news or screens or whatever. They would all be much better off just offering bare bones trading with no platform. It's not possible that anybody actually picks Etrade for the charting. I used Firstrade for a long time and it was fine. Finally, I happen to think that selling order flow is a good thing. If the buyers of order flow think I'm an idiot and want to trade against me, that would be great.

[Broeb22]

Why would you want to deal with Merrill Edge instead if Schwab, Fidelity or Interactive Brokers? I see no benefit of using Merrill Edge (I have never used it, but used Wells Fargo brokerage).

The dedicated investment brokerage offerings are far superior in terms of platform and customer service, imo.

 

Back in the day, Merrill Edge and Wells Fargo gave free trades when you had other products with them, which was worth something. Now everyone has free trades, so that point is moot.

 

I have a small amount of money with Merrill Edge (they are my primary bank and I worked there after college so left some IRAs there) and I also manage accounts at Schwab and Fidelity. I'm not the most sophisticated person ever, but their service is decent, the access to BofA research is nice, and their performance reporting is decent (and better than Fidelity or Schwab) for the average investor.

 

I consider them on par with Schwab or Fidelity. Interactive Brokers where I have most of my money, offers a whole lot more securities/markets, Forex, detailed and configurable portfolio reporting, and plenty of benefits to the small money manager, but it has numerous headaches too. I would steer clear of IB for the average investor who intends to invest in their home market.

 

[Gregmal]

Ive used a number of places over the years and IMO Interactive Brokers sucks but you cant beat their margin rates and also margin reqs. Overall though, I really like Fidelity. The layout is simple. Customer service is great. I trade a reasonable amount and pairing tax lots is also very easy/simple, especially vs IB. Oddly enough, I hate all the professional service platforms Ive ever used. Thomson One, Sunguard, etc....Stone Age stuff.

[longlake95]

Are you guys paying trade commissions?

[NoCalledStrikes]

I opened an account at Merrill edge 6 years ago back when the free trades were uncommon. I like illiquid stocks and getting hit with a full commission charge when your limit order gets hit with a single share bid was aggravating.  Unfortunately about  three years ago Merrill started making life difficult for purchasing what they call penny stocks (this includes LICT at 17k per share).  As a result, I’ve moved a fair bit of money out, but haven’t closed the account as IB wouldn’t accept my OTC stocks. 

 

Execution wise, I seem to get the best price improvement from Fidelity, Merrill edge is hit or miss, and TD Ameritrade is the worst.

 

Overall, Fidelity is my recommendation for ease of use and execution, but they don’t like dark stocks. IB is my favorite for international. Ultimately, I suggest keeping multiple accounts because you never know which stocks will be available from which brokers in advance. But yeah, if you just buy large caps, go with Fidelity.

[Guest]

Merrill Edge's platform is okay but not great. The credit card rewards are, by far, the best in the industry.

[benbuffett]

Only have had an account here (Merrill Edge) since the summer 2020. I do like all their research info. Have accounts elsewhere, don't believe in putting all my eggs in one basket  ;)

Was with Interactive Brokers for years, for trading they were good but had poor customer service. Did like them for tender offers though.

[Jurgis]

Are you guys paying trade commissions?

 

Zero commissions in US @Fidelity and I think most others mentioned. Not zero on IB AFAIK (unless you go with their severely limited noob account).

[LC]

Schwab for most of my accounts except the big ones @ IBKR solely for the margin rates.

[benbuffett]

ratiman

 

Merrill offers trailing stops. On trade page under order type.

[rb]

Are all of you guys in the US getting zero commission trades? Up here in Canada I still pay 6.95per trade on North American equities. If you buy a stock on a European borse, yes the major exchanges, we pay upwards of $200. Totally archaic. Typical Canada, roaring into the 1980's, we are always way behind the US. Our big bank monopolies just love that so they can just collect fees...

Or you could just use IB and not have that problem.