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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – June 21, 2013

Published June 21, 2013
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While storms were raging across stock markets this past week, it was definitely calmer waters in terms of discount brokerage news and chatter.  In this week’s roundup, we look at the actions that landed another Canadian discount broker in the IIROC penalty box, a report by TD on Canadian investors as well as a review […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – June 14th 2013

Published June 14, 2013
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This past week was a fairly quiet one for Canadian discount brokerages, so this roundup will focus on some of the interesting events that took place in the discount brokerage space more generally. The most popular story in the discount brokerage space continues to be the supposed return of retail investors to equity markets.  Digging […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – June 7th 2013

Published June 8, 2013
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This week’s discount brokerage update features the newly announced deal by BMO InvestorLine, a couple of great forum post on the Financial Webring Forum on Qtrade vs. RBC Direct Investing  as well as another article from The Globe and Mail about Canada’s best discount broker. Deals Getting Some Air Unlike a lot of deals that […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – May 31st 2013

Published May 31, 2013
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Discount Brokerage News This roundup features deal spotting from Disnat and TD Direct Investing at the Cambridge House World Resource Investment Conference, a new review of Qtrade and news about a costly mistake made by a  Questrade trader. In addition we take a quick peek at the latest ranking of Canadian discount brokerages. Deal Me […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – May 17th 2013

Published May 17, 2013
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We are back with the Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup! Here’s the latest news from Canadian discount brokerages this past week: JitneyTrade and Credential Direct have stepped into the investor education game offering learning webinars to their clients. A look at JitneyTrade’s Twitter feed gave us the low-down on a series of webinars about market analysis […]

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National Bank Direct Brokerage to offer commission-free ETFs

Published April 17, 2013
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Commission-Free ETFs: Peer Pressure? Letting self-directed investors trade exchange traded funds (ETFs) commission-free appears to be all the rage amongst Canadian discount brokerages these days. National Bank Direct Brokerage has now become the latest Canadian discount brokerage to offer free trading of Canadian ETFs (click here to read their press release) joining the likes of […]

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Desjardins Group buying a piece of Qtrade

Published February 7, 2013
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Desjardins Group invests in Qtrade for the long-term Desjardins Group, parent to discount brokerage Disnat, announced earlier this week that they are taking a significant ownership stake in Qtrade Financial Group.  Desjardins has committed to purchasing between 25 to 40% of Qtrade’s outstanding shares initially with the option to acquire the remaining shares within six […]

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Questrade Launches Commission Free Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) Buying

Published February 4, 2013
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Commission Free ETFs – The New Normal? Earlier this month, Questrade made a major announcement that impacts the commission fees associated with trading or investing in exchange traded funds (ETFs).   Specifically, Questrade has eliminated the commission fees associated with purchasing ETFs so that now any Canadian or American listed ETF is available for purchase commission […]

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TD Waterhouse Discount Brokerage is now TD Direct Investing

Published December 20, 2012
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It looks like TD Waterhouse Discount Brokerage has recently rolled out its new name: TD Direct Investing. With the new name TD Direct Investing comes a much more user-friendly layout to their website, and many more pictures of smiley happy people. After waves of reports and surveys about investors requiring added support and educational resources, […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – Dec 16th 2012

Published December 16, 2012
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As 2012 draws to a close, it looks like the discount brokerage industry is going into autopilot.  This past week saw the expiry of a couple of promotions. First, Scotia iTrade’s 100 days of unlimited trading offer expired this week.  This leaves Questrade as the only discount brokerage currently offering unlimited trades.   Speaking of Questrade, […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – Dec. 7th 2012

Published December 9, 2012
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Interactive Brokers made the news this week as it released its trading metrics for the month of November.  While not a perfect proxy for the rest of the investment market, Interactive Brokers’ transaction volumes, known as Daily Average Revenue Trades (DARTs) help to provide an indirect measure of the ‘health’ of the stock market participants […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – Nov 30th 2012

Published December 2, 2012
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On the heels of the results from the annual Globe and Mail Canadian Discount Brokerage rankings, the 2012 Morningstar Canadian Investment Awards were handed out on November 28th and included a “Best Discount Brokerage” category.  While not nearly as well known as the J.D. Power and Associates award for Investor Satisfaction, the Morningstar Awards offer […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Round Up – Nov. 23rd 2012

Published November 23, 2012
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This week the biggest news for discount brokerages came in the form of the 2012 Globe and Mail Canadian discount brokerage rankings.  Rob Carrick’s annual survey of the Canadian discount brokerage industry looked at 12 firms this year. The top spot went to Virtual Brokers which narrowly edged out the six year champ, Qtrade while […]

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Questrade to offer unlimited free trades

Published November 19, 2012
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We spotted the latest deal offered by Questrade – and it is a big one.  On the heels of Scotia iTrade’s offer of 100 days of unlimited trading, Questrade has responded by offering up to 3 months with unlimited trades.  While a slightly less amount of time than Scotia iTrade’s deal (100 davs vs ~90 […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – Nov. 16/2012

Published November 16, 2012
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Canadian discount brokerages seem to be busy in their workshops planning what to unveil for next year.  Many of the major financial institutions have their financial year end at October 31st which means they’re setting budgets and planning marketing campaigns for 2013.  Because of the upcoming Globe and Mail discount brokerage rankings due out next […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – Nov. 9th 2012

Published November 10, 2012
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The big news from the Canadian discount brokerage industry this week was the huge announcement that OptionsXpress will no longer be available in Canada.  Virtual Brokers will be acquiring all of the OptionsXpress Canada accounts as of December 1st pending regulatory approval. This now narrows the number of Canadian discount brokerages that provide a powerful […]

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OptionsXpress Canada officially exiting the Canadian Discount Brokerage market

Published November 6, 2012
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The Canadian discount brokerage market this week saw one of the players officially exit by selling their Canadian operations.  Virtual Brokers announced today that they will be buying out OptionsXpress Canada effectively signaling the end of OptionsXpress in Canada and shrinking the number of big discount brokerages by one.  The business agreement is set to […]

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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup – Nov. 2, 2012

Published November 2, 2012
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Discount Brokerage Weekly Roundup There were a couple of really big events that took place this past week including the impact of Hurricane Sandy, TD Waterhouse Discount Brokerage’s Direct Investing Expo and Tyler Bollhorn’s soft launch of his new book, “The Mindless Investor”.  Also November is Financial Literacy Month, be sure to pay extra attention […]

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