Every day increasing numbers of self-directed investors are either turning to exchange traded funds (ETFs) to meet their investing goals or are learning more about how ETFs could help lower their investing costs.   Given the interest in these products by self-directed investors and the commission costs that are associated with buying and selling ETFs, Canadian […]

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 […]

[Updated June 12th] With summer just around the corner, a few of Canada’s discount brokerages are going to be working a little harder this month to try and win over self-directed investors.  The recently announced earnings from several major Canadian banks indicate that they aren’t making as much money as their shareholders are expecting. As […]

Deals have been updated, see below for more details This month’s deals and promotions from Canadian discount brokerages feature a new promotion by Questrade, as well as an interesting deal/contest by Scotia iTrade announced last month.  Also, Qtrade‘s transfer fee rebate is also back, this time with no apparent time limits.  Before launching into the […]

This year’s Vancouver World MoneyShow turned out to be a little different than most others. The exhibiting space felt a bit smaller than usual, the lineups took a bit longer and the schedule a bit less punctual.  As it turned out, this year’s MoneyShow would be the one in which this franchise would announce its […]

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 […]

April’s discount brokerage deals and promotions heralds the return of unlimited trading by an unlikely character in the deals section – HSBC InvestDirect. This deal is in ‘celebration’ of HSBC’s recent award by Dalbar Inc for best customer service at a Canadian discount broker, an award that RBC Direct Investing had won for several years. […]

As we move past the 2013 RRSP season, many of the promotions offered last month are either expired or will be expiring at the end of this month.  It seems like several discount brokerages are going to pass altogether on offering up any promotions for March whereas others are just extending out the deadlines of […]

This February will be the busiest month for football, love and RRSP deals.  Winning new business is clearly on the minds of big and small discount brokerages with a number of promotions aimed squarely at Canadian investors looking to open RRSP accounts. Kicking off the RRSP-specific deals are a couple transfer deals from the usually […]

In part one of this series, we looked at the background of the Globe and Mail discount brokerage rankings as well as how they’re structured and who they’re targeted towards. In this next part, we take a detailed look at what the discount brokerage rankings are actually measuring and some interesting observations we made about […]

Happy New Year to all of our deal hunting readers and welcome to another edition of Discount Brokerage Deals & Promotions. One of the most popular New Year’s resolutions for folks is to slim down. As it turns out, the number of deals being offered by discount brokerages has also slimmed down.  Right out of […]

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, […]

If you missed the first part of our J.D. Power & Associates Discount Brokerage Rankings series, read it here. The two main objectives of this section are to provide readers with: A look at the overall discount brokerage marketplace to see what, if any trends in investor satisfaction there are that matter to consumers A […]

For self-directed investors, it seems like the gift of discount brokerage deals has already been given in November. As it stands, the deals offered by discount brokerages into the end of the year are largely carried over from last month. The most noteworthy deal announced mid-November was the unlimited trading offer by Questrade. Similar to […]

Virtual Brokers Takes Top Spot The 2012 Globe and Mail Canadian discount brokerage rankings are out as of today with Virtual Brokers claiming the top spot and displacing the 6 year “reigning champ” of this survey, Qtrade (which came in second), by a razor thin margin. Becoming Globe and Mail’s top ranked brokerage, albeit barely, […]

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 […]

November’s lineup of discount brokerage deals and promotions features many of the same players from last month, except with some minor changes to dates and amounts. Starting first with the newest deals. National Bank Direct Brokerage is running the “Take Control of the Markets!” promo where they’re offering new clients who open an account with […]

For the month of October, most of the discount brokerages who are offering deals and promotions are fighting hard to win the business of Canadian retail investors. We’ve made a few changes to the deals section so that information is a little bit easier to find.  We’ve put the discount brokerage promotions that include commission […]

Discount Brokerage Weekly roundup: The big news this week in the world of Canadian online discount brokerages was the release of the 2012 JD Power & Associates Canadian Discount Brokerage Investor Satisfaction Survey results.  With Disnat coming out on top, followed by BMO Investorline and National Bank Direct Brokerage, the survey showed that while Canadian […]

Even though discount brokerages haven’t traditionally portrayed the most “fun and friendly” image, more and more of them are starting to become visible on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. While you (hopefully) won’t find those embarrassing pictures of a drunken night gone wild or an angry rant about a horrible boss, plugging […]