Day Trading

[Tony]

I was just wondering if anyone here does the above? I’d like to know what e-trader do you use, any recommendations, pitfalls or warnings? Who do you trade with, and would you recommend them? I know a few people who use Datek online, and they have had no problems with them (yet). So what are the competitors like then – E-Trade, AMETEK etc?

[Anders]

Datek Online are considered the best. Low commission and fast execution. I just signed up and I'm waiting for them to setup the account and credit my account with the initial lodgement, so I haven't used them yet. I have an account with Suretrade also, but I have never used it. They are not considered that great.

Using an online broker doesn't mean that you're day trading. I'm not planning on doing that for sure. I'm in the buy & hold camp.

I don't think there are any pitfalls to mention. A common problem is that it's difficult to access online brokers when there is a lot of market activity but they all have phone backup where you can make trades.

One way or the other, it beats the brokers that operate in Ireland. They charge fantasy money for the services they are providing.

E*Trade has had a lot of problems with their systems going down or being generally unaccessible whenever there is a lot of market movement, but I believe they have sorted that out now.

[WhipLash]

I know a lot of people who buy and sell shares online every other day. Pass them by during the day and they'd have all sorts of ticker tapes, graphs, message boards (yahoo, fool ...) etc up on their screens. All a bit too much for me though. Oh, they all use Datek Online, and they haven’t had a single problem with them either.

[Tony]

Thanks guys, so I take it that Datek Online gets the thumbs up then?

Anyone have any other advice, like the best research sites, message boards etc to use?

[Skid Marks]

Would you go and do some work there Tony ya slacker. :mad:

[Anders]

I tend to form my own opinion on where things are headed and invest accordingly. My process for picking a stock is usually that I hear about it, then I look up news items on Yahoo and read up about the company. Often I then stumble across articles about other companies that I end up buying instead.

Right now I have no great ideas. I haven't really had the time to do much researching of late.