online trading?

[TTUPharmer]

Who does everyone here use? Scottrade seems to be the most attractive to me because there's no minimum amount to trade each month.


Also, I'm looking at finisar as a stock to invest in as they are in a growing field (high-speed networking) and have had a great yield so far this year.



Opinions on online companies, and some more inexpensive stocks with a good yield (whatever the risk may be) for a college student looking to make a little extra?

[Ima saver]

Most of my stocks have divident reinvestment plans.

[TTUPharmer]

Originally Posted by Ima saver

Most of my stocks have divident reinvestment plans.

I'm new at all of this, that would mean that whatever you make is reinvested yes? Also, who do you use for online trading (if you do)?

[Ima saver]

I am new to computers, so i don't do any online trading. There are some companies, like home depot, walmart, etc. that you can buy from directly if they have a DRIP plan. You only need to own one share . DRIP Means dividend reinvestment program.
I have also used Edward Jones, but they charge $50 which is high.
But I only got a computer recently, and have never used one in my life!

[TTUPharmer]

Ok, thanks

I'm gonna go with Scottrade since there's no minimum trading quota, and it's 7 dollars a trade. I'm just looking to dabble for the time being, and trying to low dollar stocks (under the radar stuff).

[Ima saver]

That sounds smart to me!! I got in on a good one, red hat for $7 a share. Now it is close to $30. I just dabble too!

[TTUPharmer]

Originally Posted by Ima saver

That sounds smart to me!! I got in on a good one, red hat for $7 a share. Now it is close to $30. I just dabble too!

that's awesome, and pretty much the kind of stuff I'm looking for, nothing over 20 bucks a share probably (for now, once I'm out of school I'll sink a little more into it)

[sweeps]

Scottrade is a very good choice.

Also consider Sharebuilder if you don't plan on doing much selling, just a lot of buying and holding. Sharebuilder gives a sign-on bonus too.

[PRICEPLUS]

I like Sharebuilder.It is low cost and extremely user friendly. It is especially good if you buy small amounts of stock.

[TTUPharmer]

I'll have to check out sharebuilder, I plan on only a very little buying and selling right now, I just want to play around with about $200 to get my feet wet, and after pharmacy school I can dive in a bit more

thanks for the help

actually I just dropped a little money into a sharebuilder account and am cancelling my scottrade account (didn't give them any money). Thanks for the tip, I think this is more of what I wanted.

[debtdude]

I used to do a lot of online trading. Life got busy so I pulled out.

If and only if you are comfortable sticking your money out, then I say go for it. Comfortable means either a) you can afford to lose it or b) you do a lot of research and analysis before buying a stock and have thus based your decision on sound investment principles.

I make a lot from macromedia stock when Flash was a new technology. I hit a lot of cutting edge high-tech companies that are now commonplace. However, I made those investments only after analyzing each company, reading months of company news, checking charts, and looking at the economy and consumer trends.

If a buddy said "buy company xyz" and you think that would be cool - think again. If you've been following the stock market for a year, read financial news as much as possible (2-3 times per week) and you think that finisar is a good investment, then go for it with an online trading company.

If you think the minute you buy that stock that you'll be worried about losing your money...then go to an investment firm and look at mutual funds to spread your moeny across multiple stocks thus minimizing your exposure.

Scott Trade is commonplace. Check each company for hidden fees and paperwork fees. Some charge extra for providing you paper copies. See if you can view online demos of their webinterfaces.

[34saving]

By good yield you mean a dividend? If so, you might want to check out SFL. It's price is pretty weak right now ($17) so it's paying 11.8% cash dividend. My online account lets me reinvest the dividend for free. It's weak now mostly because it's not a very sexy stock (okay, there's a lot more to it, but . . .), but the dividend is pretty secure. (It's an oil tanker financing company BTW.)

If you want high risk possibly high reward you might want to check out CORI (about $3.20). It's a software company specializing in online banking. It could be set for pretty rapid growth in the 2nd half of the year. At the same time it might fall flat. I'm not nearly the expert as many on this board, so you probably want to ignore this

[flash]

Originally Posted by debtdude

I used to do a lot of online trading. Life got busy so I pulled out.

If and only if you are comfortable sticking your money out, then I say go for it. Comfortable means either a) you can afford to lose it or b) you do a lot of research and analysis before buying a stock and have thus based your decision on sound investment principles.

I make a lot from macromedia stock when Flash was a new technology. I hit a lot of cutting edge high-tech companies that are now commonplace. However, I made those investments only after analyzing each company, reading months of company news, checking charts, and looking at the economy and consumer trends.

If a buddy said "buy company xyz" and you think that would be cool - think again. If you've been following the stock market for a year, read financial news as much as possible (2-3 times per week) and you think that finisar is a good investment, then go for it with an online trading company.

If you think the minute you buy that stock that you'll be worried about losing your money...then go to an investment firm and look at mutual funds to spread your moeny across multiple stocks thus minimizing your exposure.

Scott Trade is commonplace. Check each company for hidden fees and paperwork fees. Some charge extra for providing you paper copies. See if you can view online demos of their webinterfaces.

Absolutely correct. Lots of planning, analyzing, and don't take advice for stocks that have already performed well. The saying...don't put fertilizer at the bottom of a hill...you're wasting money if there's no where for it to go...

[lucasrd]

take a close look at finisar...this stock traded below $2 only a few months ago it's up quite a bit this year, and has been recently been given a "sell" rating from many firms...meaning it has run it's course for a while...

Also, I wouldn't shy away from stocks over $20... Share price has nothing to do with how expensive or cheap a stock is...that all has to do with the Earnings & Multiple... a stock selling for $30/share may actually be "less expensive" than one selling for $15/share because it could be trading at a lower Multiple...meaning the $30 stock has a stronger upside potential, where the $15 stock has gone as high as it can go for quite a while....

do some research and get familiar with how do discet share price, Earnings estimates, and what multiple the stock is trading at relative to other comparable stocks...then you'll find the bargains and make some money...

[poundwise]

For the amount you considering and the fact that you say you are just dabbling to get your feet wet, you'd be much better off using Sharebuilder or even BuyandHold.com.

Also, if you are still curious about DRIP (or DRP) investing, check out this link...

http://www.fool.com/DRIPPort/WhatAreDRIPs.htm

[TTUPharmer]

Thanks for the responses all, another good one to keep an eye on is clearwire, they're going public in the near future, when they officially get a symbol it will be clwr

just a heads up