Segment: Brokerage
Publication date: Friday, January 29, 2010
# Pages: (25 pages)

Abstract | Table of Contents

This report offers a comprehensive look at the trading commissions charged by Broker Monitor firms. As in past reports on this topic, we provide a detailed matrix listing self-directed firms’ online, automated phone and broker-assisted commissions for stocks, options, mutual funds and fixed income products. In a separate table, we provide a comparison of commissions for three sample stock trades from the full-service brokerage firms that we track.

In our last Commission Review more than a year ago, we found that commissions had stayed relatively steady. For the most part, only a handful of self-directed commissions changed their average commissions. There was a more noticeable change among full-service stock commissions. On average, stock commissions at the full-service firms increased 6%-8.5% depending on the size of the trade, whereas average self-directed stock commissions decreased only 2.2%.

Other key findings of the report include the following:

• $4.50 remains the lowest online stock commission among all Broker Monitor firms.
• Only one Broker Monitor firm does not offer fixed income trading.
• One firm charges the same commission for all online and broker-assisted trades.
• Four firms continue to offer commission-free programs for qualified clients.

Subjects

Fees, commissions, etc.

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