ULTIMATE Questrade Review 2017 Questrade har uppstått som online-mäklare i Kanada genom att erbjuda utmärkt service till alla vanliga investerare. De har de lägsta provisionerna i Kanada genom en demokratisk prissättning, tillsammans med utmärkta forskningsverktyg och solida handelsplattformar. Questrade är också rankad som den snabbast växande finansiella leverantören till viss del på grund av enastående kundservice. 9660 Scrolla ner för djuprecensionen SkrivenUppdaterad av Emma Li på tisdag 28 februari 2017 Editor Rating: (90) Användarbedömning: (95) När det gäller att investera 2017 är handelslandskapet badat och spränger i sömmarna med otaliga finansiella mäklarhus. Stora namn som BMO InvestorLine, RBC Direct Investing, TD Direct Investing, Interactive Brokers, Scotia iTrade och minst ett dussin mer är tillgängliga att välja bland. Tyvärr, genom en djupare analys kan man enkelt skilja distinkt skillnader bland dem, särskilt inom de stora bankernas cirkel. De flesta mäklarfirmor gör sina intäkter huvudsakligen genom nya och uppfinningsrika koncuktioner av otaliga och löpande avgifter som drivs på sina kontohavare. Sådana avgifter inkluderar, men är inte begränsade till, administrativa avgifter, uppställningsavgifter, aktivitetsavgifter, inaktivitetsavgifter, dolda avgifter och avgifter efter timme. Dessa extra kostnader kan vara bra och dandiga för den bråkdelade volymen av volymer som handlar helt enkelt för att deras rena handelsvolymer och realiserade vinster kan potentiellt kompensera dessa kostnader över tiden. Men för resten av oss är de extra och konsekventa avgifterna en påminnelse om att med tiden vinner huset alltid 8221. Använd Anbudskod: Kanada för att ta emot 50 i Free Trades från Questrade. Börjande investerare brukar kolla till sin lokala bank för att öppna sitt handelskonto framför allt av bekvämlighet eftersom de redan har en eller flera personliga kontokonton hos den banken och så öppnar ett handelskonto bara ett telefonsamtal bort. Den olyckliga katastrofen med detta tillvägagångssätt är de stora bankerna, och för övrigt kommer nästan alla andra mäklarfirmor i Kanada att debitera dig en arm och ett ben för alla typer av aktiviteter du gör (och inte gör) på ditt handelskonto. Ja, även i denna expansiva internetålder där allt är självbetjäning 247 bekvämlighet är provisionsscheman över hela linjen lång, robust och väldigt mycket företagets bottom-line-vänliga. Med standardräntor på 29-49 per handel är vanligt kan man bara fråga om hela industrin ingår i ett prisfastställande system. Var är valet Rise of Questrade. Grundades år 1999 ville detta företag göra och vara något annat. Att se den växande missnöjen av aktiva och inaktiva näringsidkare som var trött på att titta på sina marknadsvinster tvättades bort i en översvämning av nya mäklaravgifter från andra företag Questrade inledde en process för att effektivisera hela investeringsstrategin. Och därmed tror jag att de har gjort ett bra intryck jobb. I resten av den här översynen kommer jag att utforska Questrade och deras kollektiva erbjudanden när det gäller det goda och det dåliga. Först lite om mig. Jag är inte en aggressiv, mycket aktiv näringsidkare. De flesta gånger kommer jag att ta köp-och-håll-tillvägagångssättet som min försökte och sanna investeringsstil. Och så när jag köper in i ett företag gör jag det på lång sikt. Men ibland får jag det kliar och börjar handla som en galen person men det händer inte ofta. Questrade erbjuder en välgjord bransch unik 8216demokratisk pricing8217 aktiehandelskommission: 1 cent per aktie med en minsta avgift på 4.95trade och en taklimissionsavgift på 9,95 8212 idealisk för långsiktiga investerare. Aktiva handlare (eller någon när som helst) har alternativet 1cent per aktie (1cent minimum 6,95 maximalt), eller en 4,95 platt aktieavgift 8212 idealisk för högvolym aktiehandel. Alternativ som investerar för dessa aktiva användare kommer med en attraktivt låg 4,95 75 cent per kontrakt. Och processen med att delta i detta alternativa program innebär helt enkelt att prenumerera på en av Questrade8217s flera avancerade marknadsdataplaner. Detta bör blickas igen Det är inte ett typsnitt. Questrade erbjuder de billigaste affärerna i hela Kanada. Deras prispunkt är så imponerande att det faktiskt uppmuntrar nya och eller små investorer att hoppa in och ta del i investeringsspelet samtidigt som de lockar motbjudna aktiva näringsidkare från andra mäklarfirmor att överföra i (utan kostnad). De gör det tydligt klart att de inte tar ut avgifter, årsavgifter eller inaktivitetsavgifter (mer om detta senare) på någon av deras tjänster, vilket är en välkommen förändring till branschnormen. Men för dem som letar efter mer av en aktivt förvaltad portföljkontakt finns det en specialitetstjänst som de erbjuder till nominell årlig avgift. Detta kommer att diskuteras djupgående senare i den här översynen. Det finns några andra anmärkningsvärda förmåner från Questrade. Den första är möjligheten att köpa ETF-fond utan provisionsavgift 8212 De är fria att köpa Med så många investerare som idag vänder sig till ETF-företag på grund av deras låga MER och diversifierad räckvidd är det ett underbart frisk luft att kunna göra det utan kostnad. Questrade kan vara en av de första rabattmäklarna i Kanada för att göra en sådan sak, och jag applåderar dem. För det andra erbjuder Questrade IPOs (Initial Public Offering). För dem som inte är bekanta med immateriella rättigheter, är dessa helt enkelt den första försäljningen av nya problem av ett privat företag till allmänheten. Questrade har regelbundet tillgång till ett brett utbud av nya erbjudanden, vilket gör dem tillgängliga för kunder. Questrade erbjuder flera typer av konton: Marginalkonton (t. ex. Individuell, Informell Förtroende, Företag) Registrerad (t. ex. TFSA, RRSP, RESP) Forex (FX) och Kontrakt för Skillnad (CFD) ) Och ger tillgång till följande tjänster: 1 cent per aktie 8211 4.95trade minsta 9,95 maximala avgift Portfölj IQ (Managed Investing) Kostnaden varierar från 8211 0,35 till 0,70 (minst 2 000 i tillgångar) Nytt konto Registrera dig Processen att öppna ett konto online är anmärkningsvärt intuitivt, smärtfritt och väldigt snabbt (2 minuter för ditt allmänna konto, tillgång till övningsplattformar och gemenskapsdiskussion 20 minuter totalt för öppnande av handelskonton). Du behöver ditt personnummer (SIN), bankkontoinformation och arbetsgivaruppgifter (eller inkomstkälla om du är arbetslös). Och även om de har ett alternativ för offlineutskrift rekommenderar jag starkt sin säkra onlineprocess istället för att det minskar antalet inskrivningsfel och läsbarhetsproblem och stöder DocuSign för online-signeringsprocessen. Använd Anbudskod: Kanada för att ta emot 50 i Free Trades från Questrade. Registrering av startsidor Kontorsvalavtal En av de första sakerna du måste göra när du registrerar dig är att skapa ett användarnamn och lösenord för ditt nya konto. I tidigare dagar hade Questrade en automatiserad process som genererade och mailade det här lösenordet och tillsammans med din e-postadress fungerade som din primära inloggningsuppgifter. Den här gamla vägen blev en potentiell sårbarhet och så tackade de tacksamt det tillbaka 2011 till vad de har nu. Fördelen med att skapa ditt eget användar-ID och lösenord gör det också mycket bekvämare att återvända till en ofullständig ansökan vid ett senare tillfälle. Sessionerna tar slut efter 30 minuters inaktivitet vilket ger dig gott om tid att samla in nödvändiga dokument och referenser och granska dina inmatade uppgifter. Questrade erbjuder två samlingar av konton: Självstyrd och Managed Investing. Om du vill ha full kontroll över ditt konto / konto är det självstyrt för dig. För dem som vill ha ett professionellt hanterat tillvägagångssätt som hanteras av en riktig personal (Questrade Wealth Management Division) bakom kulisserna som noggrant anser dina personliga mål och risk tolerans att matcha, hantera, övervaka och anpassa sig för de bästa investeringarna utan ditt dagliga engagemang lyckades då investera (känd som Portfolio IQ under Questrade8217s lexikon) är det bästa alternativet. I motsats till självstyrd, kommer Portfolio IQ dock till ett pris 8212 en 14 årig ledningsavgift. Enligt min åsikt är det självklart att allting som någonsin behöver behöva överväga hur det är ganska enkelt att fatta välgrundade investeringsbeslut är ganska enkelt för till och med nykomlingar i dag och för att förena sig med detta, har självreglerade konton inga avgifter (utanför den vanliga handelskommissionen) som är förknippade med dem, till skillnad från dem deras lyckades investera kusiner. I8217ll går djupgående på sina förvaltade investeringar i ett senare avsnitt. Efter att du registrerat dig online (don8217t glömmer du att använda Questrade-erbjudandetoden under anmälan) kan du omedelbart logga in på ditt nya konto och titta runt. För att officiellt aktivera ditt konto (för att börja handla) krävs en initial insättning 8212 självreglerade: 1.000 för marginalkonton, 1.000 USD för valutakonton (CAD-inlåning konverteras automatiskt till USD), 5.000 för handelstransaktionsspridningar, 25.000 att skriva upp odefinierade alternativ och hanterade investeringar (Portfolio IQ) kräver minst en första insättning. När denna första minsta insättning har rensat, skickar Questrade dig ett bekräftelsemeddelande. För offlineapplikationer kommer du att kontaktas av en representant som bekräftar att handel kan börja. Det tar 1-3 arbetsdagar från att anmäla sig till ditt konto för att börja handla. Den längsta delen av processen väntar på att pengarna tas emot och bearbetas av Questrade. När allt är ett steg, är det viktigt att du håller ett balansräkning på minst 250 för att hålla ditt aktiva konto i gott skick. Questrade stöder flera metoder för att finansiera ditt konto inklusive EFT (från CAD-bankkonton), banköverföringar, kontroller, förutbetalade insättningar, postanvisningar, utkast, aktiecertifikat, överföringar från mäklare till mäklare och från andra befintliga Questrade-konton ditt namn). Det bör dock noteras att du inte kan använda EFT-metoden för att skicka USD till ditt Questrade-konto. Det omvända är möjligt där du kan ta ut USD-medel till ett USD-bankkonto (de behöver en tomgångskontroll eller ett förhandsgodkänt insättningsavtal som är undertecknat och stämplat av banken). För att deponera USD kan du skapa ett förhandsgodkänt inlåningsavtal med Questrade som tar cirka 1-5 arbetsdagar, eller skicka ett certifierat chequebank-utkast till sitt kontor eller överföra USD-fonderna direkt till ditt konto. Alternativt kan du också konvertera din befintliga CAD-balans (i ditt konto) till USD med hjälp av Exchange Funds-verktyget (finns under Förfrågningar), vilket kan ta upp till 24 timmar att behandla, eller dra nytta av Norbert8217s Gambit (framgångsrika konverteringar har bekräftats) . Att finansiera ditt marginal (eller annat icke-registrerat) konto av någon valuta typ kommer automatiskt att placeras i ett underkonto (mer om underkonton senare) av samma typ (de utför inte automatiska konverteringar 8212 du måste genomföra förfrågan på din egen). Elektroniska uttag tar ungefär tre arbetsdagar att behandla och komma till ett bankkonto. En intressant relaterad anteckning är att Questrade fortsätter att vara den enda mäklaren i Kanada för att tillåta dubbel valuta (CAD och USD) att hållas samtidigt inom registrerade konton (dvs. RRSP, RESP, TFSA, LIRA, RIF, LIF) som i och med i sig kommer att spara en enorm summa pengar från onödiga konverteringsavgifter. Var vänlig medveten om att Questrade rullade ut en subtil men viktig revidering av sin inaktivitetsavgiftspolicy. It8217 är faktiskt inte så dåligt när du läser detaljerna. Om någonting är ganska rimligt. Som det har varit länge känt Questrade inte en inaktivitetsavgift, men denna policyanpassning kan eventuellt ta ut 24,95 (ingen skatt) per kalenderkvartal. Om du emellertid gör minst en beställbar handel per kvartal (en gång var tredje månad) får du inte debiteras någon inaktivitetsavgift alls. Om du är inaktiv för kvart och får betalt denna avgift, men sedan gå på att göra minst en handel under det följande kvartalet får du upp till 24,95 i provisionsfria affärer. Välgörenhets - och valutakonton, individer 25 år eller yngre, samt eventuella nya konton som öppnas för endast 6 månader är befriade från denna avgift (du kommer inte bli debiterad för att vara inaktiv). Dessutom är alla kunder i Questrade och hushåll med samma fysiska adress, med sammanlagda eget kapital på minst 5 000 befriade. För de flesta investerare är denna förändring trivial eftersom deras tillgångar nästan alltid är över 5000, och det kommer aldrig att debiteras denna inaktivitetsavgift. Som jag påpekade tidigare anser jag att denna förändring är helt rimlig och fortfarande miles bättre än alla andra rabattmäklarhus som inte bara tar ut en inaktivitetsavgift utan undantag, de gör det oftare (varje månad) och tackar på otaliga dolda avgifter vilken Questrade gör det inte Medlemskonto Din konto8217s primära klientkontrollportal kallas Questrade Account (alternativt, vissa tycker om att kalla det myQuestrade) och helt enkelt sagt, det är en vacker upplevelse med väl genomtänkt organisation och visuell appell. Någon lägger mycket kärlek i detta område 8212, vilket ger en konsekvent, fullständigt nedsänkt och lyhörd upplevelse, tillgänglig på smartphones, tabletter, bärbara datorer och stationära datorer. Den här portalen integrerar helt och hållet handel och kontohantering tillsammans, vilket ger mycket omedelbar tillgång till buysell-värdepapper, arbetar med forskningsverktyg, använder sig av ett livfullt bibliotek av partnerapps (och developer8217s API), visa din kontoaktivitet, analysera balans och positioner, hantera din personuppgifter, visa uttalanden, göra överföringar av pengar i dina konton, ladda upp dina dokument, byta CADUSD-valuta, ta företagsaktioner på aktieägarkommunikation, överför positioner, öppna ytterligare konton, hämta skattekuponger, träningsoptioner och interagera med fonder. Questrade Account Investment Summary Mutual Fund Center När du loggar in på ditt konto för första gången blir du ombedd att välja en standard hemmabas. En hemmabas är där du vill att Questrade ska placera dig direkt varje gång du loggar in. Du kan välja mellan handelsplattform eller kontohantering. Även om it8217 är en bekväm tidsbesparare kan du hoppa mellan var och en när som helst via en alltid synlig topp menyraden. När you8217ve har gjort ditt val, går Questrade dig genom en interaktiv användarguide om hur du använder miljön. Konton 8217s består av 10 numeriska siffror (t ex 12345678-90). Detta är ett stort hopp från sin alfanumeriska storlek på 6 karaktärer före 2011 och som sådan har vissa externa banker rapporterats att de fortfarande inför en gränsen på 8 tecken för betalningsmottagarkonton när du försöker skicka pengar till Questrade. För att komma runt detta behöver du bara ange de 1: a 8 siffrorna i ditt Questrade-konto och pengarna kommer fortfarande fram till framgång. Om du när som helst behöver hjälp på praktiskt taget allt kan du alltid använda den online Questrade Live Help-sessionen (vanligtvis tillgänglig från toppen eller höger sida av Questrade8217s webbplats) 8212 operativ på vardagar (exklusive helgdagar) från 07:30 8211 20:00 ET. Jag har funnit att med hjälp av Live Help är det mycket snabbare än att ringa sina kontor. Och efter att ha pratat med flera av deras onlinerepresentanter (de som hanterar potentiella nya konton och andra som hanterar befintliga konton) fann jag att de var mycket välinformerade, professionella och snabba i sina svar. De tog alla också extra tid att tillhandahålla webblänkar för vidare läsning vilket var en bra bonus. Kontoaktivitetshistorik Beläget under Rapporter är en rad delkategorier som ger information om handel och allmänt kontoaktivitet. Några av dessa underkategorier inkluderar: Investeringsöversikt (bild ovan), Investeringsavkastning. Kontoaktivitet. Uttalanden. Handelsbekräftelser. och skattekort. När Questrade gjorde betydande förändringar i dess användargränssnitt tillbaka 2011 flyttade de i praktiken all handelsaktivitetshistorik till kundportalen. Det här är en väldigt välkommen förändring, eftersom det tidigare var all handelsaktivitetshistoria tillhandahållen av ett tredjeparts clearingföretag som heter Penson Financial Services och du måste använda en helt annan webbplats och en annan uppsättning inloggningsuppgifter för att få tillgång till denna information. Lyckligtvis är dessa dagar långa och du kan nu få en lista över alla dina investeringar (aktier, fonder, obligationer mm), nuvarande kassa och positioner (i CAD och USD), totalt eget kapital, köpkraft och mer inom en plats. Handelshistoriken bibehålls i 36 månader medan eStatements, genererade månatliga, lagras i 7 år. Skattekort (t ex T3, T5, T5008) är också tillgängliga elektroniskt för varje år. Handelsbekräftelser Uttalande Kontoaktivitet Även om Questrade8217s Trade Confirmations-databas hävdar att bära handelsuppgifter som går tillbaka till 1 januari 2009 fann vi att den verksamhet som gjordes före den 4 februari 2011 kräver medlemmar att besöka den gamla Penson-webbplatsen. Och att de som är intresserade skulle behöva ha sina gamla 6-karaktärs Questrade-konto (er) eftersom Pensons webbplats inte vet någonting om de befintliga 10-karaktärsrekordrepresentationerna. Här är en snabb titt på vad Penson Trade-verksamhetsområdet ser ut. Handelsaktivitet (fram till februari 2011) Som nämnts ovan är denna Penson-webbplats endast relevant för befintliga Questrade-medlemmar som vill komma åt arkiverad handelsaktivitet före februari 2011. Alla nya medlemmar kan ignorera vad jag just sagt och gå vidare till nästa stycke. Men för de som är intresserade av Questrade8217s kronologiska historia 8212 som noterat och visuellt sett ovanför 8212 var handelsverksamhet outsourcad och som sådan var den första märkbara skillnaden att webben-användargränssnittet var helt annorlunda och mycket bakom i tiden. Vid den tiden var det fortfarande mycket förvånande att med Questrades skicklighet och önskan att erbjuda en ren och användbar UI-upplevelse på sin huvudwebdomän att de inte trodde det var nödvändigt att ponera upp kontanterna för att inneha dessa kontoaktiviteter, hade motivation att begära webbtjänst-API-er från Penson vilket ger dem fria händer mot huden över den ursprungliga Penson-upplevelsen. Även om detaljerna som hölls inom Penson var omfattande var det rörigt och förvirrande. Handels - och avvecklingsdagbalansen tog 24 timmar att återspeglas i historien, detsamma var sant med köpkraft som uppdaterades en gång i början av varje dag. Det mesta av vad som hittades på denna gamla Penson-webbplats är nu integrerad i Questrade handelsplattformar som diskuteras senare. Questrade marginalkonton (för handel med aktieoptioner) består av två delkonton 8212 en för kanadensiska medel, den andra för amerikanska medel. Detta är väldigt bekvämt eftersom det minskar onödiga konverteringsavgifter vid handel med amerikanska instrument. Således förblir transaktioner på amerikanska aktier som USD till skillnad från de flesta andra mäklarfirmor som kommer att göra omvandlingar tillbaka till CAD direkt. Exempelvis kommer med Questrade saker som amerikanska utdelningsinkomster från amerikanska börshandelar att förbli som USD och deponeras automatiskt i ditt amerikanska underkonto. Fonder kan flyttas mellan delkonton med hjälp av Questrade8217s Exchange Funds-funktion, men notera bara att detta kommer att innebära en omvandling baserad på spotkursen vid marknadsavslutningen i Toronto plus en spread-spread (1,99 för både marginal och registrerade konton om totalt eget kapital överstiger 100k detta faller till 1,70 för marginal och 1,00 för registrerade). Ett bättre sätt att konvertera mellan USDCAD skulle dock vara att använda Norbert8217s Gambit-tekniken eftersom det nästan eliminerar valutaväxlingsavgifter (det innebär att du använder tickers DLR. TO, DLR. U.TO och journaling över dina innehav till den ena eller den andra) . Questrade uppmuntrar starkt visningsdownloading av tidigare månaders uttalanden (som pdf-filer) tillgängliga i Questrade8217s kundportal för all kontoaktivitet utan kostnad. Men för de som fortfarande insisterar på brevpapper, kan de göra det med en stor mängd information som kan beställas genom att kontakta dem direkt via telefon eller via Live Help. Och som en praktisk notering skickas aktieägarkommunikation ofta gånger via vanlig post. Genom att använda den fria InvestorDelivery-tjänsten kan du ställa in för att få all din investorskorrespondens elektroniskt, om du vill. Handelsplattformar Och så börjar en ny era i handelsplattformar för Questrade. Så länge vi kan komma ihåg Questrade hade chugging tillsammans med deras skickliga, men åldrande, plattformar: QuestraderWEB, QuestraderELITE och QuestraderPRO. Även om QuestraderWEB hade renoverats betydligt hade alla tre varit i det vilda i väl över 10 år. De utförde sig ganska bra i sin egen rätt men hade inte hängt med de tider som framgick av erbjudanden på andra rabattmäklarehus. Questrade markerade ett nytt kapitel med introduktionen av Questrade IQ-serien. Questrade har gjort mycket arbete bakom kulisserna för att återuppliva deras investors8217s handelserfarenhet. När de släppte en helt ny layout för Questrade Account-klientportalen kunde man inte hjälpa till utan huvudet och undrade varför deras handelsplattformar aldrig fick samma behandling. Tja, svaret can8217t vara tydligare: de uppdaterades lika bra 8212 det tog bara ett tag. Epiphany inser att tre separata plattformar för skrivbordshantering var förvirrande och så valde de att gå i pension för alla tre till förmån för en enda moderniserad handelsplattform som kallas Questrade IQ. Questrade IQ är en svit som består av tre smaker: Questrade Trading. en fullt fungerande webbaserad handelsplattform (för WindowsMacsLinux-användare på Google Chrome 52, Firefox 48, Safari 9 för Mac-användare, Internet Explorer 11, Microsoft Edge) Questrade IQ Edge. en strömlinjeformad skrivbordsbaserad handelsplattform (för Windows 78.110, MacOS 10) och Questrade IQ Mobile. deras första mobila aktör inom handeln (för iPhoneiPod Touch iOS 6 och Android OS 4.1). Hela denna samling är gratis för alla medlemmar och inkluderar snap quote live CanadianU. S. strömmande nivå 1-data, forskningsverktyg för grundläggande och teknisk analys, ett kartläggningspaket och mycket mer. Ibland kan marknadsdata fördröjas (upp till 15 minuter) och när det händer visas en söt klockikon på skärmen för att informera dig om streamingupphängningen. Och även om det görs tillgängligt gratis, kan dessa plattformar uppgraderas till att inkludera ett av tre datapaket eller lägga till agrave la carte-flöden. Nu let8217s tar en närmare titt på var och en av dessa unika plattformar och vad de har att erbjuda. Questrade Trading Questrade IQ Edge Questrade IQ Mobile Questrade Trading är en pluginfri webbåtkomlig plattform som är uppbyggd på HTML5 och är utformad för att vara tillgänglig på nästan vilken enhet som helst. Det är smidigt integrerat i Questrade-kontoportalen och kan nås via Trade-knappen i menyn överst. Det kan till och med ställas in för att vara din hemmabas när du loggar in. Questrade Trading är väldigt särdragspaket och fungerar som den primära gatewayplattformen för de flesta användarnas hela affärserfarenhet. Det fungerar också som Questrade8217s svar för dem som av någon anledning inte har tillgång till (eller kompatibel med) IQ Mobile eller IQ Edge. Detta skulle vara det perfekta valet för Linux-stationära användare eller den växande närvaron av tablettbärare. Eftersom det är en fullständigt kompatibel HTML5-webbläsarbaserad responsiv upplevelse, behöver den inte, i motsats till de andra, en nedladdning eller någon tillägg från tredje part för att vara fullt fungerande. Att ta en tur med denna plattform var en otroligt befriande upplevelse 8212 en utmärkt sammanslagning av kraft och användbarhet. Det introducerar begreppet Gadgets i plattformsleksikonet. En gadget är ett anpassningsbart användaranpassat fönstret med en syn på dina handelsmarknadsuppgifter. Prylar inkluderar, men är inte begränsade till, aktivitet (en loggvisare), saldon, tid och försäljning (aktuell global aktivitet för ett lager), nivå 1-citat, nivå 2-citat (om du betalat för detta tillägg), nyheter, order, Diagram, positionssammanfattning och tittellista. Questrade Trading var överraskande blixt snabbt och lyhörd i varje webbläsare vi testat. Användningen av minnes - och CPU-fotavtryck var förvånansvärt liten trots djupet av alternativ, aktivitet och funktionalitet som den hade att erbjuda. Sessioner don8217t verkar ha någon tidsgräns för inaktivitet. En bra bonusfunktion på denna plattform var att kunna starta en handelsuppgift på en enhet (t ex en hem-dator) och sedan enkelt skifta till en annan enhet (t ex smartphone eller surfplatta) för att slutföra den. Detta är ett ovärderligt litet tillägg eftersom det kan göra det möjligt för en att noggrant konstruera långa handelsprocedurer samtidigt som det tillåter fri rörlighet under upptagna scheman. Till skillnad från sin IQ Edge-kusin kan Questrade Trading dock inte ändra sitt färgtema utseende 8212 it8217s alltid i ett lätt tema. På plussidan sparas alla anpassade ändringar du gör i layouten automatiskt och återställs om du lämnar och återgår till plattformen. Anmärkningsvärda skillnader mellan den här plattformen och resten av familjen inkluderar bristen på alternativa order på flera ben, inga varningar, och heller inte arbetsrumsförstärkarkort. Om du vill använda en eller flera av de saknade funktionerna bör du välja IQ Edge istället. Layout 8211 Handelsplattform Balanser 8211 Handelsplattform Aktivitet 8211 Handelsplattform Questrade IQ Edge är den här stora svärdens pojke. Det kommer bara som en installationsbaserad inbyggd dator (eller Mac) skrivbordsapplikation konstruerad speciellt för aktiva och prohandlare. IQ Edge möjliggör en obegränsad mängd arbetsytor (Questrade Trading tillåter endast en). En arbetsyta är ett skärmområde som gör det möjligt för en att öppna och anpassa en ny uppsättning gadgets eller windows för ett visst syfte som passar en handelsmiljö stil. Flera lättåtkomliga arbetsytor är en värdefull tillgång till aktiva handlare. Den andra stora skillnaden mellan IQ Edge och Questrade Trading är att IQ Edge erbjuder en mer avancerad typ av alternativ för orderposter: villkorliga order (t. ex. utlösningsorder till en viss tid, pris eller volym automatiskt), konsolbeställningar, mer omfattande varningar, flera orderinmatningsfönster, anmälningsemail när något köps eller säljs, och förmågan att beställa anonymt. Det finns också några subtila skillnader. IQ Edge möjliggör omfattande anpassning av gadgetar som tar dem långt utöver vad som är möjligt i Questrade Trading. De flesta av dessa anpassningsbara funktioner är dock visuella (t ex float, pin, drag-drop, resize, colorize, blink text) det beror på gadgeten. Nyfikenhet har gadgets don8217t en snap-to-funktion i IQ Edge och så automatiserar de inte automatiskt när huvudprogrammets fönster ändras. Det var lite obekvämt men inte en avbrottsbrytare eftersom de flesta bara placerar sina prylar på en viss plats och behåll applikationsfönstret med en viss storlek. Intressant är att någon gadgetanpassning du gör i IQ Edge inte överförs till Questrade Trading (förutsatt att samma gadget existerar) och vice versa. Emellertid är tickersymboler och relaterad data inuti gadgets (t ex varningar) korrekt underhållna och överföres över mellan webdesktop-miljöer. IQ Edge-färgteman varierar från mörk (standard), ljus och himmelsblå. En ytterligare tillskott av IQ Edge är att det ger en näringsidkare känslan av komfort med att veta att deras platform8217s handelsaktivitet inte kommer att försenas eller uppleva hicka som det kan vara fallet om man använder en webbläsare. IQ Edge skrevs från grunden med optimerad C-kod och implementerad för IntelAMD-processorer som garanterar snabbast möjliga svar för de mest döda av aktiva handlare. Tyvärr, vid tidpunkten för det här skrivandet finns det ingen 64-bitarsversion för IQ Edge på datorn. För Mac-enheter är det native 64-bitars. Det kommer fortfarande att köras normalt på 64-bitars Windows-system, det vann bara8217t så effektivt som det kunde vara. Here8217s hoppas att en optimerad 64-bitars Windows-version av IQ Edge inom en snar framtid kommer att bli tillgänglig. Layout 8211 IQ Edge Charts 8211 IQ Edge Order Entry 8211 IQ Edge Och nu skifter vi vår uppmärksamhet mot Questrades andra viktiga plattform: Questrade IQ Mobile 8212 är deras mycket enkla, mycket skickliga mobila handelsplattform. Fungerar var som helst när som helst, den här appen är tillgänglig för iOS (iPhone och iPad) och Android-enheter från sina respektive appbutiker. Questrade hade ursprungligen planerat att släppa en liknande version för Windows Phone och Blackberry men förståeligt, på grund av deras minskade marknadshandlingar skedde idén sent i utvecklingscykeln. Som sådana måste dessa enheter använda sitt webbläsarbaserade alternativ: Questrade Trading. Vi fann att IQ Mobile8217s funktionssats är nästan identisk med sin Questrade Trading-plattform, med inbyggda visuella tweaks för att bättre passa bärbar enhetens funktionalitet. It8217s alla här, inklusive forskningsverktyg, diagram, options trading och nivå 2 data. Du kan även utföra kontohanteringsåtgärder direkt i appen. Den visuella layouten och organisationen av funktioner är mycket genomtänkt. Vi kunde navigera och använda appen med stor lätthet. Även om de på ett bekvämt sätt tillhandahåller ett interaktivt hjälpverktyg inom appen fann vi att det var lite behov av det eftersom det bara var förnuftigt. Efter att ha använt den här plattformen i flera dagar är det klart att vi letar efter oss. Questrade syftar till att göra IQ Mobile så funktionell som IQ Edge över tiden. Det är ingen tvekan om att detta är en integrerad komponent till Questrade, och är möjligen den viktigaste av hela paketet när det gäller långsiktig tillväxt eftersom de flesta kommer att fortsätta att titta på sina telefoner (och andra bärbara enheter) som deras primära nav på marknaderna. Så i8217m säker på att detta kommer att hälsas med överlyckliga leenden av aktiva näringsidkare som har längtat på att bli mer fullständigt unshackled från deras IQ Edge-stationära datorer. På språng är det här för att stanna, så det är bara logiskt att Questrade fortsätter sin trend att integrera mer Edge-liknande whiz-bang-funktionalitet i IQ Mobile, som säkert driver det långt utöver sin webbaserade syskon. Förhoppningen är dock att Questrade kommer att försiktigt gå över den rörlighetstoppet genom att behålla app8217s unika användarvänliga intuitivitet för att säkerställa massanvändning, samtidigt som den innehåller mer sofistikering för att hålla sin aktiva handelsbefolkning lycklig och samtidigt vårda en ny generation av på farten investerare som nu kommer att få tillgång till ett växande verktygssätt av avancerade möjligheter som deras förtroende och portföljer växer. Citat 8211 IQ Mobile Options 8211 IQ Mobile Level 2 Data 8211 IQ Mobile Det här nya tradingplattformssystemet är otvivelaktigt ett stort steg i rätt riktning för Questrade. Samlingen omfattar allt QuestraderWEB, QuestraderPRO och QuestraderELITE (deras nuvarande äldre handelsplattformar) hade och några. Och den här sviten gör det på det mest intuitiva, omfattande sättet. Genom att ta det djärva steget för att gå i pension med sina äldre plattformar genom att ersätta dem med en smidig nästa generations handelsmiljö är ett tecken på att Questrade bryr sig om att ge den bästa upplevelsen för den lediga näringsidkaren och krävande aktiv användare. Interestingly, upon further investigation we found that new releases for this suite is always consistent and swift 8212 a major new release occurs every month 8212 bringing with it a slew of enhancements and bug fixes, based on direct user feedback of their online community discussion forum: The Exchange . A few other unique features which I am surprised other brokerages have not yet duplicated is, firstly, the clever partnerships Questrade has with third party websites (e. g. iShares ETFs) 8212 providing one-click Buy Now buttons across the web 8212 permitting on the fly quick trades that whisk the buyer back into the IQ platform to complete the pre-filled order ticket. And secondly, a feature called Margin Power (for self-directed accounts) which, by its name, gives you a clue on at what it does. By linking your existing TFSA account to your margin account it increases your buying power within your margin account by leveraging the assets you already hold in your TFSA making it enormously convenient to enter new positions without requiring a transfer of new cash or selling existing securities. Both features are wonderfully handy The long requested single sign-on feature is now available for Questrade members. You now use one user ID and password to access the trading platform, Questrade Account, and the Exchange. This saves a tremendous amount of time because in the past Questrade had originally required at least three different sign-on credentials to access each of their trading landscapes, and so to no surprise this was a heavily requested feature. We welcome its addition. To get a better feel of what Questrade IQ has to offer here is a collection of video tutorials overviewing this trading platform8217s most common features. Videos 8211 Trading Platform Videos 8211 IQ Edge Videos 8211 IQ Mobile Although we briefly mentioned in passing their older predecessor platforms, to give you a better sense of who Questrade is and how much they8217ve improved, what follows are images of their previous generation trading platforms. Prior to IQ, Questrade offered a few other trading platforms for stocks and options: QuestraderWEB, QuestraderPRO, and QuestraderELITE. QuestraderWEB was their web-based application with a very pretty and intuitive user interface. It was Questrade8217s only free platform and required the Java plugin within your browser to function correctly. QuestraderPRO and QuestraderELITE were desktop applications requiring a monthly subscription fee. QuestraderWEB QuestraderPRO ELITE A little note on exchange and ECN fees. These are the fees Questrade is forced to charge you when you make a transaction that removes liquidity from the market (i. e. buying at the ask or selling at the bid). Although these fees translate to mere pennies for most traders one can avoid paying them altogether by executing transactions as a limit (or stop) order at the bidask instead of as a market order request. For U. S. stocks you can also send orders to non-direct access ECN networks (LAMP, MNGD, or POST) to avoid these fees. Most people will sign-up for the standard marginal account which gives you access to borrow funds at an amount more than your current cash balance. This extended buying power ability is very useful and can come in handy when you need to jump on market opportunities. Assuming you8217ve bought on margin and haven8217t settled your stocks after 3 days of the purchase the margin interest rate is prime 2.5 which is inline with most brokerages. One of the selling points Questrade likes to bring up is that for mutual funds they will rebate the trailer fees. They call this their Mutual Fund Maximizer. Trailer fees are commissions by fund management companies paid to your brokerage house for being the retailer that sold you your fund(s). This commission is an ongoing source of revenue for your brokerage as long as you keep holding onto those fund(s). You don8217t see this fee because it is part of the MER of the fund. So Questrade is willing to rebate this fee back to you each quarter. But there8217s a catch. You need a minimum of 36,000 in mutual fund holdings to be eligible for this rebate. The reasoning is simple. There is a processing fee of 29.95month so the rebates will start paying back if your mutual fund holdings is worth more than 36,000 (based on a 1 trailer fee). Portfolio IQ (Managed Investing) Self-directed investment empowerment (aka DIY trading) is offered by virtually all discount brokerages and has been a popular preference by the general public due to the myriad of easy-to-use tools and support made available to an investor desiring to control every aspect of their interests. With this style of investing customers have always been able to sculpt their own investment strategy, define their portfolio, buy and sell securities, and more. However, there is another option. For those with very little time while continuing to carry big investment ambitions Questrade introduced Portfolio IQ, the alternative to self-directed investing. Really known as managed investing, Portfolio IQ takes away the stress of investment decision making and puts them in the hands of portfolio managers of their Questrade Wealth Management division. Who doesn8217t want to take it easy and watch their money grow towards financial independence with little effort It8217s a dream come true The difficult part with that dream is figuring out how exactly to do that. This is where Portfolio IQ comes to the rescue. Becoming Canada8217s first online wealth management service, Portfolio IQ debuted as a definitive market disrupter by making managed investing accessible to everyone. Traditionally, managed investing has been an exclusive club for the uber-rich but Questrade, keeping to its roots of bringing all things restrictive to the masses, decided to do away with convention. Opening a Portfolio IQ account is straight-forward and only requires 1. As an extra bonus, this review8217s Questrade offer code can also be used when opening this type of account. Once open you8217re taken through a simple-to-use point-and-click questionnaire to set up an investor biography that identifies your risk tolerance, existing financial circumstances, market knowledge, and investment ambitions all of which is used to better crystallize the best portfolio for you. What8217s also great is that if your goals change then you can return and adjust your bio to keep things in balance, which will automatically update your underlying portfolio model accordingly. All the portfolios deal exclusively in ETFs (composed of a mix of various sectors, markets, and countries) and come in 5 flavors: With the added benefit of taking full advantage of tax-loss harvesting and providing a last quarter management fee refund guarantee if not fully satisfied for any reason, Portfolio IQ is an extraordinary entrant into the managed investing arena and has that perfect resonating mix all investors, big and small, crave when they daydream of an unshackled financial tomorrow. IPO Centre Participating in initial public offerings (IPO), secondary issues (additional sharesbonds offered by a public company), and structured products has always been the holy grail for many investors since the incredible euphoric frenzy of the 1990s internet IPO boom. Historically, because first issues usually tick up on first day closings it8217s logically understandable why so many want in 8212 it8217s a quick way to make an easy buck However, due to the natural laws of supply and demand interest in these new issues almost always outstrip the quantity made available and therefore only insiders, well-connected bigwigs, and the very rich are usually the only ones who have access to them nepotism and cronyism at its undemocratic finest. For generations the general public has had little access to IPOs. There was a brief moment in time when Wit Capital, an internet startup of the 90s, briefly unlocked this secret world, but it was short-lived. Questrade became one of the new Canadian trailblazers to usher in a sledgehammer back into this world for the masses. The Questrade IPO Centre, showcasing mostly Canadian equity, fixed income, and structured products, list newly available issues and previous offerings (for historic analysis). Their respective facts, investor summary, terms, and preliminary prospectus are also readily accessible. For instant notification of newly announced IPOs and secondary issues clients are encouraged to subscribe to the IPO Bulletin. Independent testing revealed that notifications were indeed right away. The centre is reachable on the desktoplaptops. smartphones, and tablets. When you see an IPO or other new issue you like, it8217s a simple click, tap, or a trade desk call away to express interest. An expression of interest makes Questrade aware you are putting in a commitment to buy a number of shares. However, this does not guarantee you will actually get any or all of the shares you8217ve requested. If a client places an expression of interest on the website, the trade desk will contact the client to confirm the order within an hour (rare cases may take up to 24 hours). There is a 5,000 minimum requested amount for submitting an IPO order. Some companies going public may even ask for an amount over and above this, but the majority of the time it won8217t be above the 5,000 Questrade minimum. Once the order is confirmed Questrade passes along the interest to the offering8217s underwriter. Although not possible right now, soon clients will be able to submit their expression of interest through the trading platform to reduce wait time and eliminate the need for a Questrade representative call-back to confirm the order. Cancelling an interest request can be made within two business days (this may vary depending on the province) after receipt or deemed receipt of a prospectus and any amendment (found at the online centre). All IPO and secondary offering purchases are commission free. Processing time for orders can vary but usually it takes around 3 weeks from when the underwriters first launch the IPO and when the offering closes. For some secondary offerings and preferred treasury shares times can be shorter. Once allocations from the underwriter are received Questrade informs clients via email or phone. Allocations, however, may be distributed on a pro-rata basis if an IPO is oversubscribed (the number of shares requested by all interested parties is greater than what Questrade received), and so, as mentioned earlier your original interest amount may not necessarily materialize to what you actually get. For example if Questrade receives a 50 allocation on their total order amount, they would then allocate 50 to their client8217s original order. Although the IPO Centre mostly has Canadian offerings, U. S. IPOs do show up from time-to-time as well. It8217s because of Canadian security regulations that U. S. and other foreign-based companies must file their prospectus in each province individually in order to be sold to residents of that particular province. Because many companies in the United States may feel that doing an IPO in Canada could be an added expense (e. g. listing fees, legal fees, French language requirements) and that domestic demand in the U. S. is enough to satisfy how much capital they want to raise, it8217s only logical that most offerings will be Canadian by nature. Interestingly, many international miningresource companies will choose to file a prospectus and raise money within Canada, and choose to be listed here as well. TSX has a very large mining focus in general. Registered accounts (e. g. RRSP, TFSA) are also eligible to hold the vast majority of IPOs and treasury offerings. However, some IPOs may not be eligible due to their companyoffering structure and how widely held it is. The centre is a very welcome sight and seems well positioned to grow into something incredibly special. Sadly, no word yet if and when Questrade will be issuing their very own company IPO When making trades one of the primary concerns held by most people is security. Like banks, most discount brokerage companies deploy different protection strategies to secure your account such as randomizing security questions, displaying pre-selected image captchas that only the account holder would know, two-step and two-factor verification, or even providing digital key devices which in conjunction with your secret password must be pressed to generate the final half of the login passcode each time. Questrade8217s security measures have improved dramatically over the years. For example, upon sign-up for a new account you are required to create a user ID, password, and set up a few security questions. User ID8217s are required to be 8-20 characters long while passwords must be at least 8 characters in length and include an uppercase, lowercase, and numerical (or symbolic) character. Although this seems like a standard approach across the web this is actually new and a big improvement for Questrade. They also now include extra verification steps such as when you attempt to log in to your account from an unrecognized system you are prompted with one of your security questions. An optional PIN can also be setup to help you get faster service when calling in. Security advice is made available outlining how to protect yourself by taking precautionary steps like using anti-virus software to keep your computer clean. Interestingly, they have made the extra effort by partnering with Symantec, using Norton Anti-virus to continuously scanmonitor their own internal files, ensuring your investments and privacy on their end are secure. Questrade was also one of the few discount brokerage firms that were not affected by the Heart Bleed Bug 8212 they were protected all this time. Although they don8217t have security guarantees against intruders breaching accounts on your end, if there is fraudulent activity and it8217s proven to be due to the negligence of Questrade they are in a position to cover your loss. Also note that Questrade is a CIPF member, and so Canadian investors are covered up to 1,000,000. Final Thoughts Reviews online are overwhelming negative towards Questrade. Prior to writing this review I decided to read many of these complaints so that I could be aware of and keep an eye out for any of these problems. I even took note on exact steps for some of these problems with hopes of recreating them. I had originally planned to share a collection of these complaints but seeing as how many of them might have already been resolved by Questrade I felt the company deserved another look before passing judgment. So after spending a number of days using their entire suite of online tools, making trades, and attempting to recreate customer complaints I can report back and say that I did not experience a single issue. My conclusion is that either Questrade had fixed several of these earlier problems or these complaints were from beginning traders who were not familiar with the platform nor company policies. Overall my experience with Questrade was a very pleasant one. Their 8220killer app8221, so to speak, is free (no commission charge) ETFs (Exchange Traded Funds) and that one can execute trades as low as 1cent per share (4.95 minimum) with no catch. It doesn8217t get any sweeter than that In rare instances I sometimes come across other brokerages offering promotionals at 4.95trade but when you dig deeper into their fine print it almost unequivocally is for 8220big fish8221 traders who must spend upwards of 100,000month in trading activity to be eligible for the 4.95 offer. Clearly not for the average consumer. Obviously this is not the case with Questrade. Questrade8217s low commission rate is so good it serves as an enticer to make more trades more often and not have to hesitate by attempting to time the market in hopes of covering commission costs. I am happy to see Questrade has made many brilliant enhancements over the years including, but not limited to, a unified single sign-on approach that provides a more consistent milieu. There are a few areas that can be improved such as full gadget settings retention across different trading platforms, but with such dramatic savings found among all their services it seems understandable that one can8217t always have everything. So I will give them a pass on that. Should you join Yes 8212 a resounding YES Questrade offers a remarkably rich tapestry of features well tailored for new investors and seasoned traders. For someone like me, as a casual trader, who has experienced headaches with other brokerage firms it8217s nice to finally find a good home at Questrade who doesn8217t play games nor charge exorbitant fees. Questrade fits my needs perfectly and helps unlock my potential as a growing investor. And at the end of the day isn8217t this what we really hope a respectable brokerage firm provides us Use Offer Code: Canada to receive 50 in Free Trades from Questrade when signing up for a new account. Your session is secure During the account opening process, the information you provide to us is encrypted using Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology. SSL skyddar information när den passerar Internet. För att stödja denna teknik behöver du en SSL-kompatibel webbläsare. Hur kan jag se om en webbsida är säker Du kan se om du besöker ett säkert område på en webbplats genom att leta efter hänglåssymbolen på statusfältet längst ner på din webbläsars skärm eller i URL-adressen längst upp på sidan skärm. När hänglåset är i låst läge är din session ansluten till en säker server. Obs! Om du använder en krypterad webbläsare och du inte ser den säkrade anslutningssymbolen under Questrade onlineapplikationsprocessen, kan du ha angett webbplatsen via en anslutning som inte är säker. För att komma in på webbplatsen via en säker anslutning, gå till vår hemsida och klicka på inloggningsfliken högst upp på sidan och välj myQuestrade. Vad kan jag göra för att skydda mig själv Du bör bara använda webbläsare som använder starka krypterings - och säkerhetsfunktioner som Windows Internet Explorer. Besök Microsoft för att hämta den senaste versionen. Important: we do not recommend beta browser versions. ULTIMATE Questrade Review 2017 Questrade has emerged as the online brokerage leader in Canada by catering superbly to all mainstream investors. They have the lowest commissions in Canada through a democratic pricing structure, alongside excellent research tools and solid trading platforms. Questrade is also rated as the fastest growing financial service provider in part due to outstanding customer service. 9660 Scroll Down For The In-Depth Review WrittenUpdated by Emma Li on Tuesday, February 28 2017 Editor Rating: ( 90 ) User Rating: ( 95 ) W hen it comes to investing in 2017 the trading landscape is bathed and bursting at the seams with countless financial brokerage houses. Big names like BMO InvestorLine, RBC Direct Investing, TD Direct Investing, Interactive Brokers, Scotia iTrade, and at least a dozen more are available to chose from. Sadly, through deeper analysis one can8217t easily distinguish distinctive differences amongst them, especially within the circle of the big banks. Most brokerage firms primarily make their revenue through new and inventive concoctions of countless and ongoing fees pushed onto their account holders. Such fees include, but are not limited to, administrative fees, set-up fees, activity fees, inactivity fees, hidden fees, and after-hour fees. These added costs might be fine and dandy for the fractional percentage of high-volume traders simply because their sheer trade volumes and realized gains can potentially offset those expenses over time. However, for the rest of us those added and consistent fees are a reminder that over time 8220the house always wins8221. Use Offer Code: Canada to receive 50 in Free Trades from Questrade. Beginning investors will usually look to their local bank to open their trading account primarily out of convenience since they already possess one or more personal chequingsavings accounts with that bank and so opening a trading account is a mere phone call away. The unfortunate disaster with that approach is that big banks, and for that matter, virtually every other brokerage firm in Canada will charge you an arm and a leg for any kind of activity you do (and don8217t do) in your trading account. Yes, even in this expansive internet age where everything is self-serve 247 convenience, commission schedules across the board are long, robust, and very much corporate bottom-line friendly. With standard rates at 29-49 per trade being commonplace one can8217t help but question if the entire industry is part of some price-fixing scheme. Where are the choices The Rise of Questrade . Founded in 1999 this company wanted to do and be something different. Seeing the growing discontent of active and inactive traders alike who were tired of watching their market gains washed away in a deluge of new brokerage fees by other companies Questrade began a process of streamlining the entire investment approach. And in so doing I think they8217ve done a pretty impression job. In the rest of this review I will explore Questrade and their collective offerings in terms of the good and the bad. First a little about me. I am not an aggressive highly active trader. Most times I will take the buy-and-hold approach as my tried-and-true investment style. And so when I buy into a company I do so for the long-term. However, at times I do get that itch and begin trading like a crazy person but this does not happen often. Questrade offers a well-crafted industry unique 8216democratic pricing8217 stock trading commission: 1cent per share with a minimum charge of 4.95trade and a ceiling maximum commission charge of 9.95 8212 ideal for long-term investors. Active traders (or anyone at anytime) have the alternative option of 1cent per share (1cent minimum 6.95 maximum), or a 4.95 flat stock commission charge 8212 ideal for high volume share trades. Options investing for these active users come with an attractively low 4.95 75cent per contract. And the process of enrolling into this alternative program simply involves subscribing to one of Questrade8217s several advanced market data plans. This should be glanced at again It is not a typo Questrade offers the cheapest trades in all of Canada. Their price point is so impressive that it actually encourages new andor small investors to jump in and take part in the investment game while also enticing disgruntled active traders of other brokerage firms to transfer in (at no charge). They make it abundantly clear that they don8217t charge setup fees, annual fees, nor inactivity fees (more on this later) on any of their services which is a welcome change to the industry norm. However, for those looking for more of an actively managed portfolio touch there is a specialty service they offer at a nominal annual fee. This will be discussed in-depth later in this review. There are a few other noteworthy perks provided by Questrade. The first is the ability to buy ETF (Exchange Traded Funds) funds at no commission charge 8212 they are free to buy With so many investors turning to ETFs these days due to their low MERs and diversified reach it is a wonderful breath of fresh air to be able to do so at no cost. Questrade may be one of the first discount brokers in Canada to do such a thing, and I applaud them. Secondly, Questrade offers IPOs (Initial Public Offering). For those not familiar with IPOs, these are simply the first sale of new issues by a private company to the public. Questrade regularly has access to a wide range of new offerings, making them available to clients. Questrade offer several types of accounts: Margin Accounts (e. g. Individual, Informal Trust, Business) Registered (e. g. TFSA, RRSP, RESP) Forex (FX) and Contract For Difference (CFD) Trading Managed Investing (e. g. Individual cash, Registered, Corporate cash) And provides access to the following services: 1cent per share 8211 4.95trade minimum 9.95 maximum charge Portfolio IQ (Managed Investing) Cost varies 8211 0.35 to 0.70 (minimum of 2,000 in assets) New Account Sign-up The process of opening an account online is remarkably intuitive, painless, and very quick (2 minutes for your general account, access to practice platforms, and community discussion 20 minutes total for opening trading accounts). You will need your social insurance number (SIN), bank account information, and employer details (or source of income if unemployed). And although they have an offline printout alternative I highly recommend their secure online process instead because it reduces the amount of write-in errors and legibility issues, and supports DocuSign for the online signing process. Use Offer Code: Canada to receive 50 in Free Trades from Questrade. Sign-up Start Page Account Selection Agreements One of the first things you must do while signing up is to create a user ID and password for your new account. In earlier days Questrade had an automated process that generated and emailed this password, and along with your email address served as your primary login credentials. This old way became a potential vulnerability and so they thankfully changed it back in 2011 to what they have now. The benefit of creating your own user ID and password also makes it much more convenient to return to an incomplete application at a later time. Sessions time out after 30 minutes of inactivity giving you ample time to collect required documents and credentials, and review your inputted details. Questrade offers two collections of accounts: Self-directed and Managed Investing. If you want to have full control over your account(s) then self-directed is for you. For those who want a professionally managed approach handled by a real staff (Questrade Wealth Management division) behind the scenes that carefully considers your personal goals and risk tolerance to match, manage, monitor, and adjust for the best investments without your daily involvement then managed investing (known as Portfolio IQ under Questrade8217s lexicon) is the best option. However, unlike self-directed, Portfolio IQ does come at a price 8212 a 14year minimum management fee. In my opinion self-directed is all one will ever need considering how making informed investment decisions is quite simple for even newcomers these days and to compound on this, self-directed accounts have no fees (outside the usual trade commission) associated with them unlike their managed investing cousins. I8217ll go in-depth on their managed investing offering in a later section. After signing up online (don8217t forget to use the Questrade offer code during sign up) you are able to immediately login to your new account and have a look around. However, to officially activate your account (to begin trading) an initial deposit is required 8212 self-directed: 1,000 for margin accounts, 1,000 USD for forex accounts (CAD deposits are auto-converted to USD), 5,000 to trade option spreads, 25,000 to writesell uncovered options, and managed investing (Portfolio IQ) requires at least a 1 initial deposit. Once this initial minimum deposit has cleared Questrade emails you a confirmation message. For offline applications you will be contacted by a representative confirming trading can begin. It takes 1-3 business days from signing up for your account to begin trading. The longest part of the process is waiting for the funds to be received and processed by Questrade. Once everything is a go, maintaining a minimum equity balance of 250 is essential to keeping your active account in good standing. Questrade supports several methods to fund your account including EFT (from CAD bank accounts), wire transfers, cheques, pre-authorized deposits, money orders, drafts, stock certificates, broker-to-broker transfers, and from other existing Questrade accounts (under your name). It should be noted though that you cannot use the EFT method to send USD to your Questrade account. The reverse is possible where you can withdraw USD funds to a USD bank account (they require a void check or a pre-authorized deposit agreement form signed and stamped by the bank). To deposit USD you can set up a pre-authorized deposit agreement with Questrade which takes about 1-5 business days, or send a certified chequebank draft to their office, or wire transfer the USD funds directly to your account. Alternatively, you can also convert your existing CAD balance (within your account) to USD using the Exchange Funds tool (found under Requests ) which can take up to 24 hours to process, or take advantage of Norbert8217s Gambit (successful conversions have been confirmed). Funding your margin (or other non-registered) account by either currency type will automatically be placed into a sub-account (more about sub-accounts later) of the same type (they do not perform automatic conversions 8212 you must execute the request on your own). Electronic withdrawals take roughly 3 business days to process and arrive into a bank account. An interesting related note is that Questrade continues to be the only brokerage in Canada to allow dual-currency (CAD and USD) to be held simultaneously inside registered accounts (i. e. RRSP, RESP, TFSA, LIRA, RIF, LIF) which in and of itself will save a tremendous amount of money from unnecessary conversion fees. Please be aware that Questrade rolled out a subtle but important revision to its inactivity fee policy. It8217s actually not that bad when you peruse the details. If anything it8217s quite reasonable. As has been long known Questrade does not charge an inactivity fee, but this policy adjustment can potentially charge 24.95 (no tax) per calendar quarter. If, however, you make at least one commissionable trade per quarter (once every 3-months) you will not get charged any inactivity fee at all. If you are inactive for a quarter and do get charged this fee, but then go about making at least one trade in the following quarter you will receive up to 24.95 in commission-free trades. Charitable and forex accounts, individuals 25 years of age or younger, as well as any new account opened for only 6-months are exempt from this fee (you will not get charged for being inactive). Also, all clients of Questrade, and households having the same physical address, with combined equity assets of at least 5,000 are exempt. For most investors this change is trivial since their assets are almost always over 5,000, and so will never get charged this inactivity fee. As I pointed out earlier, I think this change is perfectly reasonable and still miles better than all other discount brokerage houses who not only charge an inactivity fee, with no exceptions, they do so more frequently (each month) and tack on countless hidden fees which Questrade does not. Member Login Your account8217s primary client control portal is known as Questrade Account (alternatively, some like to call it myQuestrade ) and, quite simply put, it is a beautiful experience with well thought out organization and visual appeal. Someone put a lot of love into this area 8212 providing a consistent fully immersive and responsive experience, accessible on smartphones, tablets, laptops, and desktops. This portal fully integrates trading and account management together very seamlessly giving immediate access to buysell securities, work with research tools, make use of a bustling library of partner apps (and developer8217s API), view your account activity, analyze balances and positions, manage your personal details, view statements, make fund transfers inout of your accounts, uploaddownload your documents, exchange CADUSD currency, take corporate action on shareholder communications, transfer positions, open additional accounts, retrieve tax slips, exercise options, and interact with mutual funds. Questrade Account Investment Summary Mutual Fund Centre Upon logging into your account for the first time you are asked to select a default home base. A home base is where you would like Questrade to directly place you each time you log in. You have a choice of either the trading platform or account management. Although it8217s a convenient time saver you can jump between each at any time via an always-visible top menu bar. Once you8217ve made your choice Questrade walks you through an interactive user guide on how to use the environment. Accounts 8217s consist of 10 numerical digits (e. g. 12345678-90). This is a big jump from their pre-2011 6-character alphanumeric size and as such some external banks have been reported to still impose an 8-character limit for payee accounts when you attempt to send money to Questrade. To get around this you only need to provide the 1st 8-digits of your Questrade account and the funds will still arrive successfully. If at anytime you need help on practically anything you can always use the online Questrade Live Help session (usually accessible from the top or right-hand side of Questrade8217s site) 8212 operational on weekdays (excluding holidays) from 7:30am 8211 8:00pm ET. I have found that using Live Help is much quicker than calling their offices. And after speaking to several of their online representatives (those who deal with potential new accounts and others who deal with existing accounts) I found them to be very well-informed, professional, and quick in their responses. They all also took the extra time to provide web links for further reading which was a nice bonus. Account Activity History Located under Reports are a slew of subcategories providing details about trading and general account activity. Some of these subcategories include: Investment Summary (pictured above), Investment Return . Account Activity . Statements . Trade Confirmations . and Tax Slips . When Questrade made significant changes to its UI back in 2011 they in effect moved all trading activity history into the client portal. This is a very welcome change because prior to this all trading activity history was provided by a third-party clearinghouse company called Penson Financial Services and you had to use a completely different site and another set of login credentials to get access to this information. Thankfully those days are long over and you can now get a list of all your investments (stocks, funds, bonds, etc), current cash balances and positions (in CAD and USD), total equity, buying power, and more all within one location. Trading history is maintained for 36 months while eStatements, generated monthly, are stored for 7 years. Tax slips (e. g. T3, T5, T5008) are also available electronically for each year. Trade Confirmations Statements Account Activity Although Questrade8217s Trade Confirmations database claims to carry trading details dating back to January 1st, 2009 we found that activity done prior to February 4th, 2011 requires members to visit the old Penson site. And that those interested would need to have their old 6-character Questrade account (s) because the Penson site does not know anything about the existing 10-character account representations. Here is a quick peek at what the Penson trade activity site looks like. Trade Activity (up to Feb 2011) As stated above, this Penson site is only relevant to existing Questrade members who wish to access archived trading activity prior to February 2011. All new members can ignore what I just said and skip to the next paragraph. But for those interested in Questrade8217s chronological history 8212 as noted and visually seen above 8212 trade activity was outsourced and as such the first noticeable difference was that the web UI was completely different and very behind in the times. At the time it was still very surprising that with the skill set and desire by Questrade to offer a clean and friendly UI experience on their main web domain that they didn8217t feel it necessary to pony up the cash to in-house these account activities, nor had the motivation to request web-service APIs from Penson giving them free rein to skin over the original Penson experience. Although the details held within Penson were extensive it was cluttered and confusing. The trade and settle date balances took 24 hours to be reflected in history the same was true with buying power which updated once, at the start of each day. Most of what was found in this old Penson site is now integrated into Questrade trading platforms, discussed later. Questrade margin accounts (for stocks amp options trading) are comprised of two sub-accounts 8212 one for Canadian funds, the other for U. S. funds. This is very convenient since it reduces unnecessary conversion charges when trading U. S. instruments. So, transactions on U. S. equity stays as USD unlike most other brokerage firms which will perform conversions back to CAD right away. For example, with Questrade things like U. S. dividend income from U. S. traded stocks will remain as USD and automatically be deposited into your U. S. sub-account. Funds can be moved between sub-accounts using Questrade8217s Exchange Funds feature, but just take note that this will involve a conversion based on the spot rate at the close of market in Toronto plus a spread fee (1.99 for both margin and registered accounts if total equity exceeds 100K this drops to 1.70 for margin and 1.00 for registered). A better approach for converting between USDCAD, however, would be to use the Norbert8217s Gambit technique because it virtually eliminates currency exchange fees (it involves using tickers DLR. TO, DLR. U.TO and journaling over your holdings to one or the other). Questrade highly encourages the viewingdownloadingprinting of previous month statements (as pdf files) made available in Questrade8217s client portal for all account activity at no charge. However, for those who still insist on mailed paper statements, they can do so at a hefty 20statement which can be requested by contacting them directly by phone or through Live Help. And, as a handy note, shareholder communication often times are sent through normal mail. Through the use of the free InvestorDelivery service you can set up to receive all of your investor correspondence electronically, if you desire. Trading Platforms And so begins a new era in trading platforms for Questrade. For as long as we can remember Questrade had been chugging along with their capable, but aging, platforms: QuestraderWEB, QuestraderELITE, and QuestraderPRO. Although QuestraderWEB had been renovated considerably all three had been in the wild for well over 10 years. They all performed quite well in their own right but had not kept up with the times as was evident with the offerings at other discount brokerage houses. Questrade marked a new chapter with the introduction of the Questrade IQ suite. Questrade has been doing a lot of work behind the scenes to revamp their investor8217s trading experience. When they released a whole new layout for the Questrade Account client portal one couldn8217t help but head scratch and wonder why their trading platforms never received the same treatment. Well, the answer can8217t be clearer: they were being updated as well 8212 it just took them a while. The epiphany was realizing that having three separate desktop trading platforms was confusing and so they opted to retire all three in favor of a single, more modern trading platform known as Questrade IQ. Questrade IQ is a suite composed of three flavors: Questrade Trading . a fully functional web-based trading platform (for WindowsMacsLinux users on Google Chrome 52, Firefox 48, Safari 9 for Mac Users, Internet Explorer 11, Microsoft Edge) Questrade IQ Edge . a streamlined desktop-based trading platform (for Windows 78.110, macOS 10) and Questrade IQ Mobile . their first mobile entrant in the field of trading (for iPhoneiPod Touch iOS 6, and Android OS 4.1). This entire collection is free for all members and includes snap quote live CanadianU. S. strömmande nivå 1-data, forskningsverktyg för grundläggande och teknisk analys, ett kartläggningspaket och mycket mer. At times market data can be delayed (up to 15 minutes) and when this happens a cute clock icon appears on-screen to let you know of the streaming hang-up. And although it is made available for free, these platforms can be upgraded to include one of three data packages or add agrave la carte feeds. Now, let8217s take a closer look at each of these unique platforms and what they have to offer. Questrade Trading Questrade IQ Edge Questrade IQ Mobile Questrade Trading, is a plugin-free web-accessible platform built on HTML5 and is designed to be accessible on almost any device. It is craftily integrated into the Questrade Account portal and is reachable through the Trade button at the top menu bar. It can even be set up to be your home base when you log in. Questrade Trading is very feature-packed and serves as the primary gateway platform for most users entire trading experience. It also serves as Questrade8217s answer for those who, for one reason or another, may not have access to (or be compatible with) IQ Mobile or IQ Edge. This would be the perfect choice for Linux desktop users or the ever growing presence of tablet carriers. Because it is a fully compliant HTML5 browser-based responsive experience, unlike the others, it does not require a download or any third-party add-on to be fully functional. Taking a spin with this platform was an incredibly liberating experience 8212 an excellent amalgamation of power and usability. It introduces the concept of Gadgets into the platform lexicon. A gadget is an arrangeable user-customized window of a view into your tradingmarket details. Gadgets include, but are not limited to: Activity (a logs viewer), Balances, Time and Sales (current global activity of a stock), Level 1 Quotes, Level 2 Quotes (if you paid for this addition), News, Orders, Charts, Position Summary, and Watch List. Questrade Trading was surprisingly lightning fast and responsive in every web browser we tested. Memory and CPU footprint usage was astonishingly small despite the depth of options, activity, and functionality it had to offer. Sessions don8217t appear to have any inactivity time limit. A nice bonus feature of this platform was being able to start a trading task on one device (e. g. a home PC) and then effortlessly shift to another device (e. g. smartphone or tablet) to complete it. This is an invaluable little addition because it can allow one to carefully construct lengthy trading procedures while permitting free movement during busy schedules. Unlike its IQ Edge cousin, however, Questrade Trading cannot change its colour theme appearance 8212 it8217s always in a light theme. On the plus side though, any custom changes you make to the layout are automatically saved and restored if you leave and return to the platform. Notable differences between this platform and the rest of the family include the lack of multi-leg option orders, no alerts, nor workspaces amp heat maps. If you are looking to use one or more of those missing features then you should opt for IQ Edge instead. Layout 8211 Trading Platform Balances 8211 Trading Platform Activity 8211 Trading Platform Questrade IQ Edge is the big boy of this suite. It only comes as an install-based native PC (or Mac) desktop application engineered specifically for active and pro traders. IQ Edge allows for an unlimited amount of workspaces (Questrade Trading only allows for one). A workspace is a screen area allowing one to open and customize a new set of gadgets or windows for a particular purpose that suits a trading environment style. Multiple easily navigable workspaces is a valuable asset to active traders. The other big difference between IQ Edge and Questrade Trading is that IQ Edge offers a more advanced plate of options for order entries: conditional orders (e. g. trigger orders at a specific time, price, or volume automatically), bracket orders, more extensive alerts, multiple order entry windows, notification emails when something is purchased or sold, and the ability to order anonymously. There are a few subtle differences too. IQ Edge allows for extensive gadget customizing which takes them well beyond what is possible in Questrade Trading. However, most of these customizable features are visual (e. g. float, pin, drag-drop, resize, colourize, blink text) it depends on the gadget. Curiously, gadgets don8217t have a snap-to feature in IQ Edge and so they do not auto-arrange when the main application window resizes. It was a bit inconvenient but not a deal breaker because most people just position their gadgets at a particular spot and maintain the application window at a set size. Interestingly, any gadget customization you make in IQ Edge does not transfer over to Questrade Trading (assuming the same gadget exists), and vice versa. However, ticker symbols and related data inside gadgets (e. g. alerts) are properly maintained and do transfer over between webdesktop environments. IQ Edge colour themes range from dark (default), light, and sky blue. One additional allure of IQ Edge is that it gives a trader the sense of comfort knowing their platform8217s trading activity will not be delayed or experience hiccups as might be the case if using a web browser. IQ Edge was written from the ground up using optimized C code and deployed for IntelAMD processors ensuring the speediest of responses for the most diehard of active traders. Unfortunately, at the time of this writing there is no 64-bit version for IQ Edge on the PC. For Macs it is natively 64-bit. It will still run normally on 64-bit Windows systems, it just won8217t be running as efficiently as it could be. Here8217s hoping that in the near future an optimized 64-bit Windows version of IQ Edge will be made available. Layout 8211 IQ Edge Charts 8211 IQ Edge Order Entry 8211 IQ Edge And now we shift our attention towards Questrades other important platform: Questrade IQ Mobile 8212 their very simple, very capable mobile trading platform. Operating anywhere at any time, this app is available for iOS (iPhone and iPad) and Android devices from their respective app stores. Questrade had originally planned to release a similar version for Windows Phone and Blackberry but, understandably, due to their diminishing marketshares the idea was scrubbed late in the development cycle. As such, those devices will need to use their browser-based alternative: Questrade Trading. We found that IQ Mobile8217s feature set is nearly identical to their Questrade Trading platform, with incorporated visual tweaks to better suit portable device operability. It8217s all here, including research tools, charts, options trading, and Level 2 data. You can even perform account management actions directly within the app. The visual layout and organization of features is very well thought out. We were able to navigate and use the app with extreme ease. Although they conveniently provide an interactive help tool within the app we found there was little need for it because everything just made sense. After using this platform for several days it8217s clear to us Questrade is aiming to make IQ Mobile as feature-rich as IQ Edge over time. There is no question that this is an integral component to Questrade, and quite possibly is the most important of this entire suite in terms of long-term growth since most people will continue to be looking to their phones (and other portable devices) as their primary hub to the markets. So i8217m sure this will be greeted with overjoyed smiles by active traders who have been yearning to be more fully unshackled from their IQ Edge desktops. On the go is here to stay so it only makes logical sense that Questrade will be continuing their trend of integrating more Edge-like whiz-bang functionality into IQ Mobile, surely pushing it well beyond its web-based sibling. The hope though is that Questrade will carefully walk that mobility tightrope by maintaining the app8217s unique user-friendly intuitiveness to ensure mass appeal, while still including more sophistication to keep their active trading population happy and, at the same time, nurturing a new generation of on the go investors who will now have access to a growing toolset of advanced capabilities as their confidence and portfolios grow. Quote 8211 IQ Mobile Options 8211 IQ Mobile Level 2 Data 8211 IQ Mobile Unquestionably, this new trading platform suite is a giant leap in the right direction for Questrade. The collection encompasses everything QuestraderWEB, QuestraderPRO, and QuestraderELITE (their now-defunct older trading platforms) had and some. And this suite does so in the most intuitive, comprehensive way. By taking the bold step to retire their older platforms by supplanting them with an agile next-generation trading environment is a sign that Questrade cares deeply about providing the best experience for the casual trader and demanding active user. Interestingly, upon further investigation we found that new releases for this suite is always consistent and swift 8212 a major new release occurs every month 8212 bringing with it a slew of enhancements and bug fixes, based on direct user feedback of their online community discussion forum: The Exchange . A few other unique features which I am surprised other brokerages have not yet duplicated is, firstly, the clever partnerships Questrade has with third party websites (e. g. iShares ETFs) 8212 providing one-click Buy Now buttons across the web 8212 permitting on the fly quick trades that whisk the buyer back into the IQ platform to complete the pre-filled order ticket. And secondly, a feature called Margin Power (for self-directed accounts) which, by its name, gives you a clue on at what it does. By linking your existing TFSA account to your margin account it increases your buying power within your margin account by leveraging the assets you already hold in your TFSA making it enormously convenient to enter new positions without requiring a transfer of new cash or selling existing securities. Both features are wonderfully handy The long requested single sign-on feature is now available for Questrade members. You now use one user ID and password to access the trading platform, Questrade Account, and the Exchange. This saves a tremendous amount of time because in the past Questrade had originally required at least three different sign-on credentials to access each of their trading landscapes, and so to no surprise this was a heavily requested feature. We welcome its addition. To get a better feel of what Questrade IQ has to offer here is a collection of video tutorials overviewing this trading platform8217s most common features. Videos 8211 Trading Platform Videos 8211 IQ Edge Videos 8211 IQ Mobile Although we briefly mentioned in passing their older predecessor platforms, to give you a better sense of who Questrade is and how much they8217ve improved, what follows are images of their previous generation trading platforms. Prior to IQ, Questrade offered a few other trading platforms for stocks and options: QuestraderWEB, QuestraderPRO, and QuestraderELITE. QuestraderWEB was their web-based application with a very pretty and intuitive user interface. It was Questrade8217s only free platform and required the Java plugin within your browser to function correctly. QuestraderPRO and QuestraderELITE were desktop applications requiring a monthly subscription fee. QuestraderWEB QuestraderPRO ELITE A little note on exchange and ECN fees. These are the fees Questrade is forced to charge you when you make a transaction that removes liquidity from the market (i. e. buying at the ask or selling at the bid). Although these fees translate to mere pennies for most traders one can avoid paying them altogether by executing transactions as a limit (or stop) order at the bidask instead of as a market order request. For U. S. stocks you can also send orders to non-direct access ECN networks (LAMP, MNGD, or POST) to avoid these fees. Most people will sign-up for the standard marginal account which gives you access to borrow funds at an amount more than your current cash balance. This extended buying power ability is very useful and can come in handy when you need to jump on market opportunities. Assuming you8217ve bought on margin and haven8217t settled your stocks after 3 days of the purchase the margin interest rate is prime 2.5 which is inline with most brokerages. One of the selling points Questrade likes to bring up is that for mutual funds they will rebate the trailer fees. They call this their Mutual Fund Maximizer. Trailer fees are commissions by fund management companies paid to your brokerage house for being the retailer that sold you your fund(s). This commission is an ongoing source of revenue for your brokerage as long as you keep holding onto those fund(s). You don8217t see this fee because it is part of the MER of the fund. So Questrade is willing to rebate this fee back to you each quarter. But there8217s a catch. You need a minimum of 36,000 in mutual fund holdings to be eligible for this rebate. The reasoning is simple. There is a processing fee of 29.95month so the rebates will start paying back if your mutual fund holdings is worth more than 36,000 (based on a 1 trailer fee). Portfolio IQ (Managed Investing) Self-directed investment empowerment (aka DIY trading) is offered by virtually all discount brokerages and has been a popular preference by the general public due to the myriad of easy-to-use tools and support made available to an investor desiring to control every aspect of their interests. With this style of investing customers have always been able to sculpt their own investment strategy, define their portfolio, buy and sell securities, and more. However, there is another option. For those with very little time while continuing to carry big investment ambitions Questrade introduced Portfolio IQ, the alternative to self-directed investing. Really known as managed investing, Portfolio IQ takes away the stress of investment decision making and puts them in the hands of portfolio managers of their Questrade Wealth Management division. Who doesn8217t want to take it easy and watch their money grow towards financial independence with little effort It8217s a dream come true The difficult part with that dream is figuring out how exactly to do that. This is where Portfolio IQ comes to the rescue. Becoming Canada8217s first online wealth management service, Portfolio IQ debuted as a definitive market disrupter by making managed investing accessible to everyone. Traditionally, managed investing has been an exclusive club for the uber-rich but Questrade, keeping to its roots of bringing all things restrictive to the masses, decided to do away with convention. Opening a Portfolio IQ account is straight-forward and only requires 1. As an extra bonus, this review8217s Questrade offer code can also be used when opening this type of account. Once open you8217re taken through a simple-to-use point-and-click questionnaire to set up an investor biography that identifies your risk tolerance, existing financial circumstances, market knowledge, and investment ambitions all of which is used to better crystallize the best portfolio for you. What8217s also great is that if your goals change then you can return and adjust your bio to keep things in balance, which will automatically update your underlying portfolio model accordingly. All the portfolios deal exclusively in ETFs (composed of a mix of various sectors, markets, and countries) and come in 5 flavors: With the added benefit of taking full advantage of tax-loss harvesting and providing a last quarter management fee refund guarantee if not fully satisfied for any reason, Portfolio IQ is an extraordinary entrant into the managed investing arena and has that perfect resonating mix all investors, big and small, crave when they daydream of an unshackled financial tomorrow. IPO Centre Participating in initial public offerings (IPO), secondary issues (additional sharesbonds offered by a public company), and structured products has always been the holy grail for many investors since the incredible euphoric frenzy of the 1990s internet IPO boom. Historically, because first issues usually tick up on first day closings it8217s logically understandable why so many want in 8212 it8217s a quick way to make an easy buck However, due to the natural laws of supply and demand interest in these new issues almost always outstrip the quantity made available and therefore only insiders, well-connected bigwigs, and the very rich are usually the only ones who have access to them nepotism and cronyism at its undemocratic finest. For generations the general public has had little access to IPOs. There was a brief moment in time when Wit Capital, an internet startup of the 90s, briefly unlocked this secret world, but it was short-lived. Questrade became one of the new Canadian trailblazers to usher in a sledgehammer back into this world for the masses. The Questrade IPO Centre, showcasing mostly Canadian equity, fixed income, and structured products, list newly available issues and previous offerings (for historic analysis). Their respective facts, investor summary, terms, and preliminary prospectus are also readily accessible. For instant notification of newly announced IPOs and secondary issues clients are encouraged to subscribe to the IPO Bulletin. Independent testing revealed that notifications were indeed right away. The centre is reachable on the desktoplaptops. smartphones, and tablets. When you see an IPO or other new issue you like, it8217s a simple click, tap, or a trade desk call away to express interest. An expression of interest makes Questrade aware you are putting in a commitment to buy a number of shares. However, this does not guarantee you will actually get any or all of the shares you8217ve requested. If a client places an expression of interest on the website, the trade desk will contact the client to confirm the order within an hour (rare cases may take up to 24 hours). There is a 5,000 minimum requested amount for submitting an IPO order. Some companies going public may even ask for an amount over and above this, but the majority of the time it won8217t be above the 5,000 Questrade minimum. Once the order is confirmed Questrade passes along the interest to the offering8217s underwriter. Although not possible right now, soon clients will be able to submit their expression of interest through the trading platform to reduce wait time and eliminate the need for a Questrade representative call-back to confirm the order. Cancelling an interest request can be made within two business days (this may vary depending on the province) after receipt or deemed receipt of a prospectus and any amendment (found at the online centre). All IPO and secondary offering purchases are commission free. Processing time for orders can vary but usually it takes around 3 weeks from when the underwriters first launch the IPO and when the offering closes. For some secondary offerings and preferred treasury shares times can be shorter. Once allocations from the underwriter are received Questrade informs clients via email or phone. Allocations, however, may be distributed on a pro-rata basis if an IPO is oversubscribed (the number of shares requested by all interested parties is greater than what Questrade received), and so, as mentioned earlier your original interest amount may not necessarily materialize to what you actually get. For example if Questrade receives a 50 allocation on their total order amount, they would then allocate 50 to their client8217s original order. Although the IPO Centre mostly has Canadian offerings, U. S. IPOs do show up from time-to-time as well. It8217s because of Canadian security regulations that U. S. and other foreign-based companies must file their prospectus in each province individually in order to be sold to residents of that particular province. Because many companies in the United States may feel that doing an IPO in Canada could be an added expense (e. g. listing fees, legal fees, French language requirements) and that domestic demand in the U. S. is enough to satisfy how much capital they want to raise, it8217s only logical that most offerings will be Canadian by nature. Interestingly, many international miningresource companies will choose to file a prospectus and raise money within Canada, and choose to be listed here as well. TSX has a very large mining focus in general. Registered accounts (e. g. RRSP, TFSA) are also eligible to hold the vast majority of IPOs and treasury offerings. However, some IPOs may not be eligible due to their companyoffering structure and how widely held it is. The centre is a very welcome sight and seems well positioned to grow into something incredibly special. Sadly, no word yet if and when Questrade will be issuing their very own company IPO When making trades one of the primary concerns held by most people is security. Like banks, most discount brokerage companies deploy different protection strategies to secure your account such as randomizing security questions, displaying pre-selected image captchas that only the account holder would know, two-step and two-factor verification, or even providing digital key devices which in conjunction with your secret password must be pressed to generate the final half of the login passcode each time. Questrade8217s security measures have improved dramatically over the years. For example, upon sign-up for a new account you are required to create a user ID, password, and set up a few security questions. User ID8217s are required to be 8-20 characters long while passwords must be at least 8 characters in length and include an uppercase, lowercase, and numerical (or symbolic) character. Although this seems like a standard approach across the web this is actually new and a big improvement for Questrade. They also now include extra verification steps such as when you attempt to log in to your account from an unrecognized system you are prompted with one of your security questions. An optional PIN can also be setup to help you get faster service when calling in. Security advice is made available outlining how to protect yourself by taking precautionary steps like using anti-virus software to keep your computer clean. Interestingly, they have made the extra effort by partnering with Symantec, using Norton Anti-virus to continuously scanmonitor their own internal files, ensuring your investments and privacy on their end are secure. Questrade was also one of the few discount brokerage firms that were not affected by the Heart Bleed Bug 8212 they were protected all this time. Although they don8217t have security guarantees against intruders breaching accounts on your end, if there is fraudulent activity and it8217s proven to be due to the negligence of Questrade they are in a position to cover your loss. Also note that Questrade is a CIPF member, and so Canadian investors are covered up to 1,000,000. Final Thoughts Reviews online are overwhelming negative towards Questrade. Prior to writing this review I decided to read many of these complaints so that I could be aware of and keep an eye out for any of these problems. I even took note on exact steps for some of these problems with hopes of recreating them. I had originally planned to share a collection of these complaints but seeing as how many of them might have already been resolved by Questrade I felt the company deserved another look before passing judgment. So after spending a number of days using their entire suite of online tools, making trades, and attempting to recreate customer complaints I can report back and say that I did not experience a single issue. My conclusion is that either Questrade had fixed several of these earlier problems or these complaints were from beginning traders who were not familiar with the platform nor company policies. Overall my experience with Questrade was a very pleasant one. Their 8220killer app8221, so to speak, is free (no commission charge) ETFs (Exchange Traded Funds) and that one can execute trades as low as 1cent per share (4.95 minimum) with no catch. It doesn8217t get any sweeter than that In rare instances I sometimes come across other brokerages offering promotionals at 4.95trade but when you dig deeper into their fine print it almost unequivocally is for 8220big fish8221 traders who must spend upwards of 100,000month in trading activity to be eligible for the 4.95 offer. Clearly not for the average consumer. Obviously this is not the case with Questrade. Questrade8217s low commission rate is so good it serves as an enticer to make more trades more often and not have to hesitate by attempting to time the market in hopes of covering commission costs. I am happy to see Questrade has made many brilliant enhancements over the years including, but not limited to, a unified single sign-on approach that provides a more consistent milieu. There are a few areas that can be improved such as full gadget settings retention across different trading platforms, but with such dramatic savings found among all their services it seems understandable that one can8217t always have everything. So I will give them a pass on that. Should you join Yes 8212 a resounding YES Questrade offers a remarkably rich tapestry of features well tailored for new investors and seasoned traders. For someone like me, as a casual trader, who has experienced headaches with other brokerage firms it8217s nice to finally find a good home at Questrade who doesn8217t play games nor charge exorbitant fees. Questrade fits my needs perfectly and helps unlock my potential as a growing investor. And at the end of the day isn8217t this what we really hope a respectable brokerage firm provides us Use Offer Code: Canada to receive 50 in Free Trades from Questrade when signing up for a new account.
Comments
Post a Comment