Blogger Survey Reveals Preferred Stock Brokers

Written by Brandon Reinkensmeyer on March 18, 2011.

Stockbrokers.com recently contacted a wide variety of personal finance & investing bloggers. The purpose was to find out which broker(s) they utilized for their own personal investing and why.

After several weeks of collecting responses, input, and opinions the results have been finalized. Our staff was excited at the beginning of this project to see which broker would end up being the most utilized and were pleasantly surprised with the first place finisher. We also decided to add a special honorable mention section for our Canadian traders.

Our top three online brokers chosen by bloggers are:

1. Vanguard: This broker took first place by a small margin, but it was clearly a top favorite amongst many of the personal finance bloggers that responded to our survey. Several reasons why Vanguard came out on top:

“I use Vanguard for my personal retirement investing. I have a rollover IRA and a Roth IRA there. I’m a very passive investor who believes that expenses and taxes are the things to watch out for. Not market fluctuations. I’m in it for the long haul, and so I want to be where it’s costing me less to invest in index funds and target date funds. I don’t do much in taxable investing.” – Philip, PT MONEY: Personal Finance

“I use Vanguard.com because they offer the lowest cost index mutual funds in the industry. Since, I use a passive investing approach, this is perfect for me!” – Jacob, MyPersonalFinanceJourney

“I primarily use Vanguard for mutual fund investments and my Solo 401k. I chose Vanguard because they offer a wide range of low cost index funds and they offer a free Solo 401k plan, which isn’t something every brokerage offers.” – Ryan, CashMoneyLife

“I use Vanguard to buy low cost index funds. The reason: to keep costs low (which improves return rate.)” – FMF, FreeMoneyFinance

“I recommend Vanguard for most investing situations because they have low costs and feature knowledgeable service representatives.” – Flexo, ConsumerismCommentary

2. Fidelity: This full service broker took a close second place in our results. A well known and reputable brokerage, Fidelity continues to be a top choice for investors for reasons like:

“I use Fidelity Investments. They have competitive commissions, customer service which has always delighted me with their promptness and thoroughness, ability to buy many different asset types including managed funds as well as equities on foreign exchanges and dividend reinvesment for almost any security that issues dividends. In addition, since they have local offices throughout the country, if I have to handle any paperwork I can just drop in at a local office and get it taken care of. Fidelity also offers a variety of institutional research that is typically only available at full service brokers.” – Arohan, PersonalDividends

“For my IRA’s I have accounts with both Vanguard and Fidelity. They both provide low-cost options. With Fidelity, I moved my 401(k) from a previous employer (the 401k was with Fidelity too making the move easy).” – Craig, FreeFromBroke

“I use Fidelity for their wide range of investments and the fact they blend online self-service with phone support and local offices. They also allow you to trade 25 iShares ETFs commission-free, which is a nice perk for new investors.” – David, MoneyUnder30

“My vote would be Fidelity. Since they offer many different services and types of investments. From the small index based investor, to a HNW individual who wants to perform active trading and everything in between.” – IJ, InvestorJunkie

Fidelity is even an overall top preference in the UK: “I use Fidelity for my share-dealing. It keeps my accounts together as I also invest in their mutual and index funds. I don’t think its the best deal out there (and has a standing £5 a month fee just to use it!) but I’m willing to pay that for the convenience of having everything together and it encourages me to invest by using a service that I’m paying for.” Adam, MagicalPenny

3. Zecco: Rounding out our top three, Zecco was a top choice with more active trading bloggers due to their low flat rate commissions and, prior to their removal of the client perk, 10 monthly free trades. In addition to equity trading, they also offer Forex trading accounts.

“I have a Plain Jane brokerage account at Zecco.com that I opened back in 2008 solely b/c of the low cost trades they were offering at the time. I use this mainly for “Buy & Hold” dividend stocks that I want to hang on to for 1+ years. Ex) Energy MLPs, REITs, > 5% dividend stocks, etc.” – Matt, SteadfastFinances

“I like Zecco due to their low commissions. I actually pay no commissions with my minimum balance. I’m an ETF guy – commissions can really eat into the returns. However, I’m also a buy and hold guy – I don’t trade much at all, so this suits me perfectly.” – Lazy Man, LazyManandMoney

“I use Zecco and love it. I started investing in single stocks a few years back, and decided to give a variety of online brokers a try at once to see which I liked best. Zecco was by far the easiest to understand and interact with. I love their customer service and of course their low fees too.” – Jackie, MoneyCrush

“I use Zecco Trading for all my stock trading needs. They have one of the lowest transaction fees $4.50 per trade. They research tools as pretty good as well. But the best part is that they have a very active online community forum where you can get a lot of info about who is buying what and why, that will help you in choosing the right stocks.” – Tushar, EverythingFinanceBlog

“I picked Zecco for my options and stock trading account mainly because of the low trading costs. Options are $4.50 a trade plus $0.50 a contract. I was paying $9.95 + $1.50 a contract at Sharebuilder. I like the interface and I am happy with the commissions and fees, so that’s why I do my trading there. If another broker had similar or cheaper pricing, and offered me a good enough incentive to switch, I would change in a heartbeat. The cheaper my trades, the more money I make.” – Kevin, Thousandaire

Honorable Mention - Questrade: A top pick with all of the Canadian personal finance bloggers, Questrade offers equity, options, mutual fund, and Forex trading.

“Questrade is the broker I use. I chose Questrade for their low trading fees ($4.95) and comprehensive account offerings. They offer RRSPs and RESPs and I wanted to have access to both types of accounts. My main complaint was that they charged a fee for buying bonds and GICs, but they have recently decided to offer those transactions free of charge. Now if they would just agree to pay a decent interest rate on cash balances, I would be completely satisfied.” – Kim, BalanceJunkie

“I chose Questrade as my online broker here in Canada. Their fees are the lowest at a minimum of $4.95 a trade and a maximum of $9.95 a trade. They have no annual or inactivity fees on their RRSP and TFSA accounts and were the first to offer the ability to hold US dollars directly in your RRSP account, saving users from conversion charges.” – Tom, CanadianFinanceBlog

Stockbrokers.com greatly appreciates all of the bloggers mentioned for their participation in our survey. In addition to those quoted, we would like to thank the following:

Weakonomics | BuyLikeBuffett | DoughRoller | MyMoneyBlog | TheAmateurFinancier

InvestItWisely | ReadyToBeRich | MyJourneyToMillions | FinancialSamurai

NevillesFinancialBlog | WealthPilgrim | TheWisdomJournal | FiscalFizzle

BeatingTheIndex | ThePassiveIncomeEarner