Author Topic: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks  (Read 8726 times)

wealthviahealth

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Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« on: May 17, 2014, 08:19:25 PM »
Have any of you gotten early access to the robin hood platform yet?
I just learned about it and am very intrigued that trades are not only commission free, but that all stocks trade commission free
and the platform is not limited in stock offerings like some of the others.

I joined the waiting list here; [MOD EDIT: Spam link removed.] and look forward to testing it out.

Any feedback so far from those of you who already have access?

« Last Edit: June 24, 2014, 06:09:15 PM by arebelspy »

KingCoin

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #1 on: May 17, 2014, 08:32:43 PM »
Looks interesting.

It's funny that their model mimics so many others in tech. Free now and they'll figure out how to make money later.

I think this will eventually fail. I guess if you're an active trader and paying a high commission now, it might be worth experimenting with.

wealthviahealth

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #2 on: May 18, 2014, 05:11:43 AM »
One of the main benefits I will be looking forward to is the ability to buy more frequently and in smaller quantities since I dont need to buy enough
to offset any trade fee. This allows for more efficient dollar cost averaging which is more so my cup of tea. I am interested to see the look and feel of the platform though.

milesdividendmd

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #3 on: May 18, 2014, 03:13:01 PM »
This is very exciting indeed.

I hope that they include ETFs in their stock selection.

Thank you for sharing this exciting opportunity. I'm already on the waitlist thanks to you.

Khan

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #4 on: May 18, 2014, 04:44:34 PM »
Looks interesting.

It's funny that their model mimics so many others in tech. Free now and they'll figure out how to make money later.

I think this will eventually fail. I guess if you're an active trader and paying a high commission now, it might be worth experimenting with.

They have plans to monetize it at least somewhat through margin interest.

KingCoin

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #5 on: May 18, 2014, 06:13:43 PM »
Looks interesting.

It's funny that their model mimics so many others in tech. Free now and they'll figure out how to make money later.

I think this will eventually fail. I guess if you're an active trader and paying a high commission now, it might be worth experimenting with.

They have plans to monetize it at least somewhat through margin interest.

That's fine. But guys borrowing in size will go to Interactive Brokers which has very slim margins. Maybe they can hose enough small time guys to make this a viable business, but I kind of doubt it.

hodedofome

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #6 on: May 19, 2014, 09:27:27 AM »
If you have a small account you'll only pay $1 a trade with Interactive Brokers, and you don't have to be the guinea pig and find out if their fills are good or not. IB has pretty good fills, we don't know how this robin hood thing is going to work out. That's $1 you save in commissions may end up costing you a lot more $$ in sucky fills, not to mention margin interest. Stick with the well-knowns for now and let the dust settle on the new stuff.

dragoncar

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #7 on: May 20, 2014, 04:29:32 PM »
If you have a small account you'll only pay $1 a trade with Interactive Brokers, and you don't have to be the guinea pig and find out if their fills are good or not. IB has pretty good fills, we don't know how this robin hood thing is going to work out. That's $1 you save in commissions may end up costing you a lot more $$ in sucky fills, not to mention margin interest. Stick with the well-knowns for now and let the dust settle on the new stuff.

They do have a $10/mo fee for small accounts, right?

innerscorecard

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #8 on: May 20, 2014, 10:17:32 PM »
By the way, it looks like Bank of America is no longer enrolling people into Platinum for their own version of a free trading platform.

wealthviahealth

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #9 on: June 08, 2014, 08:46:08 AM »
Starting to make some progress on this waiting list but still have about 500 people in front of me.
Its not yet clear when most people will loaded onto the platform but the line is moving.


Dr. A

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #10 on: June 08, 2014, 03:59:22 PM »
They have plans to monetize it at least somewhat through margin interest.

Zecco.com* tried exactly this business model a few years back. It didn't work. They started charging commissions (albeit small ones) and were eventually bought out by TradeKing.

ZEro COmmissions... get it?

butchmonkey

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #11 on: June 08, 2014, 05:33:48 PM »
This time it might work. You never know. Robinhoodapp might have a better business plan


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wtjbatman

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #12 on: June 08, 2014, 07:28:56 PM »
Notice how to get yourself moved up in line so you can have the privilege of using their brokerage, you have been promoting them for the last few weeks and getting people to sign up using your referral link? Clever company.

I've been on the waiting list for 6-8 months. I'm actually farther back than I was when I first signed up. The reason? I'm not going to promote their platform for them, so I have never sent my referral link to anyone. Oh well, at this rate I won't get to try them out until they open up registrations. By then I don't think I'll care anymore.

butchmonkey

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #13 on: June 08, 2014, 11:38:36 PM »
How principled you are batman!


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wtjbatman

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #14 on: June 09, 2014, 02:59:47 AM »
How principled you are batman!


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Thank you kind sir. I don't know what I'll do without access to the robinhoodapp, but I think I'll get by.

TreeTired

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #15 on: June 09, 2014, 08:54:18 AM »
Why the limited capacity?   I am suspicious of anything that tries to create demand via artificial scarcity.   

ivyhedge

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #16 on: June 11, 2014, 10:45:21 AM »
If you have a small account you'll only pay $1 a trade with Interactive Brokers, and you don't have to be the guinea pig and find out if their fills are good or not. IB has pretty good fills, we don't know how this robin hood thing is going to work out. That's $1 you save in commissions may end up costing you a lot more $$ in sucky fills, not to mention margin interest. Stick with the well-knowns for now and let the dust settle on the new stuff.

They do have a $10/mo fee for small accounts, right?


iB has a $10/month trade fee that is accounted for by trades at any dollar amount on any market (meaning that if you buy an Aussie smallcap for a $3.20 trade cost, your "fee" is $6.80 for the remainder of the month).


For most folks, the trade fee is nullified by simply buying one or two data streams: which are very reasonably priced (and unnecessary for index investors).

dragoncar

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #17 on: June 11, 2014, 11:32:05 AM »
If you have a small account you'll only pay $1 a trade with Interactive Brokers, and you don't have to be the guinea pig and find out if their fills are good or not. IB has pretty good fills, we don't know how this robin hood thing is going to work out. That's $1 you save in commissions may end up costing you a lot more $$ in sucky fills, not to mention margin interest. Stick with the well-knowns for now and let the dust settle on the new stuff.

They do have a $10/mo fee for small accounts, right?


iB has a $10/month trade fee that is accounted for by trades at any dollar amount on any market (meaning that if you buy an Aussie smallcap for a $3.20 trade cost, your "fee" is $6.80 for the remainder of the month).


For most folks, the trade fee is nullified by simply buying one or two data streams: which are very reasonably priced (and unnecessary for index investors).

Or have an account over $100k, then they waive the fee (works for me).  I don't subscribe to data streams, although don't tell Fidelity that I sometimes use them for realtime quotes.

ivyhedge

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #18 on: June 11, 2014, 11:41:46 AM »
If you have a small account you'll only pay $1 a trade with Interactive Brokers, and you don't have to be the guinea pig and find out if their fills are good or not. IB has pretty good fills, we don't know how this robin hood thing is going to work out. That's $1 you save in commissions may end up costing you a lot more $$ in sucky fills, not to mention margin interest. Stick with the well-knowns for now and let the dust settle on the new stuff.

They do have a $10/mo fee for small accounts, right?


iB has a $10/month trade fee that is accounted for by trades at any dollar amount on any market (meaning that if you buy an Aussie smallcap for a $3.20 trade cost, your "fee" is $6.80 for the remainder of the month).


For most folks, the trade fee is nullified by simply buying one or two data streams: which are very reasonably priced (and unnecessary for index investors).

Or have an account over $100k, then they waive the fee (works for me).  I don't subscribe to data streams, although don't tell Fidelity that I sometimes use them for realtime quotes.


@Dragon: Yes! I forgot the obvious one ... And if you need to contact iB, accounts over the $100 thousand and $1 million breakpoints receive much friendlier customer service (though rarely needed because the platform is so strong).

Thedudeabides

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #19 on: June 15, 2014, 12:45:51 AM »
Why the limited capacity?   I am suspicious of anything that tries to create demand via artificial scarcity.

They're probably limiting capacity so that they can get the experience right (work out all the kinks) before offering it to everyone. This is typically why services are gated behind invite lists.

This is common in other industries as well. Restaurants, for example, have soft openings before opening to the general public.

Thedudeabides

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #20 on: June 15, 2014, 01:19:38 AM »
Looks interesting.

It's funny that their model mimics so many others in tech. Free now and they'll figure out how to make money later.

I think this will eventually fail. I guess if you're an active trader and paying a high commission now, it might be worth experimenting with.

They're backed by Andreessen Horowitz (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Skype and countless others) and Google Ventures, so I suspect they have a very good plan on how they will make money (it sounds like initially via renumeration and margin). I doubt many founders with their background and experience would waste years of their life on a hope and a prayer when they could be making millions developing high frequency trading algos. My guess is their strategy is to take significant market share from any other discount brokerages currently charging fees and provide an API so that other developers can build great experiences on top of it.

I don't think free is a stretch. I recall when $25 trades were the standard and the first brokerages came out offering $10 trades. People were skeptical and wondered if they would be getting a degraded experience. In the travel industry, I recall when paying $10 booking fees was the standard. People no longer pay the booking fees and the business model is the same (renumeration from the GDSs). Technology improves, software continues to eat the world, and as a result costs get driven down for all of us lucky consumers.

Will they make it? Who knows. However, I bet they have a pretty good plan in place and it will be interesting to see how it plays out.


GGNoob

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Re: Commission Free Trades on All Stocks
« Reply #21 on: June 21, 2014, 07:38:31 PM »
Have any of you gotten early access to the robin hood platform yet?
I just learned about it and am very intrigued that trades are not only commission free, but that all stocks trade commission free
and the platform is not limited in stock offerings like some of the others.

I joined the waiting list here; https://www.robinhood.com/?ref=zuZg5b and look forward to testing it out.

Any feedback so far from those of you who already have access?

I've been around 1,300 in line for quite a while for Robinhood app. They keep saying they sent out new invites but I never move closer. I find that very strange...