Online Broker Guide

E-Trade announced today that they will discontinue offering their four index funds, including the E-Trade S&P 500 Index Fund (ETSPX), the E-Trade International Index Fund (ETINX), the E-Trade Russell 2000 Index Fund (ETRUX), and the E-Trade Technology Index Fund (ETTIX). The funds that were closed on Feb 23 will be liquidated by no later than March 27.

At less than $250M assets each, the E-Trade funds did not seem to attract enough interest - seems like people prefer ETFs. In addition, online brokers might be better off just offering 3rd party products and not compete with their own.

For comparable ETFs check out IWM iShares TRUST RUSSELL 2000, SPY SPDR TRUST SENIOR 1 ETF, and QQQQ - PowerShares QQQ Trust.

Zecco, the online broker that let you trade stocks for free until now, has announced a new pricing structure.

Starting on March 1, Zecco’s fees will depend on your assets or on the total number of trades you make in a given month - similar to the commission structure of other online brokers. If you have more than $25,000 in your account or if you trade at least 25 times per month, you still get 10 trades per month for free. If not, each trade will cost you $4.50.

According to the CEO, the change became necessary because of the low interest rates that reduce profits that Zecco generates from its deposits. In addition, trading volume has apperently fallen at Zecco, which leads to lower commission revenues.

It’s unfortunate that this became necessary, as Zecco was one of the few places beginning investors could get started without losing their shirt on commissions. That said, at $4.50 per trade, Zecco is still a pretty good deal.