Part of the point of electronic trading, is to factor out money-grubbing brokers. They like to offer “handholding for the newer trader” at a “full-service broker”. But I do not remember ever getting much of this handholding from brokers when I was new many years ago; they just took my trades over the phone. It just seemed like an excuse to charge a lot more.
I was talking to a broker the other day. They charge $166 a trade (per contract), in concert with their in-house advisory. When I remarked how criminal it seemed, he said “You have to pay to play with the big boys”. Needless to say, their service was down 20% in May. I felt quite smug about this. But didn’t respond to ask how the big boys were that month…
