Questrade is an online broker that is not for everyone and what I mean by this is that it won’t be very useful for individuals outside of Canada. For Canadian residents, however, it makes an excellent platform to make trades and investments in the US market. The platform is offered exclusively to residents in Canada and has a ton of options and features that make it stand out from the competition. They have various plans and commission structures to suit all traders and styles.

Questrade

Even though the broker is based in Canada, you still get access to all the major US exchanges, Forex and precious metals. You can also set up retirement plans and savings account and a whole range of other specialist savings account suited to all occasions. As a company, they currently manage over 5 billion in customer assets and has been in operation since 1999.

This is an excellent platform if you are Canadian and are looking for a way to access the US stock market. If you want to learn more about this platform, continue to read the article.

Commissions and Fees

The commission structure for Questrade is a little complicated as they have a few different options depending on the type of trader you are. Each plan covers all the different areas, including stocks, options and ETFs. In total, there are two different models to choose from: the democratic pricing model or the Questrade Advantage pricing model.

The democratic pricing is their standard pricing model that sets stock trades at $.01 per share with a minimum charge of $4.95 and a max charge of $9.95. Options are $9.95 including a $1 contract fee.

The Questrade Advantage model includes a further two different plans to choose from. To access the Questrade Advantage model, you first need to subscribe to one of their advances market data plans. You then have to choose between the variable plan and the fixed plan. The main difference is that you are charged per share with the variable plan.

No matter which choice you make, EFTs will be commission-free.

Research and Tools

I was very impressed by the research that was presented on the Questrade platform. They allow you to perform some in-depth analysis into stocks and is located in their Market Research center on their website. The platform uses MorningStar which is the go-to provider when it comes to stock research and because of this, the analysis was easy and quick. You can easily compare equities and EFTs in the Canadian and US markets and the screener make the job so much easier. If you’re looking into mutual funds, they have a high-quality system that is also powered by MorningStar.

Market Intelligence

Other Features

Questrade offers clients the ability to use two different trading platforms: IQ Web and IQ Edge. Over the two, Edge was the better pick and provided more detail and analysis when it comes to looking at stocks and options. The platform worked perfectly and didn’t bug-out when I had it running on my Chrome Browser. It will display everything you need, including live streaming quotes, charts and watch lists.

Conclusion

Questrade is an excellent platform to use if you are a Canadian resident. It will allow you to trade in both the Canadian stock market as well as the US one and it provides you with a number of high-quality features. The platform is suited to a range of trades thanks to their varying price plans and they use MorningStar as their main research platform, making everything so much easier. If you’re looking to get started in the stock market, this will be a great broker to go with.

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