TD Ameritrade reviews, ratings, pros and cons, complaints from brokerage customers

TD Ameritrade Ratings

TD Ameritrade average user rating: brokerage firms reviews

TD Ameritrade BrokerageReviews.org rating: 4-star brokerage firm rating

TD Ameritrade Review: Stocks, ETFs & Options Trading Commissions

Stocks and ETFs: $9.99
Options: $9.99 plus $0.75 per contract
No-load mutual funds: $49.99
Treasuries at auction: $25 flat fee
Futures: $3.50 per contract (inclusive of exchange fees)

Minimum To Open Online Brokerage Account

There is no minimum to open an account, however, a $2,000 deposit is required to be considered for margin and options privileges, regardless of any promotional offer.

TD Ameritrade Promotional Code/Offer/Bonus 2012

Ameritrade Reviews


by tombilliodeaux, 11/22/2011 Pros: Cons: TDA has been good to me in both service and support. I have 4 accounts for 3 years. while the day trading platforms are not PRO level, for my low level of trading, i like the poor Strategydesk for viewing my accounts and setting triggers and alerts. Decent level I and Level II quotes with real time quotes that have executed quickly in my experiences......2x per week or less. I like the data available to run complicated trade algorithims that StrategyDesk has simplified to allow one to create and do runs on historical data. Can put the algorithm on line and actual allow it to trade automatically if your are brave enough. ThinkorSwimis web based and faster, and good for trading, but not so good for account management. It does allow muti account access which is nice and time saver. I also like the stability of a well funded organization....with that said, nothing in this day is a surety
by Erick, 11/19/2011 Pros: Great tools & website Cons: High Fees, Bad Service & support I like the tools & the website lay out of TD Ameritrade, but always hated their high fees specially for assisted trades. Further, their support can be horrible at a time. After reading several reviews like below I have switched top OptionsXpress as it seems to beat it on every comparison I have found online :).
by brokerage-review.com, 5/8/2011 Pros: No surcharges for penny stocks, large orders and after-hours trading Cons: $9.99 commission for stocks/ETFs is high, $49 commission for mutual funds is extremely high TDAmeritrade.com website becomes slow or goes down on high volume days. Sometimes orders take forever to execute. It often happens on most critical days when markets make big moves. This is the time when customers really need to be able to access their accounts and have their orders executed promptly. Also, at after-hours trading we often experience very long and costly order execution delays or orders don't fill at all. Read full review at Ameritrade review.
by J.Z., 2/9/2011 Pros: great research tools Cons: expensive I don't use my TD Ameritrade account to trade anymore because it is very expensive at $9.95 per stock trade and especially for options trading at $9.95 plus $0.75 per contract. I do use them for research on investments because they really help. I love their tools for filtering through stocks to find ones with favorable attributes. I now use OptionsHouse for all my trading because they are really inexpensive. They now charge $3.95 per stock trade but when I opened my account it was only $2.95 and they didn't raise my fee! Options trades are up to 5 contracts for $5 otherwise it is $8.50 plus only $0.15 per contract. Their customer service is really great but the research tools are not very good. I am thankful to Ameritrade for their tools.
by P.M., 12/27/2010 Pros: very good reliable broker Cons: expensive I worked with them for nearly 2 years. The software is great, many diffenet tools you can choose. Quite good service, though it could be better. What is bad - 10$ per trade is really very expensive if your account less than 100K (and you have to follow your own risk-management). You feel it especially when makes a lot of daytrades. A give 5 stars and those who give less than 4 ones try to cheat you.
by viktar, 11/9/2010 Pros: NOOOO for TD Cons: I have been using TD Ameritrade for more that 2 years, not anymore. I am an active trader, and everything was perfect until I experienced a problem with Command Center 2.0, they had technical problem, and because of that I lost significant amount of money. After I called them they gave me 10 free trades which is nothing compare to my loss. So, many hours on phone I wasted by trying ti get my money back, NOOOO. I called different brokers and explained situation, they were surprised, how it is so unprofessional, especially when I had a talk with main supervisor, it was terrific. So unprofessional person who manages people, she does not know how to do business. The company already lost more because my negative advertisement about company, and my inactivity. If TD is going to continue this kind of behavior they are going to be nothing, even with a good platform from Thinkorswim. There are a lot of brokers around, even much- much cheaper and better tools. My recommendation is do not deal with TD Ameritrade if you want to trade safely.
by Kenny, 10/29/2010 Pros: Cons: Execution was slow like hell and down twice times a week. If you’re day trader, you will lose money because of this. Sometimes you saw level 2 and chart in different prices and didn’t know which one was right. Lost over 500 bucks because server was lagging and frozen over 10 seconds
by Beauticontrolpw, 10/1/2010 Pros: Cons: I investigated many companies before I chose a place to save and invest, and I am glad I chose TD Ameritrade. I feel safe and secure, and although in this economy growth has slowed, it hasn't come to a halt, and I have not lost any money. I show growth every month--sometimes more than expected. The website is a bit difficult to navigate, but with practice you can figure it out, and there is always support if you need it.
by freewilly, 9/24/2010 Pros: Cons: Thii morning till now,, Strategic desk is very buggy for me. Canceled buy order at 10000 shares of ONNN AT 6.00, confirmed, but it showed up in my account. I was scrared. I had a 3000 shares short of SYMC at $16, thought to cover at market price, but it was just frozen there for 3 minutes, no action. SYMC is a very liquid stock, and I was a market order (because I was so scared.) Canceled that cover order, then realized could lead another problem. What if it filled but I didn't know. Finally, I covered it at 15.38, worked better for me, but I was so sacred, otherwise I would hold till $14.8. Then trying to sell 35000 shares of C, man I was just so scared, everything was a mess, not allowed again, complaining I was selling more share than I had. Then tried to sell 10000 shares of FPR at $1.72, few minutes no luck, finanlyy sold at $1.62. Second time on me. I had similar problem with TD ameritrade last Friday. This is so scary.
by leftfreddy, 9/2/2010 Pros: Cons: Love to use TDAmeritrade! I would rate it a 5 it was cheaper and if they made a tiny web-site revision that would allow you to hit refresh on your current page (it goes back to the original log-in page at that point no matter what material you were viewing). I started using Sharebuilder and hated it. Switched to TDAmeritrade and it was like day and night.
by maximum, 8/21/2010 Pros: Cons: I just want to admonish your readers what a terrible experience I have had w/ a new account I opened at TD Ameritrade. Every month, for the past 3 months, I have had to re-set my password and "security questions" because they are repeatedly erased when TD Ameritrade does one of their frequent "software upgrades". The process must be done over the phone. Problem is, TD Ameritrade does not have enough customer service reps to answer the phone during normal market hours. If you want good service, stick with Scottrade, Fidelity or Vanguard. TD Ameritrade is a PITA.
by stockchick, 8/7/2010 Pros: Cons: It seems that Ameritrade and Etrade are abandoning their discount broker roots to become more like the Merrill Lynches they attacked in the early days. What I mean by that is that they have invested heavily in the fee for advice model. Their online platforms are OK, but their commissions are high compared to the newer discount brokers, and they don't have the same level of leading edge investing community tools that other sites have these days.
by aformerclientoftd, 5/24/2010 Pros: Cons: Very unreliable & erroneous site data. Tech dept is lousy & site very often is messed up.
by ZUCK169OM, 4/14/2010 Pros: Cons: Cheap trader and good quotes.
by upsettrader, 4/12/2010 Pros: Cons: All the balances on their site are off today. 5/30/07 I'm showing a zero balance on my cash and I can't make a trade online when the market is going south. I called their # and the phones are tied up for 30 minutes. I'm moving my money elsewhere.
by kornell_911, 3/20/2010 Pros: cheap trades, good for people who know what their doing Cons: Ameritrade offers 8 dollar trades for most of their basic transactions. (Buy/Sell). Other transactions like limit orders, and margin calls, etc. are around 13-18 dollars. Not bad considering some firms charge twice or even three to five times this amount. the Bad --Ameritrade's trades are cheap because its service is bad. Their web page is lacking in adequate stock, mutual fund, bond information. They do link their page to other sites but the fact of the matter is they do not have their own research and even information on their own web page. Other companies like Schwab, DLJ, and even eTrade allow you to effortlessly research info on their page. They also offer recommendations as to what to buy, what not to buy, etc. etc. --Ameritrade doesn't even provide unlimited real-time quotes. A few months ago, they charged you for real-time quotes. This is pretty ridiculous considering the fact that many sites like ragingbull offer free RT quotes. Now, Ameritrade offers a real-time quote balance -- if you place trades they add a certain number of quotes that you can use. -- Ameritrade does not execute trades at the buy/sell and bid/ask price. Their priority level is low. -- The charts that they offer for your account balance, positions held, etc are too simplistic and too basic. They simply post three lines of your balance: Cash balance, Equity balance, and total. For equity positions held, they simply list the number of shares you hold, the price (current), and the total. Other such advanced, options are not present. In order for me to get more advanced options I turn to finance.yahoo.com on my.yahoo.com page. I cannot say how great Yahoo!s financial page is. You can tailor what options you want to see for all your stock positions held. For instace, you can see the total amount for the whole year you have earned. Also you can daily charts, high-lows, average trade volume, etc. etc. ---- the lowDown Ameritrade recently fixed up it's web page. It is not that much improved; they are still trying to compete with other firms such as eTRade, MSDW online, ML online, and other investment banks, insurance companies that will enter this very profitable market as a result of the repealing of the Glass-Steagle Act, by way of keeping their commissions at a low price. Ameritrade is good for the frugal investor who knows what he's doing and doesn't need the bells and whistles of other internet online trading web sites. I would only recommend it.
by goodbull, 2/5/2010 Pros: Cons: Terrible customer service! No one ever seems to know what's going on. Just to save a few bucks, I went with TD Ameritrade, and it was not worth it at all! They held my checks, lost my paperwork, referred me from one department to another... it was awful. Go somewhere else!
by zulu948, 12/12/2009 Pros: Cons: For being such a large company, ameritrade charts are no special than Yahoo financial charts. I am truly disappointed. The charts have minimum data points. The charts look like those created by kindergarden students. Even for a free service like Yahoo financials, ameritrade charts are sub-par to Yahoo financial charts.
by greenrebellion, 11/28/2009 Pros: Cons: A bit expensive, but I am willing to pay since their customer service is good, platform rarely crashes, and trade execution is very reliable.
by lahee ricky, 8/30/2009 Pros: Cons: they support canadians eh ameritrade canada better than td waterhouse!!!

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