What You Don’t Know About Scottrade

Written By Young Finances  |  Investing  |  8 Comments

You may think you know all about the online discount broker Scottrade from the plethora of Scottrade review posts that are out there, but there’s always something you don’t know.

Don’t believe me?

Well, you don’t know what you don’t know. 😛

Inexpensive Trades for Young Adults

You might already know that Scottrade offers $7 trades online and advertises that you can open an account with just as little as $2,500 dollars.

But did you know that you can maintain an account with $2,499 dollars? Yes, with Scottrade there is no minimum balance and no fee on balances below 2,500 dollars.

So open an account and start your automatic deposits.

You’ll build it up to 2,500 dollars in no time.

  • iPhone, Android and Blackberry mobile trading
  • No transaction fee IRAs
  • No account maintenance fees
  • No inactivity fees
  • Watch lists
  • Real Time Streaming Quotes
  • Local Branches so you can talk to a human in person
  • Over 3,000 no transaction fee mutual funds

Referral Program

Did you know that you can earn free trades when you refer your friends?

Once you have opened an account with Scottrade, click on the “Refer Someone You Know” link to automatically send an email to a friend.

When they open an account you and your friend get three free trades.

No Transaction Fee Mutual Funds

Are you looking for a broker where you can trade mutual funds without paying a fee?

Scottrade offers over 3,100 mutual funds with no transaction fee. Not sure which mutual fund to choose?

Use their mutual fund screener to explore your choices, including load funds, no-load funds, no transaction fee funds (NTF) and more.

Gain Loss Tax Center

The tax center was put into place to help you when it is time to file your taxes.

When you sell your stocks, you will have a gain or a loss. The tax center helps you figure out your tax basis for the trade so you can file your taxes easily.

The drawback

Everything is not all stars and roses. Here is the one drawback to having a Scottrade account. They do not offer dividend reinvestment. Dividend reinvestment is when your dividends are automatically put back in to the stock you own. There is no trading fee to purchase these incremental shares. But unfortunately, Scottrade does not offer this. In my opinion, all of the good outweighs this one negative.

Update: 6/30/2013

Scottrade recently announced a major improvement in their services.

They now offer a Flexible Reinvestment Program.

In this program, you can use dividends to buy other stocks and exchange-traded funds commission free!

A lot of brokerage firms have dividend reinvestment programs for their clients, but Scottrade’s program takes it one step further. In a typical DRIP, dividend-paying equities can only be reinvested back into that equity.

As mentioned earlier, with Scottrade’s Flexible Reinvestment Program, dividends flow into a program balance, or pool.

You can then tap that pool to buy up to five securities – none of which have to be the securities that contributed the dividends – commission free.

Most stocks and ETFs are eligible in the program.

From Scottrade..

The added element of flexibility is something our clients were looking for, and it gives clients the choice to reinvest their dividends however they want.

AWESOMENESS

Ok, now we are down to the best part of becoming a Scottrade customer.

The knowledge base.

They have live local events so you can learn how to place a trade, how to get started with options and more. All of these events are taught by a licensed representative.

Here is what you can expect to see once you login to your account.

How to Open a Scottrade Account

  1. Open your Scottrade account online or by faxing in the paperwork.
  2. Fund your account via ACH, check, brokerage account or wire transfer.
  3. Print, sign, and mail the account agreement.
  4. Choose stocks, mutual funds, or other assets to purchase.