When you’re ready to trade, it’s essential to find a broker that offers a range of products and services at a price that is right for your budget. In addition, look for a trading platform with user-friendly features and tools; training and educational resources; customer support; regulatory safeguards; and trustworthiness.
Oanda
Oanda is a well-regulated broker that offers an excellent platform for trading forex. It also provides an extensive library of educational resources, which makes it a good choice for beginner traders.
The broker’s fxTrade trading platform supports margin trading, which means you can trade positions more prominent than your account balance. This can be a lucrative way to change, but you need to understand the risks involved.
Beginners can get a free trial and practice their skills with a MetaTrader 4 demo account. This allows them to see how the average exchange rates work live and practice with guaranteed stop losses and a range of valuable tools.
TD Ameritrade
TD Ameritrade is a top-rated discount broker that offers a wide range of investment products. Its online trading platform provides access to stocks, ETFs, mutual funds, and options. It also offers futures and forex trading.
Unlike most discount brokers, TD Ameritrade does not charge fees for research and data. This is a huge plus for investors who value these essential tools.
Its research selection includes 400,000 global data points from the Fed and access to third-party analyst reports from organizations such as FRED, Argus, CFRA, Reuters, and Morningstar. It also has a comprehensive suite of fund screeners that help you find opportunities in stocks, options, and mutual funds based on factors like performance, lifecycle, and the highest alpha or lowest expense ratio.
TD Ameritrade’s web and mobile platforms are intuitive and feature-rich, making them a great choice for beginner traders. The thinkorswim app, for example, is an advanced platform that lets you trade securities 24 hours a day.
FXCM
FXCM is a trusted forex broker that offers multiple trading platforms and educational materials. Its prices and fees are reasonable, and the customer support is excellent.
It is regulated by several jurisdictions, including the UK, Australia, and New Zealand. It has a multilingual phone service and live chat and is available in 42 countries.
The broker offers a demo account that lets you trade for free before investing your own money. This is an ideal way to see a broker’s work before opening a live performance.
The user-friendly platform allows you to trade with various instruments, including forex, CFDs, indices, stocks, and cryptocurrencies. It also offers a variety of charting tools, including an auto-zoom feature for drawing trendlines.
TradeStation
TradeStation has a robust, fully customizable trading platform with many powerful analytical tools. It’s best for experienced day traders, though casual investors can also find value in the company’s low fees and extensive educational resources.
The company’s web-based platform is easy to use and offers a secure login process. It also provides a variety of pricing plans, which offer low commissions on most investments.
Users can place commission-free trades on stocks, options, and ETFs. They can also access direct market access (DMA), which allows them to route their orders directly to exchanges for a smaller fee.
Stock research is a strong point for TradeStation, with full screening capabilities, equity backtesting, and streaming futures and forex data. It also provides plenty of free market data, including a news feed from Benzinga and several charting tools.
