Barron’s release its 16th annual online-broker review

This week Barron’s release its 16th annual online-broker review (http://online.barrons.com/article/SB50001424052970203523604576188781715729822.html?mod=BOL_hpp_mag#articleTabs_panel_article%3D1), and it is without merit that Barron’s does not have any review on Wells Fargo Advisors as it did in previous years. However, I realize that reviewers at Barron’s are paying special attention to what they have to offer for wealthy, “active” traders like a Barron's reader.

The closest type of service to Wells Fargo online broker that I can find in the review is Merrill Edge (merrilledge.com) from Bank of America/Merrill Lynch. The review says Merrill Edge has four pricing tiers and they are confusing. The pros of MerrillEdge.com include 30 free equity trades per month with $25,000 or more in your Merrill Edge or Bank of America account.

If an investor simply trades stocks or ETFs only, I think Merrill Edge will do the trick at a very low cost unless the investor indulges in trading and uses up 30 free trades per month that come with his/her combined balance of over $25,000 in Bank of America/Merrill Lynch accounts.

To a frugal investor like me, I would like to keep my investment cost down, so Merrill Edge or Well Fargo brokerage services are for me to minimize the trading cost. I am an investor with a strategy mixing with buy/hold and periodic rebalance, so hardly I make more than 10 trades per month on average. In my nearly 2-year experience with Well Fargo online brokerage, I never use up the quotas of 100 free trade each year. In the same token, if I have accounts at Merrill Edge, the number of trades I place each month probably will not exceed 30. Therefore if I use both companies’ services, I will only use the free portion of the services.

Before I opened up accounts with Well Fargo in 2009, I made a comparison between Wells Fargo and Merrill Edge (It was called Bank of America online brokerage back then) B of A offer 30 free trade per month with combined balance of more than $25,000 and limited choice of no transaction fee mutual funds.