If Yoda were watching the discount broker activity this past week, he’d probably say: ‘a slow news week this was not’.  Going into the long weekend there’s quite a bit of activity to report from Canadian discount brokers.

In this week’s discount broker roundup we look at the big news coming out of a major player in the Canadian discount brokerage industry, an extension of a commission-free ETF trading offer, whether social media matters to investors and an upcoming educational event of interest to options traders.

Interactive Brokers Canada Gets a Bit More Canadian, Eh?

In what feels like one of those big, end of season plot twists, the discount broker landscape in Canada underwent another seismic shift this past week when Interactive Brokers Canada announced to its customers via email that starting in mid-September, they are going to transition their clearing operations from the US to Canada.   Several Canadian investor forums were alight with speculation as to what this move means and whether Interactive Brokers Canada is paving the way to offer registered accounts, something that would definitely rattle more than few nerves with their competitors.  This post (thanks to ‘Mark77’ for posting the message) has an interesting glimpse of what the Interactive Brokers Canada move might mean.

For now though, shifting their back office operations to Canada instead of through their US affiliate means, most importantly, that the pattern day trading rule will be removed and that margin requirements can, in theory, be eased.  This is definitely great news for active traders (especially those with less than $25,000 in their trading accounts).

For other interesting perspectives on the Interactive Brokers Canada announcement, here are links to forum posts discussing it:

Canadian Money Forum

• Interactive Brokers Canada (IB Canada)

Financial Webring

• Pattern Daytrader Rule gone from Interactive Brokers Canada

RedFlagDeals:

• Anyone here with Interactive Brokers
•  Interactive Broker Changes Mid-Sept

Commission-Free ETF Trading Gets to Die Another Day

Earlier this week, I wrote about the announcement from National Bank Direct Brokerage’s decision to extend their commission-free ETF offer.  The announcement of the deal extension, however, wasn’t the only thing that really caught my attention.  Included in their news release was an official mention of an upcoming website upgrade in September and reporting of trading account activity levels increasing with Canadian investors.  It will be interesting to see whether they will continue to report these activity metrics as well as to view the new website when it is unveiled.

Do Canadian Investors Shy Away from Using Social Media for Advice?

Ah, sweet irony.  Within a week or so of BMO InvestorLine publishing results from a study they commissioned that found Canadian investors prefer traditional media over “social media” for investment advice, they also joined an investor forum to dole out some ‘advice’ of their own about their ‘AdviceDirect’ platform.

Late last week, results from a study commissioned by BMO InvestorLine on where Canadian investors seek out financial information found that ‘traditional’ media, such as television and newspapers, are still the preferred sources for financial information for Canadians.  What was interesting about the findings was that, although social media has become so much a part of the daily lives of Canadians, when it comes to investment advice, only a small number of those surveyed either accessed or trusted sources like LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook as sources for investment information.  I will be publishing a piece exploring these results in detail shortly however one figure that did stick out was the percentage of those surveyed who do look to ‘forums’ for information.

Now, whether a ‘forum’ is technically considered social media or not is up for debate (I personally think it meets the criteria for being social media) however it was interesting to see that reps (or someone claiming to be a rep) from BMO Financial Group join the Canadian Money Forum and subsequently respond to this post by user “MoreMiles” wondering out loud about the value of BMO InvestorLine’s adviceDirect service.

Joining forums to ‘set the record straight’ is not something new – Questrade has done this numerous times on the RedFlagDeals Forum and TD has actually created their own ‘forum’ of sorts (TD helps) in which their customer service representatives also field questions regarding TD Direct Investing.

Options Education Gets a Mention

Also appearing this past week in the Financial Post was a “special piece” (or advertorial?) promoting options education day, which is coming in Montreal (Sept. 7^th) and Toronto (Sept. 28^th). The piece features comments from Disnat and Scotia iTrade (two of the sponsors of the event) about the interest in options education from retail investors and some the access options provide to additional investment strategies.   Judging from the educational events calendar, there is definitely a lot going on this month in terms of learning opportunities.

Options Education Day is organized by the Montreal Exchange and if you’re interested in learning more about the event, click here for a review or here to be taken to their page.

That’s it for this edition of the discount broker roundup. Remember that Canadian and US stock markets are closed on Monday, September 2nd for Labour day.  Have a safe and happy long weekend!