10-second breakdown:
Beginners who follow the “buy and hold” strategy will find all the functionality they need with an easy-to-use platform inside Firstrade. From signing up all the way to making your first investments, the process is laid out to be as clean and simple as possible.
The good:
The navigation and interface just makes sense to anyone who goes on the site. The process of opening an account stands out from other services and the dashboard just spews simplicity (and it’s not bad looking). Firstrade has really made an effort to push their UX/UI to a whole other level.
The mobile app is one of the cleanest in the industry (no surprise here). Basic, but useful functionality and the whole process just flows together making trading just as fun as on your desktop.
The fees are better than many other flagship online brokers, and the terms are surprisingly simple and easy to understand. You won’t have a problem figuring out how much a trade will cost you, it’s all laid out.
The bad:
Unfortunately, simplicity can also be a negative and most of the tools aren’t as powerful as many other trading platforms out there.
Options trades can be made, but the research and other capabilities aren’t good enough to attract the heavy options player.
How it works:
Right out of the gate, signing up with Firstrade is a breeze. You’ll be prompted and guided through the process in no time flat. No minimum deposit is just another sign of their ease of access. After you get signed in, you’ll feel like you understand everything fairly quickly.
While the fees are far less than other flagship brokers, you will notice that there aren’t as many bells and whistles in the research department. Morningstar research is the only company that Firstrade uses for analysis. While this is plenty of data for your stocks, ETF’s and mutual funds; it’s far less than other platforms provide.
Your client dashboard is just as pretty as the rest of the site and everything is right there for you to clearly see. Your panel is customizable so you can put widgets where you like them, but if you’ve used other brokers in the past it will feel a bit less professional-grade.
Once you get to the actual trading platform, things take a slight turn for the negative. “X-Stream”, as it’s called, tries really hard. You can live-stream up to 20 different stocks and do your trading with the tools and deep-ish research capabilities. However, it’s not desktop-based. This fact wouldn’t be a problem if the web application wasn’t based in the Java programming language and doesn’t work on all web browsers.
Next, the advanced charting has over 30 different indicators, but the average trading software has a far higher number than that (typically above 80). Essentially, you’re stuck with a limited amount of data which makes Firstrade a less than stellar option for the frequent trader. The buy and hold crowd may even want to take notice here. The indicators available are good, but there are many missing to tell you the long-term health of a given equity.
You may notice that there is a paid “advanced” version of the software. Access to this software (also web-based and on Java) will cost you a nominal monthly fee, but as far as we can tell it’s not much better than the original and frequent investors will find better tools included with other software products available (even options with the same and lower trading fees).
Alerting is something that Firstrade has going for it. You can customize the alert parameters to a certain degree to have the platform warn you of certain events including price rises or drops in percentage, trading volume, 52-week highs/lows, ask or bid price has reached the customized amount, among others.
Options traders will probably want to stay clear entirely as the research is just not there. Data is an essential part of any strategy and you will find far more of it in other places online.
There is an app available to do your trading mobile-style, but it’s only on iPhones and Android phones. As you’d expect, it is well-made, easy-to-use, but lacking the features you may want.
It’s a decent stock trading platform. It’s perfect if you want a broker that is as beginner friendly, as say, ETrade and super simple to find your way around. All said, it’s not the most feature-rich option and lacks many capabilities that are typically considered “standard” in a lot of other products.
We aren’t telling you to avoid this option altogether. There is an ideal client for this software. It’s made for the person (or people) who want to do just like Warren Buffet and think that “if you aren’t willing to own a stock for ten years, don’t own it for ten minutes”. If that quote sums up your investment style AND you’re not too technically savvy, then you’ll feel right at home with Firstrade. If not, take a look at our other top brokers.
For complete rankings of all online trading platforms, go here.
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