BUSINESSWEEK ONLINE : MAY 22, 2000 ISSUE
COVER STORY And the Winner Is... AMERITRADE (www.ameritrade.com) vs. E*TRADE (www.etrade.com) Winner: E*TRADE E*Trade's graphics are easy on the eye and simple to follow. We liked the site's financial supermarket: Trade stocks, open a bank account, obtain a credit card, buy insurance, or take out an auto loan. Ameritrade's $8 trade beats E*Trade's $14.95, but its site looks dull. Research is virtually nil: One page with a few financial stats and a wire-service story were all it had on Microsoft. CHARLES SCHWAB (www.schwab.com) vs. TD WATERHOUSE (www.tdwaterhouse.com) Winner: TD WATERHOUSE Waterhouse gives you more bang for your buck--$12 per trade for up to 5,000 shares, vs. Schwab's $29.95. Schwab has got to be kidding if it thinks housing an IRA there is worth a $40 annual fee--whether you trade or not. MORGAN STANLEY DEAN WITTER (www.msdw.com) vs. MERRILL LYNCH (www.ml.com) Winner: MERRILL LYNCH A close race, but Merrill gave more guidance to self-directed investors and offered nice freebies if you used its credit card on the Web. MSDW charges clients with less than $100,000 for research, though it has a lower minimum balance for a basic account--$2,000 vs. $20,000 with the bull. We hated MSDW's confusing layout and bilious color scheme, which made the site hard to navigate. DATEK (www.datek.com) vs. SURETRADE (www.suretrade.com) Winner: SURETRADE Both sites are frill-free. But SureTrade offers two advantages: a cheaper price per trade and much broader research, including material from Stockpoint, Zacks, Briefing.com, and Digital Investor. Datek has to shave more than $2 off its $9.99 market-order fee to meet SureTrade's $7.95 price. Datek's learning center is nice for newbies but irrelevant to others. AMERICAN EXPRESS (www.americanexpress.com) vs. DLJDIRECT (www.dljdirect.com) Winner: DLJDIRECT DLJdirect gets down to business with clear screens and speedy navigation. It also offers great research, but if you have less than $100,000, you only get a two-month free trial. American Express tries hard to educate investors, but explanations are hard to fathom. Free trades with $100,000 and up are nice. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ BACK TO TOP					RELATED ITEMS Clicks of the Trade TABLE: And the Winner Is... How We Reviewed the Sites See also our reviews of 10 online broker sites: E*Trade and Ameritrade Daytek and SureTrade Schwab and TD Waterhouse DLJDirect and American Express Online Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch INTERACT E-Mail to Business Week Online

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