Fidelity vs TD Ameritrade

[LOL!]

For cash management, Ameritrade is poor. Rather than buying BIL or FLRN I just ACH money from Ameritrade to or from a high yield savings account.

I ACH all cash from my taxable account at TDAmeritrade out to my checking account. This cash comes from quarterly dividends. I do the same thing with my Fidelity taxable account.

But for my 401(k) and IRAs, I cannot ACH the cash out without paying taxes, so that's not going to happen.

I decided long ago that there is no one financial institution that is best at everything. So what I have done is keep a few accounts open to use the tools available at each, but avoid making transactions at those places.

For instance, we really like the Fidelity Charitable Donor-Advised Fund. We basically donate shares held in our Fidelity taxable account to the DAF occasionally.

And Vanguard has excellent bond funds, so Vanguard gets a slug of our money that is in set-and-forget mode.

Most of my transactions are done at WellsTrade since we are grandfathered into the no-fee for anything deal.

 

[COcheesehead]

I have all my cash management at Fidelity. Billpay, checking, debit and credit card tied in. They offer a 2% back Visa. Makes it super easy to pay all your bills and manage cash.
Their fixed income tools are fantastic, easy to use CD/bond ladder builder, cash flow manager, never had a problem with customer service. I really like Fidelity. No reason to go anywhere else.

 

[mamadogmamacat]

OP here
decided today to transfer TD to Fido
happy to accomplish some consolidation and trades are cheaper at Fido
also, Fido's Active Trader Pro is much easier to use, and faster, than thinkorswim
indeed, even the stock screener on Fido has most all of what I want easily displayed

 

[COcheesehead]

OP here
decided today to transfer TD to Fido
happy to accomplish some consolidation and trades are cheaper at Fido
also, Fido's Active Trader Pro is much easier to use, and faster, than thinkorswim
indeed, even the stock screener on Fido has most all of what I want easily displayed

Cool, let me know if you have questions about the Fido site. There’s a lot of info and functionality on there and it takes a bit to discover.

 

[ownyourfuture]

I'll give a specific example of why I don't like Fidelity as much.

I have an account with a bond fund in it and I have the monthly dividends automatically reinvested. Sometimes I want to see the transactions of those reinvestments with dollar amount, number of shares, date. Here is what that looks like for part of one transaction (date is a few lines above)

Why does it take so much display real estate to show this? I have to scroll to see all the transactions? Am I doing something wrong? This is not simplicity.

And I cannot get Activity for more than 90 days at a time at Fidelity. That sucks.

In contrast at TDAmeritrade, I get a fairly clean report of multiple transactions in less space than a single partial transaction at Fidelity:

And I can put in any custom date range that I want.

I also like that I can customize the columns and order of the columns in the Positions display at TDAmeritrade. Can one do that with Fidelity?

I have a REIT that pays monthly dividends @ Fidelity.
Here's how I look at all my transactions.
After logging in, I'm at the 'All Accounts' page.
Choose the account & click on 'Positions'
Click on the position you're interested in & then click 'Purchase History/Lots'

 

[LOL!]

^Thanks, that is very helpful, but that doesn't show the price per share in your screen capture nor in my account. Yes, I can do the math, but because of round-off issues, I want to see more than math, but also want to see the NAV when the transaction happened. But it's better than what I was doing.

And yes, I know it doesn't show "Cost basis" because the account is an IRA.

 

[COcheesehead]

^Thanks, that is very helpful, but that doesn't show the price per share in your screen capture nor in my account. Yes, I can do the math, but because of round-off issues, I want to see more than math, but also want to see the NAV when the transaction happened. But it's better than what I was doing.

You can also go back at least 3 years, not just 90 days. You have to use the time period pull down box to pick quarterly reporting or pick your own custom date.