The 5 page write up by Simon Keane (starts on P20) of the current edition of Shares Mag is very revealing & only goes to confirm IMHO that if you swim with sharkes you will get eaten.

The seperate editorial on P6 was also very informative & helpful although stating one should be careful, it does seem to be the law of the jungle out there (kill or be killed), which is not how they present themselves, when one is cold called.

How long will it be before FSA wakes up & takes some real action against them remains to be seen, as this firm has had a very chequered past to say the least.

Q.How many people have been on the receiving end of the telephone transcript (published in the report) from this firm ?? it seems to ring a bell in my mind

There were 6 pages in total on this one controversial firm of brokers how many others have been caught in their web & lost capital in the process ??

Amber, when you open a broking account the key question to ask is how many market makers they have online gateways to. Big brokers such as Squaregain/TDWaterhouse will be connected to nearly all, whereas small brokers such as HB are only connected to a small number. This means that when you come to trade online there is a much greater chance that there will be no MMs willing to deal online and they will have to put the order through by telephone, and also a much lesser chance of any price improvement on the displayed spread.

Amber,

So although the cost of trading is cheaper, you lose on the prices!

TDW and Squaregain always get within the yellow strip price.

www.share.com 2.50 (batch), or 7.50 (immediate) are better IMO.

Thanks guys, yes will have to find the time to sort myself out, but that share at 77p...now 95p! Just hope they can sell it quicker than they bought it! Not bad for a week-end and I only started re-trading last Wed....but it's only coz the shares gone up i'm happy, not with them obviously :>)

Look out there back: http://www.hbmarkets.com/online-share-dealing-and-isas-W21page-14-#charges