Navigating Questrade

In this post, I share how finding the right brokerage is a crucial step for investing independently.
I use Questrade because I am a Canadian citizen and resident. It offers a lot of flexibility and significantly lower fees.

What is Questrade

Questrade is a Canadian broker with a reputation for low fees and offers resident Canadian citizens an alternative to trading and investing with larger financial institutions.

You can transfer your funds to Questrade from any Canadian broker/financial institution you have a registered account. You can open a Questrade account on their web platform. You must have a Canadian address to open an account.

After creating an account or transferring your funds over, you are ready to start trading. Questrade provides trading in stocks, options, bonds, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and mutual funds.

How to Make Your First Trade

You’ve set up your Questrade account; funds are in your account you are ready to trade.
Here are the steps you need to take to facilitate your buy or sell.

Login in to Questrade
Click the green Trade button on the right-hand corner
In the Order Entry form is where you will input the stock symbol, the number of securities you want to buy or sell, at what price, for the duration, and from what account.

STK: The stock symbol is a unique series of letters assigned to a security for trading purposes
Quantity: enter the number of securities you want to trade for
Order Type: Limit – a limit order is to buy or sell a security at the specified price or better
Market – a market order is to buy or sell a security at a price currently available.
Duration: Day – the order will remain open until the end of the current trading day or is filled

Once your order is accepted, it will appear under Orders. How you will know if the buy or sell went through, the stock symbol with the quantity will appear under Executions with the action noted. When you buy an ETF, there is no fee. Be aware that some ETFs are priced in USD.