From IIonline this morning.."E*Trade (NASDAQ: EGRP - Quotes, News, Boards) has been by far the most successful of the purely Internet brokers. The company lacks the 'bricks and mortar' storefronts of traditional brokers, but its services rank high with Gomez Advisors, a site that provides ratings about various businesses. What?s more, E*Trade?s business has grown tremendously.
The company added 330,000 new accounts in the fourth quarter and led the industry with 65% sequential transaction growth. E*Trade is also spending less than most of its rivals on customer acquisition, about $289 in advertising for each account activated.
Like Schwab, the company has made some recent acquisitions to bolster its range of services. E*Trade bought Telebanc last June, in a move to offer conventional banking products over the Internet.
On the International front, E*Trade has ventures through most of Europe and has more than 80,000 registered accounts in the Pacific Rim between its Australian and Japanese operations.
At Thursday?s closing price of $24.28, E*Trade looks compelling as a 'pure-play' online broker.
Bottom Line:
Because of its size and its clicks-and-mortar strategy, we think that Schwab remains the best play in this field, but E*Trade has a solid future too. " excerpt |
