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Strategies & Market Trends : Booms, Busts, and Recoveries -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: marcos who wrote (14362)	2/3/2002 5:00:13 PM
From: Moominoid	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74559

Yes, i remember holding a few td.to when they took over Commonwealth, it was a big deal and the market liked it ... they don't offer direct access though, do they? ... this is very much a coming thing in the business, accounts for the majority of trades already i think ... do you know of any direct access operation in Australia at this point? ... SE Global has no broker alliance there, so far Commonwealth (Aussie Bank) took over Colonial / First State which I bought at the IPO. Waterhouse took over Pont Securities here which was my broker. Commonwealth Securities is the biggest online broker in Australia. Waterhouse now just got the customers of Schwab that pulled out here and so is going up the ranks. TDW has just switched to direct access to the Aussie market on non-margin regular stock trades (you have to do margin and options over the phone). I read something about direct access on the US trading on either Commonwealth or Waterhouse now (you can do it online but did go through a real live person but that is changing). How enlightened of Aus to permit you to deal direct with US b/ds ... Canada doesn't do that, as citizens of the great white north we are classed with subjects of North Korea and Cuba and those who were under the taliban ... i kid you not, the securities regs in this country were clearly written by and/or for the ruling oligarchy ... in Hong Kong you can deal with whomever you like, none of the government's business [gee what a communist attitude eh] US brokers are not meant to advertise or solicit for customers here, but I don't think that stops you having an account with them just like my bank account in Boston. On the other hand the tax rules on foreign mutual funds are punitive (designed to promote local fund management industry) but the tax rule on margin debt tax deductibility for foreign stocks just improved. On Americans... We use the term "Americas" for the two continents but would definitely refer to South and North Americans if we referred to non US inhabitants and North and South American as adjectives. A lot prefer "Latin American" because then they can lump Mexico etc. out of the North American camp. "North American" definitely includes Canadians. By analogy "Europe" and "European" are increasingly referring to the European Union. Asia/Asian is another misused term. In Britain an Asian is someone from South Asia primarily. In the US from East Asia. Even in Australia, people look at me weirdly when I say that Israel is in Asia. But of course the Middle East (or SW Asia in UN parlance) is just where the term Asia originally applied to. David