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Non-Tech : Datek Brokerage $9.95 a trade -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: RockyBalboa who wrote (11297)	3/19/1999 9:44:00 PM
From: john o	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 16892

I've have had a Datek account for 3 months. It beats all my other regular on-line brokers hands down (two others). I also use it as an alternative to my direct order entry broker. I get just as good fills and its a lot cheaper. I use the streaming quotes as a backup to the Level II data I get from the direct order entry broker. The only time I ever had problems was when I first got the Datek account and entered a stop loss on a stock. It took six minutes to fill while the price dropped two more dollars. They waved the commission. Big deal. Cost me 40 times that amount for the loss. Chocked it up to experience. I'm a true believer in limit orders only.

To: RockyBalboa who wrote (11297)	3/22/1999 2:52:00 AM
From: eims2000	Respond to of 16892

I have used Datek for 6 months and I feel that it is the fastest way to trade (especially when it is up). Its accounting is excellent and its realtime portfolio is great. Most of the time I would simply enter orders and watch for them in Level II and TS. I would still use them except for the fact that they will not allow margin or shorts on just about any internet stock available, except the ones which will kill you. I do not know how this got so bad so fast but in my book this makes them almost useless in trading many of these volatile issues. I have since moved on to Yamner and am looking at Watley. In my opinion, I stuck with Datek for so long because I was so pumped up on its speed (and it is fast), but when you take away the ability to margin and short you can't imagine the cut that is made in your profits. Now with these other brokers I am free again and making trades like I used to with Datek. I think they will loose the core of the serious (100+ trades per month) traders unless the reevaluate their margin requirements. Maybe this is what they want, I can't understand why, you would think that with their position in the trading world (Island) that they would want to offer the best. In my opinon Datek is now the farthest thing from a real online broker than any other one I have seen, regardless of its speed.