Fidelity to Eliminate Online Trading Fees

Fidelity Investments is following the steps of competitors by eliminating the fees for online trading.

Major competitors have announced this month that they would make similar moves when it comes to online trading fees.

Fidelity has said in a tweet that it will be scraping commissions for online trading of stocks, options and ETFs. The firm will also automatically direct customer cash to higher-yielding money markets.

Charles Schwab, E-Trade, TD Ameritrade and Interactive Brokers all announced recently that they were dropping trading commissions.

Fidelity had previously charged $4.95 for trades.

“With this decision, Fidelity is taking a different path from the industry,” Kathleen Murphy, president of Fidelity Investments’ personal investing business. said in a statement.

She added, “We are providing customers unmatched value while challenging industry practices that appear to give value in one place when they are actually having customers pay in other ways.”

In regards to directing customer cash to higher-yielding money markets, Murphy remarked, “We made this decision after careful consideration to our clients and ensuring we are satisfying their full needs.”