There is rarely a 'free lunch'. Free trades? Makes me want to look at the fee structure really hard. There are expenses that someone has to pay. And how are they paying for their TV budget? Are there monthly account fees? Please look hard at anything promising free trades. There will be a catch.
< one thing to watch for is getting screwed on the price of the stock. Say you are buying Apple at $252.00 bid / $252.02 ask but the price you paid was $255.00, three dollars higher per share. There is the fee, buried in the details of the transaction. Still ok if you just bought a single share, but rather high if you bought ten shares. >
I have a question - are we talking about odd lots or round numbers of shares? Anything less than 100 shares is an odd lot. Lowest transaction cost isn't one of the key questions if this is about five and six figure stock purchases. Lowest cost is a huge deal if we are talking ten shares or less. So much depends on the scale of the transaction.
Please be cautious, the lowest price is often not the best deal -=- DrStrange