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Ameritrade Says Customer Trading Fell in February

Yahoo! News - Ameritrade Says Customer Trading Fell in February

Fri Mar 12, 3:20 PM ET
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Online brokerage Ameritrade Holding Corp. (Nasdaq:AMTD - news) on Friday said customer stock trading in February fell 22 percent from January's record level as investors eased their buying and selling.

Ameritrade, based in Omaha, Nebraska, reported 197,000 daily average trades in February, compared with a record 254,000 in January.

The company also raised the bottom of its projected per-share earnings range for its fiscal second quarter and full year by 3 cents. The new ranges are 16 cents to 19 cents per share for the quarter, and 56 cents to 79 cents per share for the year.

Separately, financial regulator NASD on Thursday fined Ameritrade and two affiliates $10 million for improperly extending credit to customers in violation of federal securities laws.

Ameritrade, whose main rivals include Charles Schwab Corp. (NYSE:SCH - news) and E*Trade Financial Corp. (NYSE:ET - news), said it opened 39,000 new accounts in February. The company has a total of 3.2 million customer accounts, although some of them have no money and are essentially inactive.

March 12, 2004 at 06:59 PM in Financial Services | Permalink | TrackBack (15) | Top of page | Blog Home