No closing commissions (delete ‘fees’) ($0.10 clearing fee applies)*. Can’t beat that. ThinkOrSwim may be a better commission fee structure if doing large chunk trades. Frequent smaller trades and scale in trades are much better for tastyworks.

Interactive Brokers has a great, and better, fee structure when it comes to direct buying and selling of stock. However, tastyworks wins when it comes specifically to stock option commissions (delete: fees).

*All opening and closing transactions incur the following clearing fees: Options: $0.10 per contract; Stock: $0.0008 per share; Futures: $0.30 per contract.

9/10
 
 

2. Platform Fees

Very competitive, listed in above post. There as an incident where retirement accounts (IRA) received a $35 monthly fee. Tastyworks proactively refunded the fees and sent an email to all users (even those not effected) to notify of both the issue and resolution.

Compare Tastyworks to Tradestation platform fees. Tradestation charges $90 per month for their platform. Traders can avoid the fee if they conduct a certain number of trades.

The typical platform mentality is to charge traders for tools.

Tradestation mentality is to attract trades from traders to avoid fees.

Tastyworks mentality is to attract traders with tools to use the platform.

10/10
 
 

3. Options Exercise Fees

Cheap cheap cheap. $5 to be exercised and assigned options. Very reasonable if you use the feature.

10/10
 
 

4. Trading Platform

Easy to use. Drag and drop interface with basic ability to add complex options trades within just a few clicks. Great.

10/10
 
 

5. Analysis Tools

Proprietary Implied Volatility ranking system along with many other indicators. Indicators list growing and more being introduced.

8/10
 
 

6. Data Subscription

No fees. Can’t beat that.

10/10
 
 

7. Ease of Use

Very easy if you have used ThinkorSwim. One of the original creators of ThinkorSwim is one of the brains behind tastyworks. The rest of the paragraph is fine as is.

10/10
 
 

8. Platform Stability

The platform is very fluid. Switching tabs/pages is near-instant without lag. Changing contract details when attempting to alter details on an options contract (such as quantity/expiration/strike) is fast, smooth, and mostly drag-and-drop or button pushing. The drag-and-drop features are VERY nice and INCREDIBLY user-friendly.

9/10
 
 

9. Research Information/Tools

There’s additional technology tools available exclusively to them such as their implied volatility ranking system. Even if I wasn’t using their platform for actual trading, I would consider having it just for the extra tools embedded in the tastyworks platform and for access to the wealth of live trading (delete ‘of their group’) and educational content made available by the tastytrade team. This area needs improvement. Good news is that the improvement is underway.

7/10
 
 

10. Customer Service

Interviewed an active trader on Tastyworks:

Hard evidence supports real trading issue occurred by a trader. Trader contacted Tastyworks via phone call. No wait time. Resolved in under ten minutes.

Trader cited five additional contacts with customer service over three months since January 2017. Three by phone, two by email. Email responses were under 2 hour response window. All phone calls had zero wait time. Each phone issue resolved on the phone without follow up calls needed. Excellent.

10/10
 
 

Continue on to sign up at Tastyworks: TastyWorks or read more: Tastyworks fee schedule