National Bank Direct Brokerage (NBDB) - any experience or view? | Page 2 | General comparisons | Discussion forum

CI Direct Investing has Yearly fees based on total portfolio value. Not really a "Direct Investing" player to compare to NBDB and the like.

https://www.cifinancial.com/ci-di/ca/en/invest/pricing.html

Fritz23 said
Jon, IKBR have very, very limited number of CAD-Bonds. CI Direct Trading has the best pricing and no fees on CAD bonds. Don't know about NBDB.  

When you bid on bonds at CI Direct do you usually just pick the last bid price, or pick an amount in between last bid and last asked price? I've only ever bought bonds at ITrade, which didn't have that granularity.

AltaRed said
The last time I bought bonds at Scotia iTrade, I thought pricing was transparent, i.e. commission schedule was known, as well as the Bid and Ask prices.

In any event, it has always been my view that a retail investor has to pay the Ask price as these bonds are almost exclusively in the brokerage's inventory (secondary market) and that is the price they are expecting to receive. I recall finding the Ask price will vary a bit depending on the face value one is purchasing, i.e. the larger the face value, e.g. $100k vs $15k, the less of an Ask premium (aside from commission fee schedule) and thus the higher the net yield to the retail investor.  

I just tried it on the CI Trading site. If I choose a bond and click on " Price Bid" it only allows me to sell the bond. If I click on "Price Ask" it only allows me to buy it. So I guess there's no choosing a price.