Broker choice

[evancross]

What discount broker/brokers do you use (have you used) for personal trading, and how did you bridge your quant tools to your broker if you use automated trading? I imagine this will be heavily dependent on what instruments you trade most, so state that as well.

I apologize for the green nature of this question as I am new to quantnet and new to q finance entirely. I am interested in doing some small scale personal investment or investment games that integrate well into the quant's tools. I tried a search and found nothing on the subject so I thought I would start a thread.

 

[Uncle Max]

Interactive Brokers is a pretty good shop to start your search.

If you are a student the have annual Collegiate Trading Olympiad where you can test your ideas in real time environment, learn their platform, and hopefully win first prize