Exclusive Online Only ContentOptionMonster Launches Online Brokerage
October 29, 2008
OptionMonster, a two-year-old provider of news, education and analysis for the options and equities markets, announced Tuesday that it has launched Trade Monster, an online brokerage subsidiary that is joining a crowded field.
Trade Monster has been in the works since last year, when Chicago-based optionMonster began hiring staff to build the firm, including executives from online brokers thinkorswim and optionsXpress. Wade Cooperman, former president of E-Trade Clearing and a 14-year veteran of Charles Schwab & Co., is the venture’s chief executive.
In an interview, Cooperman called Trade Monster “the first online broker to combine the convenience and reliability of a browser-based platform with the power and flexibility of professional trading software.” Unique to Trade Monster, he said, is its ability to allow “extensive customization in how trade, position and market information is displayed, letting customers realize their own visions for the optimal brokerage experience.”
Trade Monster users are not stuck to one computer and can access their personalized screen wherever they are, noted Cooperman, remotely accessing streaming quotes, portfolio information or news. “Everything is a click away,” he said, adding that the platform will combine the convenience of a Web-based application with powerful trading tools.
“OptionMonster’s vision is to bring professional-grade information, tools and technology to the retail investor,” said Jon Najarian, who along with his brother and fellow professional options trader Pete is a co-founder of the company. “We listened to optionMonster customers, and their wish lists for a perfect online broker were remarkably consistent. First and foremost, while they love the functionality of trading software, they do not want to sacrifice the convenience and reliability of a browser-based broker.”
Trade Monster provides educational content as well, ranging from glossaries to online discussions about sophisticated option strategies. Web seminars are also available and the hosts include the Najarians and Guy Adami, a former trading executive at Goldman Sachs and CIBC World Markets who in August joined optionMonster to head newly created Drakon Capital, which provides equities and equity derivatives research to institutional investors. “The broad range of free content reflects our passion for investor education,” said Cooperman.
Dirk Mueller, optionMonster co-founder and CEO, added in a statement that Trade Monster is “not constrained by legacy technology and [uses] the latest best-of-breed technologies.”
OptionsMonster is “sort of the content king of the options business,” said Adam Honoré, senior analyst at Boston-based research firm Aite Group. It is a competitive advantage, he said, that optionMonster became a popular subscription site before it introduced a brokerage business.
While he doesn’t believe there is much room for additional options brokers, Honoré noted that, “if you have a strong value proposition--and these guys do--then certainly leverage what you have to extend it into different business venues. Having the content and teaching people how to do this, they can essentially create a market as much as they can poach from some of their competitors. That’s an opportunity for them.”
