| 11 August 2009

David Fisher, CEO of optionsXpress, hit the road today to talk with Fox Business about trends he's seeing in the industry. We recently reported their latest results which mirrored the results we've seen from other online brokers: a decrease in profits but an increase in trading activity.

"Resilient" is the term Fisher used to describe his accounts. He says the most active investors are not "running for the hills" but sticking with their strategies and staying in the markets.

He takes a crack at the full-service brokers by talking about optionsXpress tools and product launches as an alternative to the advice you might seek from a traditional, full-service broker. We agree with those sentiments, and as we pointed out earlier, the data lines up with the statements: more than $100 billion in assets has flowed out of traditional, full-service brokers since the start of the market downturn.  

However, Fisher goes on to position optionsXpress as a complement to "traditional" online brokerages, such as E*TRADE (ETFC) and Schwab (SCHW), rather than a complete replacement. Firms that specialize in options and futures can provide income-generating or hedging opportunities for active investors, says Fisher.

See the interview here.