| 07 October 2009

Forty six percent of "every day investors" surveyed in the latest TD Ameritrade (AMTD) poll, released today, indicated they were optimistic on the markets. Only 27 percent held "somewhat" or "very negative" outlooks.  Thirty-nine percent of investors surveyed said they put new money in the markets in the last month.

It's as yet unclear whether this new money benefits all brokers, large and small. In quarters past this money-shifting has come at some expense to the traditional, full-service firms. We reported earlier that $100 billion poured out of firms like SmithBarney and Merrill Lynch, now part of Bank of America (BAC) and subsequently made its way into discount brokerages such as Schwab (SCHW) and TD Ameritrade.

Money is still leaving the stock market, however, and the number one destination for that money (37%) is Money Market funds, according to the survey. However, more and more people are pulling their funds from the stock market to pay down debt. Now 16 percent of investors are opting to pay down debt instead of just 11 percent in April 2009, the last time the survey was given.

When will the markets again reach their all-time highs? More than half of all those surveyed (56%) think it will take three years or less. But fully 31 percent feel we're in for a much longer slog than that.

These results don't quite correspond with the results seen in Schwab's survey of independent advisers, released in September. Individual investors, it seems, aren't as optimistic about our recovery. A whopping 72% of advisers feel the markets will continue to climb over the next six months. This is the greatest level of optimism they've measured in two years.

We suggest this clearly indicates the difference between talking about "your" money versus talking about "their" money.