discount brokerage

Charles Schwab, a discount brokerage company, plans to launch a new service to allow customers to invest directly in foreign stock markets using local currencies.

Related services are already offered by other brokerages including E*Trade, Fidelity, TD Ameritrade and Zecco.

"The U.S. is becoming less important with the overall asset mix people are thinking about," says Schwab's Brian McDonald. Investors are "looking to grow global trading, and we want to make sure we're right there with them."

A largest discount brokerage and fund company Charles Schwab Corp will pay $118.9 million in fines to settle regulatory charges that it hid from investors the mortgage-related risks in a seemingly safe, multibillion-dollar bond mutual fund. This week the US Securities and Exchange Commission announced the settlement and filed a civil lawsuit charging two Schwab executives, Kimon Daifotis and Randall Merk, with violating securities fraud laws over how the Schwab YieldPlus fund was marketed.

 A discount brokerage company Scottrade was fined by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority $600,000 for allegedly inadequate money laundering controls to detect suspicious transactions.

The FINRA, the brokerage industry's self-policing organization, announced the fine on Monday. On the other end, Scottrade neither admitted nor denied any FINRA’s allegations.

As is known like banks brokerage companies are obliged to establish proper anti-money laundering policies, procedures and internal controls.