Ally Invest Review 2023

How we ranked fees

We ranked Ally Invest's fee levels as low, average or high based on how they compare to those of all reviewed brokers.

First, let's go over some basic terms related to broker fees. What you need to keep an eye on are trading fees and non-trading fees.

• Trading fees occur when you trade. These can be commissions, spreads, financing rates and conversion fees.
• Non-trading fees include charges not directly related to trading, like withdrawal fees or inactivity fees.

In the sections below, you will find the most relevant fees of Ally Invest for each asset class. For example, in the case of stock investing the most important fees are commissions.

We also compared Ally Invest's fees with those of two similar brokers we selected, Merrill Edge and Fidelity. This selection is based on objective factors such as products offered, client profile, fee structure, etc. See a more detailed rundown of Ally Invest alternatives.

To have a clear overview of Ally Invest, let's start with the trading fees.

Ally Invest trading fees

Ally Invest's trading fees are low. The fee structure is transparent and easy to understand. 

Forex products and services are offered through Ally Invest Forex LLC, which acts as an introducing broker to GAIN Capital Group LLC. We didn't include forex trading fees in this review, but if you need info on Ally Forex fees, head over to our Forex.com review.

Stock fees and ETF fees

Ally Invest charges no commission on stocks and ETFs priced above $2. If you trade stocks or ETFs cheaper than $2, a $4.95 flat fee plus a further $0.1 per-stock is charged.

If you prefer stock trading on margin, you should check Ally Invest margin rates.

Trading on margin basically means that you borrow money from your broker so that you can purchase more shares than you could with just the available cash in your account. For this borrowed money you have to pay interest; the interest rate is called the margin rate. It can amount to a significant portion of your trading costs.

Ally Invest margin rates are lower than what similar US brokers charge, but are markedly higher than those of Interactive Brokers (IBKR) at 1.6%. 

The Ally Invest margin rate for stocks is volume-tiered. The higher the amount, the lower the margin rate.

Fund fees

Ally Invest fund fees are generally low.

Ally Invest charges $9.95 per trade for mutual funds. In mutual fund pricing, you don't get a discount if you trade frequently or maintain a higher account balance.

Bond fees

Ally Invest has generally low bond fees, though some of its closest competitors charge even less.

The commission for bonds is $1 per bond with a $10 minimum. You don't get a discount if you trade frequently or maintain a higher account balance.

Options fees

Ally Invest options fees are low.

The options fee is $0.5 per contract.

Non-trading fees

Ally Invest has low non-trading fees. It charges no inactivity fee or account fee.

There is no withdrawal fee if you use ACH transfer. However, withdrawals to other banks using wire transfer cost $30. We tested ACH, so we were charged no withdrawal fee.

Can you open an account?

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Only US residents can open an account at Ally Invest.

What is the minimum deposit at Ally Invest?

The required minimum deposit at Ally Invest is $0. The minimum deposit is higher for margin accounts and managed portfolios.

You can also transfer your account from another broker to Ally and get reimbursed for the costs.

*Forex trading is available through a separate Ally Forex account provided by GAIN Capital (Forex.com)

**You trade with money borrowed from the broker, also called trading on leverage.

Account types

Ally Invest offers several account types. 

In this review, we tested the Individual Brokerage Account without margin.

How to open your account

The account opening process is fully digital and user-friendly. Online application takes roughly 20 minutes, but account verification can take much longer. Our account was verified after 3 business days.

Follow these 8 steps to open an account:

1. Enter your personal information and email address
2. Choose the account type
3. Continue with some more personal info and details for later verification of the account, like your Social Security Number
4. Add your personal phone number (to be used during the registration process and as your default contact), and choose a security question
5. Provide your employment info
6. Select your investment profile and trading preferences
7. Add some investment objectives and state your margin and option preferences
8. Upload a copy of the relevant documents to verify your date of birth and your SSN

If you want to trade forex, you need to register a separate Ally Forex account as well.

Deposit fees and options

Ally Invest charges no deposit fee. Clients can use check, ACH and wire transfers to deposit funds. Credit/debit cards and electronic wallets are not accepted.

Of course, the easiest is if you have an Ally Bank account, in which case you can simply move funds to your brokerage account.

We tested the ACH transfer and it took 2 business days to go through. You can only deposit money from accounts that are in your name.

Ally Invest withdrawal fees and options

Ally Invest charges no withdrawal fees if you use ACH withdrawal, but wire transfers cost $30. Alternatively, you can request a check for a $5 fee.

How long does it take to withdraw money from Ally Invest? We tested the ACH withdrawal and it took 2 business days.

You can only withdraw money to accounts in your name.

How do you withdraw money from Ally Invest? Just follow these steps:

• Log in to the account
• Go to 'Transfers'
• Select the 'Bank Transfers' menu, then 'Withdraw'
• Select your Ally Invest account in the 'From' field and your previously linked external account in the 'To' field
• Add the amount you wish to withdraw and set the frequency and date of the withdrawal
• Preview and initiate the withdrawal

Ally Invest has three trading platforms, which differ in tradable products and the devices the platforms are offered for:

In this review, we tested Ally Invest's web trading platform. This trading platform is available only in English.

If you are interested in Ally Invest Forex, you can find out more in our Forex.com review.

Look and feel

The Ally Invest web trading platform is user-friendly and well-designed.

You can also do basic customization when setting up your dashboard. You can change the tabs' positions, but you can't change their sizes.

Login and security

Ally Invest provides only one-step authentication for logging in. A two-step login would be more secure.

In theory, when you first log in on a new device, you'll need to give an answer to your security question. However, during our test, we were not always prompted with a security question when we switched to a new device.

Search functions

The search functions are good, you can search by typing both a company's name or an asset's ticker.

There is also a useful auto-suggestion feature that shows relevant results.

Placing orders

Ally Invest offers a wide variety of order types:

• Market
• Limit
• Stop-loss
• Stop limit
• Trailing stop
• Market on close

If you are not familiar with the basic order types, read this overview.

You can also use basic order time limits:

• Good 'til canceled (GTC)
• Good 'til Day (GTD, or 'Day')

Alerts and notifications

You can easily set up price alerts. To do this, click 'Investments', then go to 'Tools' and select 'Alerts'.

You can't set up alerts for your email or mobile; they pop up only in the trading platform.

Portfolio and fee reports

Ally Invest has a clear portfolio report but lacks a similarly transparent fee report. You can't see how much commission you paid to the broker.

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We tested Ally Invest's in-house developed mobile trading platform and not the trading platforms offered for forex trading.

The mobile trading platform is available both on iOS and Android devices and we tested it on iOS.

Look and feel

Ally Invest's mobile trading platform is user-friendly and well-designed.

Login and security

Ally Invest provides a one-step login. A two-step login process would be more secure.

On the plus side, you can log in using fingerprint authentication, which is a convenient feature.

Search functions

The search functions are good and are similar to those offered on the web-based platform. You'll easily find what you are looking for.

Placing orders

You can use roughly the same order types as on the web trading platform, along with a slightly wider range of order time limits.

These order types are available:

• Market
• Limit
• Stop-loss
• Stop limit
• Trailing stop

There are also order time limits you can use:

• Good 'til canceled (GTC)
• Good 'til time (GTT)
• Pre-Market
• Post-Market

Alerts and notifications

You can't set alerts or notifications on the Ally Invest mobile platform.

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We didn't test Ally's available desktop trading platforms because they are only for forex trading. If you are interested in the Ally Invest Forex desktop trading platform, read our Forex.com review.

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​​​​​​Ally Invest has a great selection of bonds and mutual funds. Its stock and options product ranges are average or below-average, though.

Forex trading is offered through Gain Capital's Forex.com brand.

Stocks and ETFs

Ally Invest covers only the US market. In this regard, its product portfolio is similar to that of E-Trade but worse than Merrill Edge's.

You can trade stocks on these exchanges: NYSE, NASDAQ, AMEX, OTCBB, and other OTCs.

Funds

Ally Invest has great mutual fund coverage.

You will find funds from the biggest fund providers like BlackRock or Vanguard and from smaller ones, too.

Bonds

Ally Invest has a wide bond offer: agency, treasuries, municipals, strips & zeros, CDs, and new issues.

Options

At Ally Invest you can trade options only on the CBOE. 

Ally Invest Managed Portfolios

Ally Invest also offers a robo-advisory service called Managed Portfolios. It's a great service if you need help managing your investments.

To get started, first, you have to answer questions about your investment goals, risk tolerance, time horizon and available funds. Then, based on your answers, a portfolio is created and the robo-advisor will automatically rebalance the portfolio when needed.

It only takes a $100 minimum amount to start your portfolio and the annual advisory fee is low, at 0.3% of the account balance.

If you are interested in such automated investment services, check out our robo-advisor reviews.

Maxit Tax Manager

As an Ally Invest client, you can also access a platform called Maxit Tax Manager. It's a third-party service that helps you easily manage the factors that determine the taxes you pay on your investments each year.
Maxit has a number of tax strategies that are easy to set up, e.g. which lots get sold when. For example, if you have bought the same share on more than one occasion, you might want to sell a lot with a higher purchase price in order to realize a loss and lower your tax bill that way.

Ally Invest focuses on stock and options research tools; however, these tools could be improved.

Ally Invest has an ETF screening tool, but we missed a good screener for stocks and mutual funds. As for bonds, the platform offers a completely different structure, where you can also find a useful screener.

Ally offers real-time streaming quotes to non-professional users. Quotestream is also available by request to customers who trade more than 10 times a month.

Trading ideas

Ally Invest provides trading ideas. For stocks, the platform channels various third-party providers like Morningstar and CFRA. The Morningstar analysis focuses on fundamentals and moats, whereas CFRA is more technicals-oriented.

Options trading is supported by an overall strategy evaluation tool (which calculates greeks), while you can also test your strategy against different volatility settings. However, it's not possible to save and download the results.

Additionally, stock picks and options trades are featured on Allly's YouTube channel “Stock Play of the Day” series. The interactive show is hosted by Brian Overby (author of “The Options Playbook”) and Ally's strategist Lindsey Bell. The emphasis is usually on finding good trades and playing them via options.

Fundamental data

Ally Invest offers fundamental data on stocks. You will mainly find financial metrics (i.e. performance measures, margin data) under the 'Fundamentals' menu. We liked that Ally Invest selects 4 other stocks and creates a quick peer comparison. We missed a customizable peer group option, though, as well as a detailed financial statement dataset.

Charting

Ally Invest has excellent, easy-to-use charting tools. You have access to 120 technical indicators and approximately 30 charting options. You can save your charts for later use.

News feed

The news feed could be improved. It is easily readable but lacks visual elements, like charts or pictures. It is provided by a third-party news service, MT Newswires. You'll be better off using other third-party newsfeeds outside the platform.

Compare research pros and cons

You can contact Ally Invest via:

• phone
• email
• live chat

The customer service is available only in English.

The Ally Invest phone support provided relevant answers albeit the speed of the service was average.

Via email, we got relevant answers, but it took a couple of days to receive a reply.

Ally Invest's live chat could be improved. The response speed was average and the relevancy of the answers was mediocre.

Despite all this, it's a big plus that the Ally Invest support team is available 24/7.

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At Ally Invest, you can learn in the following ways:

• Platform tutorial videos
• General educational videos
• Webinars
• Quality educational articles
• Extra features, like live streams

Educational material on the platform covers a wide range of topics and is good quality overall.

The videos and educational articles are beginner-friendly and have useful content. You can access the written material in the 'Do it right' section. It's great that educational materials are broken down into product categories (e.g. stocks, ETFs). In addition, there are weekly live streams; the series now has dozens of episodes, all archived on the site for later viewing.

The 'How to' platform tutorial videos are linked to the relevant parts of the platform. 

Ally Invest's webinars focus on various subjects, mainly on a beginner level. You can also participate in a basic financial education course hosted on the website Ally Wallet Wise.

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Is Ally Invest regulated?

As Ally Invest is based in the US, it's regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), as well as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) in the case of Ally Forex.

Is Ally Invest safe?

To be certain, we highly advise to check two facts:

• how you are protected if something goes wrong
• and what the background of the broker is.

How you are protected

This matters for you because the investor protection amount and the regulator may differ from entity to entity.

Ally Invest operates several legal entities, but all customers (except forex) are covered by the US investor protection scheme called SIPC.

The SIPC investor protection scheme protects against the loss of cash and securities in case the broker goes bust. The limit of SIPC protection is $500,000, which includes a $250,000 limit for cash. This amount is substantially higher than what most other investor protection schemes provide. 

Not all investments are protected by SIPC. In general, SIPC covers notes, stocks, bonds, mutual funds and other investment company shares, and other registered securities. It does not cover instruments such as unregistered investment contracts, unregistered limited partnerships, fixed annuity contracts, currency, and interests in gold, silver, or other commodity futures contracts or commodity options.

Below is a rundown of Ally Invest regulators, legal entities and investor protection amounts:

As a plus, Ally's clearing firm, Apex Clearing, has also purchased an additional insurance policy through a group of London Underwriters (with Lloyd's of London Syndicates as the Lead Underwriter) to supplement SIPC protection. This policy becomes available to customers in the event that SIPC limits are exhausted, and provides protection for securities and cash up to a total $150 million.

Like most US brokers, Ally Invest does not provide negative balance protection.

Background

Ally Financial is a bank holding company that was founded in 1919 by General Motors to provide financing to automotive customers. Today Ally is one of the largest car finance companies in the US but also provides online banking, corporate lending and mortgage loans. In 2016, the company acquired TradeKing (a stock brokerage with a focus on options trading) and re-branded it as Ally Invest, with a more general focus on investors and traders.

Ally Group (Ally Financial Inc.) is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, which is a big plus in terms of safety as Ally Invest releases financial statements regularly and transparently.

Having a banking license, being listed on a stock exchange, providing financial statements, and being regulated by top-tier financial authorities are all great signs for Ally Invest's safety.

Find your safe broker

We recommend Ally Invest for investors and traders looking for low fees and focusing on the us market.

Below you can find links to all aspects of Ally Invest in this comprehensive collection.

Lower fees, lower costs?

We detailed this in our Ally Invest fees article.

What about the minimum deposit?

Our ultimate guide to the Ally Invest minimum deposit is updated regularly.

How to start your Ally Invest account?

Look no further than our evaluation of the Ally Invest account opening.

How's their trading app?

Here's our expert view after checking the Ally Invest trading app.

Is the quality of customer service satisfactory?

All you need to know about the Ally Invest customer service.

Legit or scam?

Is Ally Invest legit features all the key aspects you need to look at to see if a broker is safe and legit.

Free or premium? Or both?

A glance at actual costs and whether Ally Invest is really free.

Is this broker good for beginners?

We checked it in Is Ally Invest good for beginners.

Should you buy your silver bullets on Ally Invest?

Research for silver bugs in the Silver buy on Ally Invest guide

I want to trade options, are they available at Ally Invest?

We explored the topic in Can you trade options on Ally Invest?

What is the minimum account balance at Ally Invest?

Check out the current account balance requirements at Ally Invest in our What is the minimum account balance at Ally Invest article.

Looking for commission and fees data for Ally Invest?

We collected them in Ally Invest commission and fees.

How do you withdraw money from Ally Invest?

We tested it and collected the options and costs in How to withdraw money on Ally Invest.