Speedtrader vs CME

[nostalgiaguru 1]

I have heard many of our folks say that if you can comfortably afford to deposit $25,000, you should go with Speedtrader (or IB), rather than CME group.  Why is that - security, protection, ease of use, better tools?  I understand the Pattern Trade Rule in the US requires the $25,000 on account, but outside of that, what advantages to the US brokers have over the offsite?

I have one month of simulator left of my initial three months, and am starting to think about broker choice.  I foresee continuing in the sim for a while longer, but want to have an active account to play around with small share sizes to test my psychology from time to time while I am learning.

[Lee W 82]

In my opinion, there is no reason to use an off-shore broker if you have the capital to fund a broker here in the U.S. (enough to avoid PDT, that is).  The off-shore brokers aren't regulated by the U.S., it sometimes takes longer to open an account, fund the account, and withdraw from the account.  IB has some of the best customer service I've experienced, they have shorts available most of the time, and the commissions are not expensive. 

Some use Speedtrader as an alternative to Interactive Brokers.  We've seen that Speedtrader sometimes does not have the shorts available (compared to IB).  However, they do offer a per-ticket commission of $2.95 whereas IB does not.  This is beneficial if you are taking large positions and not scaling in or out of a position.  There are discussions in the forum on the comparison of commissions.