How to calculate commission?

How do Ameritrade calculate my gains fees/commission from clients?

• I bought 50 shares of stock at 41.20, 2 days ago. Today my trailing stop sold that stock for 44.49. So that's a gain of 164.50. It's still in my unrealized gain for some reason but it says 146.51. Why did Ameritrade take away 7.99? I understand the $10 commission to sell but what about the 7.99? BTW that stock was a high margin requirement stock however, i used my own cash no margin. So what's with the extra 7.99 taken away from gains?

• Answer:

  All brokerage firms have their own unique commission schedule. They all are based on what is called the "May Day" commission rate which was the schedule that was mandated by the regulators. \When the mandate was lifted, all firms started to change this base schedule. So you will have e to go to the firm for a copy of their commission schedule which, by law, they must provide. Not sure why the $7.99 but you should ask the firm, they may have been "routing" fees depending on the market which most firms do not pass off to the customers, there may be a special "clearing" fee (but not likely). Don;t forget on all listed sales, there is a SEC fee charged. Whether a stock is marginable or not or whether there may be "special" margin requirements" is immaterial when it comes to commissions and/or trading fees. Just call the firm, you'll get the proper response rather than a lot of what many of use think it could be