Investools
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| Investools, Inc. | |
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| Type | Public (NASDAQ: SWIM |
| Founded | By Dr. Richard Carlin in 1983, as Telescan, Inc. |
| Headquarters | New York with offices in Draper, UT and Palo Alto, CA |
| Key people | Lee Barba, CEO Ida Kane, SVP/CFO Ainslie Simmonds, SVP/CMO/CPDO Paul Helbling, SVP/CAO Tim Knight, SVP Technology Dale Ainge, SVP Student Acquisition Scott Sheridan, EVP, thinkorswim Group Inc Tom Sosnoff, EVP, thinkorswim Group Inc Pete Santori, SVP & GC |
| Industry | Investor Education and Online Brokerage |
| Products | Investor Education and Online Brokerage |
| Revenue | ▲ $318 million USD (2007) |
| Website | www.investools.com |
Investools, Inc. is an American company offering live and online investor education services. In addition, through its brokerage subsidiary, thinkorswim, Inc., Investools provides services to more than 71,175 funded trading accounts for self-directed option traders and institutional users who invest in equities, exchange-traded funds, futures, mutual funds and bonds.
The company's strong financial performance for 2007 reflects the successful evolution as an integrated online brokerage-investor education leader. Revenue for 2007 was a record $318 million, including the operations of thinkorswim from February 15, 2007. The positive trends in the company's business is reflected in virtually every one of the key metrics during 2007. New retail accounts opened nearly tripled to 75,875. Retail DARTs reached 41,900 for the fourth quarter, a four-fold increase from a year ago. Client assets rose to almost $2.6 billion at December 31, 2007, from $890 million a year earlier. The average client account was a strong $45,000---significantly above industry average. Active subscribers to our education programs ended the year at a record 102,800, up 17,400 from the prior year-end.
Investools Inc. offers investor education and brokerage and related financial products and services for self-directed investors. Investools Education Group offers a full range of investor education products and services that provide lifelong learning in a variety of interactive delivery formats, including instructor-led synchronous and asynchronous online courses, in-person workshops, one-on-one and one-to-many online coaching programs and telephone, live-chat and email support. thinkorswim Inc., Investools’ financial technology pioneer and industry-leading online brokerage firm, is focused on providing services to self-directed options traders and active traders. thinkorswim offers customers a broad range of products including equity securities, fixed income, index products, options, futures, other derivatives and foreign exchange. thinkorswim provides unique front end trading platforms that allow its customers to trade electronically and provides sophisticated trading tools and analytics, including tools for implementing complex, multi-leg options strategies. The products and services offered by Investools Inc. have received numerous accolades from third parties including thinkorswim’s ranking by Barron’s as its top rated software-based online broker and best for options traders (2007 & 2008), and Prophet’s top Barron’s ranking for best technical analysis tools (2007).
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[edit] History
[edit] 1997: Founding
Telescan, a provider of stock charting and screening tools, is created by Dr. Richard Carlin.
[edit] 1999: Mergers
The current Investools was formed by the merger of Telescan, Inc. of Houston, Texas, and Online Investor's Advantage of Provo, Utah.
[edit] 2005: Prophet Purchase
In January, Investools purchased Prophet Financial Systems, Inc. and embarked on a re-architecture of the Investor Toolbox. Prophet's founder, Tim Knight, was made the SVP of Technology.
[edit] 2006: Stock Listing
In May, Investools common stock was listed on NASDAQ and added to the Russell 3000, 2000 and Microcap indexes on June 30.
In September, Investools announced a merger with thinkorswim, Inc., a leading online brokerage specializing in options that was founded in 1999.
[edit] 2007: New Ticker Symbol
In February, the company completed the merger with thinkorswim and its ticker symbol was changed to SWIM.
[edit] 2008: SEC Investigation
In May the company announced that they were cooperating with an informal SEC investigation into deceptive presentations used to persuade customers to purchase Investools products.
