and online brokerage founded education division investools in 1983 as telescan inc. headquarters new york with offices in chicago il draper ut and palo alto ca key people lee barba ceo ida kane svp cfo 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 peter santori svp and general counsel products investor education and online brokerage revenue 318 million usd 2007 parent td ameritrade website www.thinkorswim.com www.investools.com thinkorswim often stylized and officially branded as thinkorswim lacking capitalization is an american brokerage offering live and online investor education services . in addition through its brokerage subsidiary thinkorswim inc. investools provides services to about 100 000 funded trading accounts for self directed option traders and institutional users who invest in equities exchange traded funds futures mutual funds and bonds . revenue for 2007 was a record 318 million including the operations of thinkorswim from february 15 2007 . client assets were almost 2.6 billion at december 31 2007 . the average client account is 45 000 significantly above industry average . citation needed active subscribers to its education programs were 102 800 . investools inc. offers investor education and brokerage and related financial products and services for self directed investors . investools education group offers a range of investor education products 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 online brokerage firm services self directed stock options and futures 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 front end trading platforms that allow its customers to trade electronically and provides trading tools and analytics . the thinkorswim software is free through td ameritrade and costs 10 per trade . subsidiary thinkorswim inc. is a brokerage firm registered with the financial industry regulatory authority finra a self regulatory body . 1 contents 1 history 2 s.e.c. investigation & penalties 3 see also 4 references 5 external links history edit this section contains embedded lists that may be better presented using prose . you can help by converting the list or lists to prose if appropriate . editing help is available . september 2016 learn how and when to remove this template message thinkorswim inc. was formed through multiple company mergers and acquisitions in 1982 2 telescan a provider of stock charting and screening tools was founded by dr. richard carlin in houston texas . citation needed also in 1997 online investors advantage an investor education company was founded . 3 in 1999 thinkorswim inc. was founded as an online brokerage specializing in options . 4 also in early 1999 an international investor education company ziasun acquired online investors advantage later referred to as online investor toolbox . 3 5 in 2000 lee barba now the ceo of thinkorswim started as ceo with telescan . 6 on december 6 2001 ziasun merged with telescan to form investools . 7 8 in january 2005 investools purchased prophet financial systems inc. and embarked on a re architecture of the investor toolbox . prophet s founder tim knight was made the senior vice president of technology . in may investools common stock was listed on nasdaq in may 2006 and added to the russell 3000 2000 and microcap indexes on june 30 . in january 2006 thinkorswim acquired arrowhead solutions a privately held institutional sell side trade order management system provider . in september 2006 investools announced a merger with thinkorswim . in february 2007 the company completed the merger with thinkorswim and its ticker symbol was changed to swim . in june 2008 the group adopted the name of its brokerage subsidiary thinkorswim for its corporate identity changing the listed holding company s name from investools inc. to thinkorswim group inc. 9 new york investment banking firm paragon capital partners led by david adler and michael levy initiated this transaction and acted as investools financial advisor in connection with the proposed merger and with respect to the financing of this transaction . link to press release at the time of the transaction thinkorswim had been a portfolio investment of technology crossover ventures . link to press release 10 in may 2008 the company announced that it was cooperating with an informal u.s. securities and exchange commission investigation into presentations used during sales meetings . 11 in january 2009 td ameritrade holdings inc. acquired thinkorswim group inc. including its investools division in a cash and stock deal valued around 606 million . 12 s.e.c. investigation & penalties edit on 12 10 2009 the securities and exchange commission began an investigation into investools purchased by think or swim use of misleading sales practices in which 2 named defendants michael j. drew drew and eben d. miller miller were giving trading workshops under the guise of being full time investors by trade having made their fortunes in this manner as well as assuring students they would achieve the same results by following the investools method . 13 among the allegations by the s.e.c. investools did not prevent its speakers from misleading investors about a survey of its customers trading success 13 currently the investigation by the s.e.c. is continuing . 14 see also edit comparison of online brokerages references edit brokercheck thinkorswim inc crd 106069 sec 8 52991 . financial industry regulatory authority . retrieved 2008 07 25 . http caselaw.findlaw.com tx court of appeals 1243370.html a b prnewswire april 17 2001 solana beach california . tom sosnoff tom sosnoff a q & a with the 600 million man behind thinkorswim . daily finance . retrieved 2009 11 08 . orem based online trading educator expands gets new headquarters courtesy parent company . enterprise salt lake city . 8 august 1999 . p. 11 . thibualt john april 2008 . lee barba . equities . 57 3 . pp. 68 6 . issn 1053 2544 . ziasun and telescan to merge ; combination unites leader in investor education with leading provider of financial content and analytics . business wire . 3 may 2001 . retrieved 17 december 2008 . investools acquires ziasun and telescan . business wire . 6 december 2001 . retrieved 17 december 2008 . press release thinkorswim group inc. name change effective today . thinkorswim . 2008 06 06 . retrieved 2008 07 27 . http www.tcv.com news archives newsitem.php4 file . txt 20060919.txt nair dinesh ; vinu pilakkott 2008 05 01 . investools says sec conducts informal inquiry . reuters . retrieved 2008 08 15 . ortega edgar 2000 01 08 . bloomberg.com article td ameritrade buys thinkorswim to expand in options update4 . bloomberg . retrieved 2012 09 28 . a b http www.sec.gov litigation complaints 2009 comp21331.pdf http www.sec.gov litigation litreleases 2009 lr21331.htm external links edit official website making it click annual ranking of the best online brokers barron s march 2008 http www.sec.gov litigation litreleases 2009 lr21331.htm s.e.c. litigation release no. 21331 re investools http www.sec.gov litigation complaints 2009 comp21331.pdf retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title thinkorswim & oldid 741484557 categories derivatives finance online brokeragesstock marketfinancial derivative trading companieshidden categories all articles with unsourced statementsarticles with unsourced statements from june 2007articles needing cleanup from september 2016all pages needing cleanuparticles with sections that need to be turned into prose from september 2016articles 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