IRAs

Out of curiosity, does any trade using their IRA? I dont mean the regular buy and hold dividend stock forever, I mean actual buying and selling of stock(s) every few months or weeks even?

Know that certain sites (scottrade I believe) offer no commissions on any trades within IRA's. (dont understand why a company would offer this though, especially since scottrade doesnt have annual fees or anything?)

I trade a Scottrade IRA but still get charged the normal $7 per trade

ok, so pretty much nothing changes in terms of trading except the tax stuff?

As stated... Commissions stay the same the only advantage to trading in an IRA is that the taxes are deferred until you start withdrawing the money at retirement.

You don’t have the ability to short anything in IRAs as they are cash accounts, not Margin accounts. Using inverse ETFs can be an alternative to shorting though. Otherwise you can buy options, create spreads and just about anything you want in them.