How to connect your brokerage account to ChatGPT or Claude

You connect a brokerage account to ChatGPT or Claude with a connector: a separate service that links to your brokerage with read-only access and then hands your holdings to the assistant when you ask. You don't paste your password into the chat, and the assistant can't trade. Once it's set up, you can ask "what's the news on what I own this week?" and get an answer based on your real positions.

That's the short version. The rest of this post explains how it works, what to check before you connect anything, and what to ask once you have.

What "connecting your brokerage to ChatGPT" actually means

AI assistants don't have a built-in link to your Wealthsimple, Questrade, TD or Interactive Brokers account. Out of the box, they know nothing about what you own. They can talk about markets in general, but they can't tell you which of your stocks report earnings next week.

A connector fills that gap. Most assistants now support an open standard called the Model Context Protocol, or MCP. An MCP connector is a small server that offers the assistant a set of tools, like "get my holdings" or "get my notes on this stock". When your question needs one of those tools, the assistant calls it, gets the data back, and writes its answer from that data.

For a brokerage, the connector sits between two things:

• Your brokerage, which it reads through an aggregator with read-only permission.
• Your assistant, which asks it questions on your behalf.

If you want the deeper explanation, see What is an MCP server for investing?.

Three ways people try to do this

Screenshots are fine for a one-off question. If you want an assistant that keeps up with your portfolio week after week, a connector is the only approach that stays current without work from you.

What to check before you connect anything

Connecting a brokerage to any app deserves a few minutes of care. Before you sign in, check:

1. Is the access read-only? It should be able to see positions and balances, not place orders or withdraw cash. Look for that in plain words on the sign-up screen.
2. Who handles the brokerage login? A good connector uses an established aggregator for the brokerage link, so the app itself never stores your brokerage password.
3. Can you disconnect easily? You should be able to remove the link from the app, and usually from your brokerage's own settings as well.
4. What does it do with your data? Read the privacy policy. It should say plainly what's stored and why.

We go through this in more detail in Is it safe to connect your brokerage to an app?.

Step by step: adding a brokerage connector

Menus differ between assistants and change often, so these steps are general on purpose.

1. Create an account with the connector. With Bywell, that happens in the Bywell app, coming soon to iPhone and Android (join the launch list). You answer a few questions and create an account.
2. Link your brokerage. You pick your brokerage and sign in through the aggregator's connection screen. Bywell uses SnapTrade, which supports Wealthsimple, Questrade, TD Direct Investing, Interactive Brokers and 20+ more.
3. Copy the connector address. After sign-up, you're given the address (a URL) your assistant needs.
4. Add a custom connector in your assistant's settings. In Claude, ChatGPT and most other MCP clients, there's a place to add a connector by URL. Paste the address there.
5. Sign in once more to approve it. The assistant sends you to the connector's sign-in page. You sign in with the same account and allow access. Then you're back in the chat.
6. Ask a question. Try "What do I own, and what's the biggest position?" If the answer matches your account, it's working.

Some assistants only offer custom connectors on certain plans or in a developer mode. If you can't find the option, search your assistant's help centre for "custom connector" or "MCP".

What you can ask once it's connected

This is where it becomes useful. With your holdings available, the assistant can answer questions that used to take several tabs:

• "What's the news on my holdings from the last three days? Newest first."
• "Which of my stocks report earnings in the next two weeks?"
• "Walk me through the last earnings report for my largest position. Did it beat or miss estimates?"
• "Pull the fundamentals for one of my holdings: P/E, dividend yield, 52-week range."
• "How concentrated am I? What share of my portfolio is in my top three positions?"
• "Remind me the day before anything I own reports earnings."

Bywell's tools cover exactly this ground: holdings with portfolio weights, news on everything you own, news for any ticker, fundamentals, past earnings against estimates, upcoming earnings dates, watchlists and earnings reminders. There are more example questions in AI investing prompts for your own portfolio.

What a connector can't do, and shouldn't

A read-only connector can't buy or sell anything. It can't move money between accounts. That's a feature. It means a misunderstood sentence in a chat can never turn into an order.

It also shouldn't make your decisions. A good investing connector is built to explain, not to pick. Bywell's instructions to the assistant are clear: explain what news could mean for your holdings, give both the bull and bear reading, cite the source and date, and never tell you to buy, sell or hold. You stay the decision maker.

This is general information, not investment advice.

Which assistants work with brokerage connectors?

Any assistant that supports MCP can, in principle, use a brokerage connector. Today that includes Claude, ChatGPT, Codex, Gemini and a growing list of other clients. The details differ:

• Some let you add a custom connector in settings directly.
• Some need a developer or advanced mode switched on.
• Command-line tools like Codex usually take a connector address in a config file or a single command.

Because support changes quickly, check your assistant's current documentation rather than relying on an old screenshot.

The short checklist

• Use a connector, not screenshots, if you want answers that stay current.
• Make sure the access is read-only and that you never type your brokerage password into a chat.
• Add it by URL in your assistant's settings, then sign in once to approve.
• Ask for explanations and both sides of the story, and make the call yourself.

If you'd like to try it, Bywell's free plan covers one watchlist and three earnings reminders, with news and earnings on five US or Canadian stocks. Pro, with a 1-week free trial, links every brokerage you use and adds every stock you own and watch, alerts, charts and Bywell AI. Get started here.