No, it's definitely a trend with Etrade. The executions with paid commissions at IB are pretty much instantaneous as they should be. I'm not waiting minutes for the trade to execute at Etrade, but maybe 20 or 30 seconds, but that's ridiculous because it's all electronic. If you're trading on news, that's a lifetime.
I have seen lots of $1 stocks with strong earnings and solid balance sheets triple, quadruple and more, but I have yet to see one go below zero.