Update 3/4/22: Offer has increased from $50 to $101 (ht mangorunner)
The Offer
Direct Link to offer | Press Release
- Schwab Starter Kit offers new Schwab investors a
$50$101 bonus when they open a new Schwab account and fund it with $50 within 30 days from opening.
Schwab will deposit an additional $101 to invest in fractional shares ($10 in each of the top five S&P 500 companies by market cap) through Schwab Stock Slices. Schwab will automatically make that investment unless you instruct otherwise.
The Fine Print
- The Schwab Starter Kit™ offer is only available to eligible new customers.
- To be eligible to receive the $50 cash bonus, you must be an individual who does not have a Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. (“Schwab”) account (other than a Schwab Stock Plan Services account) and who: (1) opens a Schwab One individual taxable retail brokerage account and (2) deposits at least $50 into that account within 30 days of enrolling in the offer (only outside assets new to Schwab qualify; assets transferred from affiliates other than Schwab Retirement Plan Services are excluded).
- The Schwab Starter Kit is intended to help you start investing. So with this offer, when you open your brokerage account, you will instruct Schwab to use the $50 cash bonus to place orders for you in the future to buy $10 fractional shares of each of the top 5 stocks by market capitalization in the S&P 500® Index through Schwab Stock Slices™ (unless the orders are cancelled by you -see details below). The top 5 stocks will change from time-to-time. To see the top 5 stocks at any time, go to www.schwab.com/starterkit.
- After you enroll in the offer, here’s what will happen: Two business days after your account is opened, Schwab will begin checking for qualifying deposits every business day. Once your qualifying deposit has been received, Schwab will credit the $50 cash.
- Schwab will place the 5 orders for you ($10 fractional share orders for each of the top 5 stocks in the S&P 500) at approximately 8:00 pm Eastern Time the day the cash bonus is credited to your account, provided you maintain at least $50 in your brokerage account at that time. You will have a short period of time (from approximately 8:00 pm Eastern Time until approximately 9:25 am the next trading day) to cancel the orders. To cancel the orders, you will need to go to the Order Status page on schwab.com or on any of Schwab’s other trading platforms or call a Schwab representative at 800-435-4000. If you cancel your orders, you will keep the $50 cash bonus and can save or invest it however you want. If you take no action, the orders will be executed shortly after market open the next trading day. You will then see the stocks reflected in your account and Schwab will send you trade confirmations for the trades.
Our Verdict
Nice, easy bonus here, especially for someone interested in opening a Schwab brokerage account. This is only for new Schwab customers and won’t work for existing users.
There’s also a separate Schwab offer for a bonus of between $100 – $1,000; that one requires large deposits to get. I don’t think you’d be able to do both of these offers so you’ll have to choose this easy $101 offer or the capital-intensive $100/$1,000 offer. We’ll add this offer as well to our List of Best Brokerage Bonuses.
Hat tip to reader Ryan
Anyone able to get approved with Chex frozen? Or for those that get approved and then schwab says they’ll close it due to financial info (chex). Were you ever able to get in and stay in?
Schwab does not pull Chex for brokerage accounts. They do pull Chex for the checking account.
FYI, they are currently paying 0.45% interest on cash balances.
They are able to make it non interest bearing if you call.
I did that, hoping I’ll avoid a 1099 statement entirely (saw some comments saying they only got 1099 for the nominal interest, not for the $101 bonus).
So odd, I received the $101 promo, but it never invested in Stock Slices.
7/15 opened account
7/16 $50 pull posted
7/19 $101 promo credited
8/2 and still all money sitting in cash without going into stock slices (I’ve gotten multiple emails about my $101 stock slices on the way)
Seems there’s no minimum time to hold this account, so I’ll probably just move out the cash and shut it down soon anyway (while keeping my new I401k account that I moved from Vanguard, which was the reason I decided to bank with Schwab altogether).
Second Starter Kit account. Closed first account11/8/22.
Opened second with new e-mail and number: 6/20/24 and deposited $51
6/27/24: $101 posted to account (can’t transfer out yet). Banner says “It’s happening! You’ll soon get a trade confirmation for every order of Schwab Stock Slices™.”
My $50 deposit posted yesterday (5/29) and now I’m seeing the “It’s Happening” banner at the top of the homepage. I should be able to cancel the orders after 8pm tonight, rather have the cash than fomo at these levels.
They aren’t fractional shares, they’re stock slices.
I was able to complete this as well recently as someone with a previous Schwab account closed in 2021 I believe. I used a different email but I think the phone number was the same. I didn’t spot the order in time to cancel, but I plan on using the account for real anyway.
I can confirm what snailrock said is true. This is churnable. I did the same thing, used the same personal info and different phone # and different email.
1st go around:
Opened 3/22/23
Deposited 50+
$101 slices posted 3/29/23 – cancelled orders took the cash
Closed Account 4/19/23
2nd time as a “new” customer
snailrock
Opened 3/22/24
Deposited $55
$101 in slices going to post 3/29/24 – planning on canceling the orders
Thanks
Is the standalone brokerage account a good hub account? I was waiting for a good SUB at Ally or CapOne, but this seems pretty good…
I opened an investment account first, and then a checking account. After opening it, I didn’t log in for more than ten days. Yesterday I found that I couldn’t log in, so I called and was told that my account was closed because of chex. Have you ever encountered this situation? I want a chex report, but I forgot my chexsystem password. I tried several times, the account was suspended, and I called several times but nothing was resolved.
I got my Chex report online last week and don’t have a Chex account. Maybe try to request a Chex report without logging in. Under Account Declined, select yes.
I request online report, always error, I ask for mail, I will check，thank you.
I had a similar problem trying to retrieve my Chex report and got around it by changing browsers. I usually use Firefox but even though I turned off ad blockers and cookie blockers, I got the error message. I switched to naked Chrome – no add-ons whatsoever – and received my report online. Also, make sure you type in all of your information. Do not use autofill for any part of the report request.
Eason
Does anybody know if this account can be opened for minors? Would be great learning tool and teachable moment for our kids.
Have a 401k and IRA that have rolled over to Schwab. Have no taxable brokerage. Hoping I could be eligible for this.