Capital One ShareBuilder Costco Membership Exclusive: Receive $50 and Discounted Trades

This post is part of our series on IRA & Brokerage bonuses. Every Tuesday we share another bonus with you.

The Offer

Capital One ShareBuilder is offering a Costco membership exclusive of $50 cash and a discounted trade and automatic investment pricing scheme for new customers who open and fund a ShareBuilder IRA or brokerage account (individual, joint, or custodial) using a valid executive  membership number by 12/31/2015.

The discounted pricing scheme is as follows:

Costco Membership Bonus of $50 Cash and Discounted Trades

Direct link

To receive the Costco membership bonus, you must do the following:

1. Open a new ShareBuilder IRA or Individual, Joint, or Custodial account by 12/31/2015 using a valid executive membership number.
2. Execute at least one trade by 1/29/2016.

Rules:

• Offer expires 12/31/2015.
• You must have a U.S. Social Security number to open a ShareBuilder account
• The cash bonus will be added to your account within 5 days after the first trade is executed.
• The cash bonus will not be available for withdrawal until 180 days after it is awarded.
• Limit one ShareBuilder bonus per customer or custodial beneficiary
• Offer is nontransferable
• Offer is not valid for ESAs
• May not be combined with other offers
• You will need to pay any taxes resulting from this cash bonus.
• Investing involves risk.

The Verdict

This bonus may have limited appeal to those outside of existing Costco members who were already inclined to invest with Capital One ShareBuilder. In terms of trade value, even with the discount, $5.95 for trades under the basic plan is still more pricey than TradeKing’s standard rate. However, the good thing about this bonus, albeit small, is that it requires no deposit commitment on the part of the investor – only a single trade execution.

That said, quick cash goals are not the intent of this bonus as the offer prevents bonus withdrawal before 180 days have passed since the award date. Your decision to pursue this offer should ultimately come down to your investment strategy and broker needs. To research the investments offered by ShareBuilder, you can utilize their Investment Screener to better examine the selection of stocks, ETFs, and mutual funds.

Capital One ShareBuilder does not offer the SEP or SIMPLE IRAs. If you know that you will require one of these retirement accounts, another broker (such as Fidelity which offers both types) would be more appropriate.

As a Costco member, would this promotion incentivize you to invest with ShareBuilder?

HT: MaximizingMoney.com