Report of this not working for existing customers
The Offer
- TastyWorks brokerage is offering a trading challenge where you can earn up to $250.
The Fine Print
- Participants must be 18 years or older.
- Participants are limited to $5,000 in buying power during their Trading Challenge Period.
- Participants must complete their Trading Challenge Period within 14 calendar days of registering for a Trading Challenge Account.
- The maximum promotional cash credit that can be redeemed is $250.00 USD.
- Individual margin or cash accounts are the only eligible account types that may receive a cash credit earned during the Trading Challenge period upon successfully funding with a minimum of $2,000 USD within 30 calendar days after completing the Trading Challenge. The funds must remain in your brokerage account for a minimum of six months.
- Trading Challenge and profit cash credits are limited to U.S. residents only.
- There is a limit of one Trading Challenge Account per participant for the entire Trading Challenge Promotion. Each participant is limited to a single promotional cash credit. Any attempt by any participant to obtain more than one Trading Challenge Account by using multiple email addresses, registrations, logins, fictitious identities, or any other method will void the participant’s Trading Challenge Account and disqualify them from receiving a promotional cash credit.
- The Trading Challenge Period will begin at the time the participant elects to start trading in the Trading Challenge Account and end on the following two trading day’s close of the market session at 3:00pm CT (unless such day is a market holiday then the Trading Challenge Period will end at the close of the market session for that particular market holiday, which may be before 3:00pm CT). Participants who elect to start their Trading Challenge Period after 3:00pm CT and before 8:30am CT Monday – Friday will begin their Trading Challenge Period at 8:30am CT on the next trading day. Participants who elect to start their Trading Challenge Period on a Saturday or Sunday will begin their Trading Challenge Period at 8:30am CT on the next trading day.
Our Verdict
Basically you’re given $5,000 in a trading account (play money) and you get to keep any ‘profit’ you make up to a maximum of $250. To keep your profit you need to deposit at least $2,000 within 30 days of starting the challenge. I think the best strategy would be just purchasing one position and then set it to sell as soon as you’d get to a balance of $5,250. TastyWorks also has a spin game where you can get $25-$250, but that is only for new users and not as good as the previous $250 bonus.
Hat tip to reader Chao Xu
This promotion is dead according to Tastyworks as of 6/30/20.
I got the 100 shares bonus from Tastyworks but the $600 per TIN per calendar year terms existed when I then did the trading challenge. Like other users have noted below, Tastyworks is claiming I should not receive the $250 from trading challenge since I did the 100 shares promotion already. Has anyone tried to fight this via BBB/CFPB/FINRA? I’m not sure where the best place to file complaint would be if I wanted to bother. Technically, I think they have an out as the trading challenge terms state:
This promotion, when combined with the
value received from all other tastyworks offers, may not exceed $600 USD per TIN during the calendar year. The offer is not transferable, saleable, or valid in combination with certain other offers.
As a result, I don’t think I will fight it further beyond emailing their terms back at them and threatening filing a complaint……unless others found success after filing a complaint.
Anyone out there do the 100 shares bonus first and then the trading challenge….and ultimately get their trading challenge bonus manually added after a complaint?
YMMV but I think Tastyworks did end up agreeing to give both 100 shares and trading challenge. It took several emails, removing my funds, and telling them I was going to close the account. I had to make my case based on their terms and point out inconsistencies in the their responses based on their terms. They said put the 2k back and we’ll credit you the promotion (if you keep funds there for 6 months). Cash credit is supposed to credit in Sep so hopefully all goes smoothly there. As I stated above, trading challenge is dead now (ended 6/30) and the direct link in this post doesn’t work anymore.
Data point – I’m an existing user and got the bonus. I did not sign up using a bonus though so that is probably why. My account was well over a year old.
What was the date that you received the bonus? I did my deposit a month ago and they still haven’t given me the bonus.
Can someone please explain in a simple language how this works? I singed up for the promotion, and I did the $2000 transfer. now what? I am logged onto trade.tastyworks.com but I don’t see the $5000 play money (I see my $2000 though). Some comments below say I need to install the desktop software, is that true?
I’m also confused about the “14 calendar days” requirement and “Once you start the challenge clock, you will have two consecutive trading sessions to make $250”.
Any tips to get the $250 and painlessly as possible?
thanks!!!
Looks like the current terms and conditions state that you cannot receive more than $600 in value from tastyworks promotions per TIN per calendar year, so maybe this is a sign that they’re going to be better about paying out the bonus to customers who received other promotions in the past.
Also, don’t forget you need to keep the $2000 deposited for six (6) months! When I read that, I decided not to continue, especially since I have received other promotions this year and would max out at $125 from the trading challenge anyway.
Reached out via chat after completing the challenge (I signed up with the 100 share promo).
thanks for reaching out! You cannot qualify for both promotions so since you used the 100 free shares promo code first you would not be eligible for the trading challenge credit
Another DP of them not honoring the promotion on existing accounts, despite funding with an additional $2K in deposit. Pretty shady of them in my opinion and not a company I would recommend doing business with.
Datapoint: Opened Spin to Win taxable brokerage on 3/20/20, funded for bonus on 3/23, received $250 on 4/17. Attempted trading challenge on 3/24, opened 2nd taxable account on 4/15/20, funded for bonus on 4/20. Received the trading challenge on 5/21. I managed to get both bonuses, as well as refer my friend (he got 1 refer credit). I think if you seperate the timing you can get both credits. I had 2 taxable account, they both put credit onto my first account.
In the end, I got both, too. The transfer 5K worth bonus and this trading bonus. I just didn’t mention my first account when I contacted Tastyworks about the second promo.
Are both your accounts under the same username? Or did you create a new username/email to keep the accounts separate?
Yes, under the same username/login. After winning the trade challenge, I followed the link for “if you have an account already…” on the page confirming that I won and made a new account that way.
It was the only way that made sense to me since I’d already signed up for the trade challenge with the same email linked to my existing account
If you didn’t do that, you can try using a different email/username
Didn’t work for me (existing user, received Spin to Win bonus earlier). I was expecting this from previous reports, so went into it for fun. I ended the game with ~$6k, but their promo summary page shows my total as $0 and says “Sorry, You didn’t qualify for a Credit”. Not sure if the other failed reports saw the same message, maybe they updated it after people complained.
Any idea what i should invest into tomorrow?