Update 1/16/25: Extended through 3/31/25 (ht Jimmy J)
The Offer
TradeUp brokerage is offering the following three bonuses which stack together:
- New TradeUp brokerage who make an ACATS transfer from another brokerage into TradeUp by December 31, 2024 are eligible for 2% cashback on the transferred amount. Max $1,000 bonus (transfer $50k or more to get the max $1,000 bonus).
- Clients who transfer $100,000 or more to their TradeUP account and maintain their transferred assets for a year will receive an additional 1% match ($1,000 capped match).
- Those who signup with TradeUp also get some free stocks: 2 for $100 deposit, 3 for $2,500 deposit, 4 for $10,000 deposit, 5 for $100,000 deposit.
Offer valid August 5 – December 31, 2024. You can find this offer on the TradeUp homepage scroll and mentioned on this page; find the terms on this page. You can find the 5 stock offer on this page and the terms on this page.
Important Notes
- There is a $50 fee for doing a full account ACAT-out, so keep that in mind if you aren’t sure that you’ll be staying with the brokerage forever.
- It appears these bonuses are all for new customers (“new clients“).
- Clients who transfer assets from a brokerage account that was originally opened through TradeUP Securities, Inc. and now clears exclusively through Interactive Brokers are not eligible for this campaign.
- This promotion applies exclusively to an account’s first ACAT transfer that qualifies for this promotion. Subsequent ACAT transfers will not qualify for this promotion.
- An account is said to have “maintained the value of the transferred assets” if it does not initiate any withdrawals or outgoing account transfers during the specified period. Transactions involving securities purchases and changes in asset valuation do not affect reward eligibility. However, withdrawals or account transfers will result in forfeiture of the reward.
- Cashback Distribution: Cashback will be distributed quarterly, with payments made on the last business day of each fiscal quarter. The maximum cashback amount per quarter is $350. The distribution schedule follows below: After the first 90 calendar days: Clients must maintain their account assets for a full 90 calendar days from the settlement date. The first cashback installment will be distributed at the end of the first full fiscal quarter after the 90 calendar day period. For example, if the settlement date is August 15, 2024, the first cashback installment will be distributed on December 31, 2024. Subsequent Quarters: Cashback will be distributed on the last business day of each subsequent fiscal quarter. For example, if a user completes an ACAT transfer of $50,000 and qualifies for a 2% cashback bonus, they will receive a total of $1,000. This amount will be distributed in installments of $350 for the first quarter, $350 for the second quarter, and $300 for the third quarter. If the transfer date is August 15, 2024, the first $350 installment will be distributed on December 31, 2024, with subsequent installments of $350 and $300 distributed on March 31, 2025 and June 30, 2025, respectively. By participating in this campaign and receiving the cashback bonus, you agree that the cashback bonus will not be issued until the end of the first full fiscal quarter after the 90 calendar day holding period is complete. The cashback bonus is subject to forfeiture if the account is transferred out within 90 calendar days of the cashback issuance. Certain restrictions may apply when you request withdrawal of the cashback bonus.
- Where required by applicable rules and regulations, the value of all TradeUP Securities Inc. offers received may be reported as Other Income on Form 1099-MISC. TradeUP Securities Inc. is not responsible for individual tax reporting related to this reward program.
Our Verdict
If you transfer in $50k you’ll get $1k bonus and around $40/$80 in free stock. If you transfer in $100k you’ll get $2k bonus and around $50/$100 in free stocks. And you can get up to $300 to cover any fees from your old brokerage company.
Overall this offer is from the better brokerage bonuses we’ve seen. We’ll add this to the list of Best Brokerage Bonuses.
Though the long hold times are a pain, I’m still thinking of hitting this one. I’ll signup on the offer landing page in the coming weeks and transfer $100k from my current brokerage account in a single ACAT transfer to TradeUp. I’ll get 5 free stocks right away which will be worth $50 or more. Then I’ll get $350 on March 31, 2025 and another $350 on June 30, 2025 and another $300 on September 30, 2025 to complete the $1k bonus for the 2% part. I’ll also get another $1,000 bonus for the 1% $100k match (it’s not clear in the fine print when that $1k bonus will payout; update: it’s possible the second $1k will pay out at $350 quarterly, in that case you’ll have to leave the $100k funds there for about two years total to get the max $2k bonus). I’ll then leave my funds there until at least the end of 2025 since the fine print mentions leaving funds until 90 days after bonus payout.
If anyone has used TradeUp in the past, kindly share your experiences with them in the comments below. Specifically I’d be interested in knowing whether cost-basis transfers over properly when transferring stocks from another brokerage.
Hat tip to reader Lrdx
Is the extra $1000 for a $100k deposit paid out in installments too? The terms seem like it might pay all at once after one year. It’ll be interesting when people start getting their first bonuses.
it looks like if you ACATS less than 100k, you will still get 2%, that means you don’t need to do 50k or more to get 2%, am I missing something? also don’t see where you get the free stock from the link
These people have no phone number?
It seems Tradeup is affiliated with a brokerage company Marsco.
https://www.marsco.com/contact-us
The latter also says Tradeup on their webpage.
No phone listed on Tradeup but Marsco has the following.
BY PHONE
Toll Free +1-800-962-7726
Is it possible to do this with ETFs held in a Fidelity Cash Management account or do I need to open a Fidelity brokerage account?
Yes. No.
The Fidelity Cash Management Account… is a brokerage account that allows you to spend, save, and invest.
Depends on the ETF. I successfully transferred CMA, but wasn’t allowed to transfer SPAXX (money market). I ended up having to move all remaining cash out of the account for the transfer to go through.
The crux of the questions is no, there is not a difference between the Fidelity and CMA and brokerage account as far as ability to ACATS securities out.
If SPAXX is your sweep, you’ll simply have that transfer out as part of cash. If you did partial transfer, DO NOT specify SPAXX (or your specific sweep MMMF). Just specify the amount of cash.
If you have money market mutual funds in EITHER CMA or brokerage, no those wont transfer to Tradeup.
Thanks, good to know. I was planning to still keep SPAXX cash in the Fidelity CMA account to pay bills. I would only transfer out money that’s invested in Vanguard index funds. Sounds like I need to request a partial ACATS transfer of the account then.
SPAXX isn’t an ETF.
Which brokerage accounts offer free ACATS out? I guess I’ll need to transfer the funds into there and then do the ACATS.
Fidelity is always free. Merrill Edge is free for partial.
Merrill Edge partial means you can leave $1 in taxable accounts and still be partial. For IRAs they require you to leave $50.
For Fidelity, I prefer doing partial ACATs even though both full and partial are free. They require $500 in the account for it to be partial. I prefer keeping the account open as a hub since it’s annoying to have so many closed accounts.
So are you saying you need to leave at least $500 in Fidelity in order to not have your account closed?
I never knew the specific ME IRA partial $, thanks.
Once you have over a dozen or two Fidelity accounts, having a few closed ain’t so bad! At least you can hide $0 accounts from most places in the UI.
I’m pretty sure tradeup will cover the acat transfer fee at least for the first time. I actually usually prefer to close the brokerage acct completely normally especially for merill edge because it can be churned.
BofA only giving me $600 for $200k+
https://www.merrilledge.com/offers/pr1000
If I read the offer correctly, it’s not $2,000 but a $3,000 bonus for a $100,000 transfer – because there’s a 1% bonus for amounts over $100,000. Downside is a slow payout capped at $350 per quarter – it would take a whopping nine quarters for the payout to dribble in, on top of waiting the first quarter to qualify. So basically it’s a 2 1/2 year project, for a $100k transfer. That really diminishes the attractiveness of this SUB.
If you:
– Initiate ACAT of $100k on 3/15/25 to clear by 3/31/25
– Hold through 6 quarterly payments + one additional per terms, ending 12/31/26
– ACAT out 1/1/27+ and assume it clears by 1/15/27.
So if you tie up $100k for 22 months you’ll get $2k bonus issued in quarterly payments (Max $350).
Where’s a better bonus for $100k?
TastyTrade. $2k issued within 2 weeks for $100k transfer. And only need to “tie up” the $100k for 12 months instead of 22 months.
https://www.doctorofcredit.com/tastyworks-brokerage-bonus-fund-with-2000-earn-200-bonus/
Just do both? Tastytrade bonus has been around for several years and will likely be extended. Do the “limited time” bonuses first.
Already did that bonus a few years ago. Unless I’m mistaken (and I’d love to be) you can’t churn it.
Either way Trade Up is a top 5 offer.
TT is lifetime :(. I got $500 back then. I don’t think they had the $2k/$100k at the time or it was a little too rich for me at the time.
Same
If someone can only do one TT is tempting. Having money locked down for almost two years is a long time even if you don’t think you’ll need it, and there’s no assurance TT will have this offer in two years.
I think you still get the $350 payments quarterly until $2000 after maintaining $100k for a year. You just likely need to keep account open.
Yep, $350 x 5 and one $250 payment over 6 quarters.
re $3000 vs $2000 for the bonus for $100k, I was mistaken, it’s just $2,000. Thank you anthonyjh21 for correcting that, and explaining the timeline.
It’s a $2,000 bonus, not a $3,000 bonus. Because the initial 2% on the $100,000 transfer is capped at $1,000 (so really 1% not 2%). I can’t really figure out a scenario where you could earn the 3% that they advertise here… seems deceptive, or at least confusing.
Tradeup are advertising $3000? Or is that just what someone incorrectly surmised?
I want to provide my datapoint. I drew MELI (worth $2K) as one of the free stocks. I took a screenshot of it in my account. Few days later it was replaced with a worthless TELUS stock. When I complained, after some bitching and moaning, they offered me a compromise. They will give me 12 shares of NVDA(one a month for 12 months). A shady company based in Singapore or HongKong, doing its best to be a legitimate brokerage in US. Be careful.
See this thread. They did it to others, too. File a complaint with FINRA, the SEC, and the BBB. https://www.doctorofcredit.com/tradeup-brokerage-1000-2000-bonus-with-50k-100k-transfer/#comment-1957472
Given the amount of DoC commentors saying they got MELI and then had it disappear, I’m thinking there’s a bug in Tradeup’s stock drawing service. Not saying it’s OK to not give the shares.
Just the hit rate for an $1,800 stock seems weirdly high when the odds are 0.20% per their table. Probably why they’re trying to get out of providing it since it was being issued too often. I wonder if some programmer accidentally merged “0.2” vs “0.002”.
https://www.tradeup.com/activity/market/welcome/?lang=en_US#/terms
At time of the original stock draw, meli was worth over 2k and their stock draw table only goes up to $1800 in value. Something weird definitely happened to their back end that gave so many ppl that stock.
Judging by how many ppl got the same stock draws even for the smaller stocks makes it seem like the outcomes were predetermined.
Their site looks like a kid made it and I noticed an error in their fees a few months ago. So, it wouldn’t surprise me if there’s a typo in the code. But, even it was a true glitch, they messed up by not just communicating w the customer. They chose to be sneaky.
Also, despite what their chart says, it’s very possible for more ppl to get more than the odds. Also, we don’t know how many customers participated. I also think that it’s likely that doc probably gave them a lot of new customers. They advertise on SB, so not hard to believe that the same audience reads here. I only saw a few ppl that had this issue. According to the odds, if they got 100k customers, that would be about 200 MELI. Again, we don’t have enough, and they still screwed up by covering it up.
Sharing my dp here. I filed a complaint with finra and trade up gave me back the share of meli. I got to also keep the previous share of Nvidia. I’m very happy with the resolution I was given.
Would you do this one or the TastyTrade one next? Ideally would like to do one this month and then the other 12 months from now, but not sure which of these two is more likely to still be offering this a year from now…
Edit: This one seems more convoluted than TastyTrade for the $100k transfer I’m contemplating. Delays on the bonus payouts and some cautioning that the second $1,000 might not be fully paid out for 2 years. Gonna do TastyTrade now and see if this one is around in a year.
TastyTrade’s new platform is garbage. I’ve reported dozens of high severity defects (“it’s the data, stupid!”), many of which are still broken months later. I’ve been actively looking for a brokerage offer to make my escape. If you’re moving to TT for the bonus and aren’t an active trader, great. But if you need a functional platform for active trading (stocks, options, etc), you may be very very disappointed. I transferred into then in 2022 for their bonus at the time… paid out without issue… and was mostly satisfied with the old trading platform until their 2024 rollout of the new garbage product. YMMV.
I did tastytrade. 2k payout was fast despite no bonus stocks.
Still in the holding period, but I plan to do this one eventually, just do have the liquidity to meet another 100k transfer.
You have to submit a form to do a partial transfer, it was fast and the cost basis shows up just fine. Transferred 100k of VTI ETF.
Tax lots for transferred positions are not visible, but total cost can be seen in statements. In web trading you can see the unrealized P&L.
Trades done with Tradeup are shown by lot.