Juicing Your Brokerage Returns: Get a Head Start with Free Money!
TL;DR: With free commissions everywhere, brokerage bonuses could become the tie-breaker. IBKR is one to consider.
With so many brokerage firms out there, it could be a daunting task to choose where to begin your investing journey. When you choose, here are some important factors to consider:
- Brokerage bonuses!
- Commissions + Fees assessed when trading
- Price Improvement
- Customer service quality
- SIPC Insurance
- Investment products offered
- Margin/stock lending capabilities
For the most part most big brokerage firms (like Schwab, Fidelity, IBKR, etc) will offer pretty competitive points on all of these, and honestly there’s not a huge difference. As a rule of thumb smaller firms you’ll need to check on all these points to compare. If anybody at this point is charging commission for stock trading, run (everybody has $0 stock trading commissions now).
However, currently IBKR is offering one of the best brokerage bonuses out there at $1 in IBKR stock for every $100 you deposit, up to $1000. You can confirm for yourself that this is one of the best by Googling – a lot of people have placed lists of current brokerage bonuses. If you’re trying to choose one to start with, this is not a bad choice right now.
Happy Investing!
TheJKW