Update: New tiers added with higher bonus values, offer extended. Tastyworks is a discount brokerage targeted at active options traders, as they are cheaper than the big brokers for options trading while also having the full fancy options interface. Right now, they have a up to $25,000 ACAT transfer bonus with promo referral code MYNEWBONUS and you must keep the initial funding there for 12 months.
These ratios are pretty competitive, especially the $2,000 for $100,000 tier (2% of assets), but hey if you have more than that, why not grab more money even at a lower ratio.
New customers who open and fund a tastytrade account with $5,000 or more in cash or by an account transfer (ACATS) and enter MYNEWBONUS into their referral code field when initially registering with tastytrade will receive a cash bonus. The bonus amount is dependent on the initial funding amount. There is a 12-month withdrawal hold on the initial funding amount to retain the cash bonus. You can find each tier’s funding threshold and resulting payout in the table below.
- $100 with $5,000+ in transferred assets or deposits
- $500 with $25,000+ in qualifying new money
- $2,000 with $100,000+ in qualifying new money
- $3,000 with $250,000+ in qualifying new money
- $5,000 with $1,000,000+ in qualifying new money
- $25,000 with $5,000,000+ in qualifying new money
Eligible account types include individual (cash or margin), joint (cash or margin), LLC, Partnerships, S-Corp, C-Corp (cash or margin), and Autotrade enabled accounts. IRAs, trust accounts, and international customers are not eligible. Promotion extended to March 31st, 2024. Note their definitions:
WHEN CAN I WITHDRAW MY AWARDED CASH?
The deposit ($5,000+ cash deposit or account transfer) plus the value of the awarded cash are required to remain in the account for a minimum of 12 months. As mentioned previously, any principal fluctuations due to trading will not preclude you from keeping the awarded position value after 12 months.IF MY ACCOUNT DROPS BELOW THE FUNDING REQUIREMENT, WILL I BECOME INELIGIBLE?
Principal fluctuations due to trading will not affect your eligibility to keep your awarded cash value. As long as you keep your original $5,000+ deposit in your account, then you will be able to keep your awarded cash.WILL I BE PENALIZED IF MY ACCOUNT DROPS BELOW MY FUNDING AMOUNT?
Principal value fluctuations are not considered. As long as the initial $5,000 (or more) remains in the account for 12 months, then the awarded cash value will not be debited from your account.WHAT HAPPENS IF I NEED TO WITHDRAW MY DEPOSIT BEFORE THE 12-MONTH HOLDING PERIOD END?
You are free to withdraw the deposit you made to your account. However, if the amount withdrawn no longer meets the minimum deposit requirements, then the value of the awarded stock position will be withheld from the withdrawal amount.CAN I TRANSFER THE CASH OUT OF MY ACCOUNT?
Not until the 12-month hold period has lapsed.
Brokerage Asset Bonuses vs. Bank Deposit Bonuses. There is an important difference between brokerage asset bonuses and bank deposit bonuses. A bank deposit bonus pays you extra interest for holding a certain amount of cash with them. A brokerage asset bonus allows you to transfer over your existing investments like index funds, individual shares of Apple or Berkshire Hathaway, individual shares of REITs, and so on. You still own the asset and it’s still doing its thing. The brokerage bonus is on top.
In this example, if you really wanted to compare it directly against an interest rate, you should at least assume you will be holding a T-Bill ETF like SGOV, GBIL, or BIL (current SEC yield over 5%) and then adding the bonus to that yield. However, the real benefit for patient, long-term investors that you can just keep your existing assets and earn yourself a nice “self-management fee”.
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Stay away from Tastyworks, they will find a way to make all the money back that they gave you.
I used your website for years but this is a big no no.
Interesting, I’ve already gotten a previous bonus from them and walked away with no issues.
Can you share what the issue was?
So that’s a maximum of 2% bonus (if you’re at the minimum end of those ranges… closer to 0.5% if you’re near the top of a tier) , and you’re locked in for one year. That’s a nice perk if you want to do your options trading with them, but otherwise you’re better off parking the money with SoFi at 2.5% interest, for instance.
this is simply a 2% offer, or less. You can get double that with a one year treasury. However, sadly, they really have little competition because brokerage firms as a general rule offer nothing to hold your savings or have obscene requirements to get a bonus. Mine is held at Ally Savings paying 2.25%, which is not great, and I transfer it to Ally Invest when i feel like getting my head bashed in in the market. The one year commit is troubling as well. Side note is I just saw today that Ally is offering up to a $500 bonus for new money. I have no connection to Ally other than being a long time customer. Oh and the terminology withdrawal hold is troubling as well. it’s my money not theres. Id expect a penalty for withdrawing early. Not a hold. 100K for waving goodbye to my money for a year long hold paying 2% interest is not for me.
There is an important difference between brokerage asset bonuses and bank deposit bonuses. You just transfer over your existing investments like index funds, individual shares of Apple or Berkshire Hathaway, shares of REITs, or or whatever. The brokerage bonus is on top. People get excited when an index fund cuts its expense ratio by 5 basis points. This is 200 basis points!
If you really wanted to compare it against an interest rate, you should assume holding a T-Bill ETF like GBIL or BIL (current SEC yield roughly 2.5%) and then adding 2% to that yield.
You can buy money market funds at brokerages that return more than those advertised rates. Fidelity has SPRXX that has a 7 day yield of 2.9% no minimum. Would be interesting to know if Tastyworks has something like that.
The link for the offer says the amount has to be deposited, there’s nothing on the offer page about an ACAT qualifying? “The Promotion is available to (1) all approved new customers (as determined by Tax ID) who fund their tastyworks account with $5,000 USD or more, and (2) existing customers who have never funded any tastyworks account prior to the start of the Promotional Period, and who fund their existing brokerage account with $5,000 USD or more (each, a “Qualified Account”).”
Ah, thank you, now I see the source of confusion. I fixed the link to include the FAQ which clearly includes ACAT transfer amount as counting. I didn’t notice the nicer landing page didn’t include acat transfers. This is their official terms and FAQ:
https://support.tastyworks.com/support/solutions/articles/43000678965-tiered-opening-promotion-2022
Jonathan, as far as I can tell whoever had an account with them before is not eligible to be a ‘new customer’: The Promotion is available to (1) all approved new customers (as determined by Tax ID) who fund their tastyworks account with $5,000 USD or more…
I got the $500 back in 2020 and closed my account this year.
Do you agree with my reading of their offer?
I’m not sure how far they look back, but I would probably agree that if you are a recent customer then they won’t give you the bonus.
“AM I ELIGIBLE FOR THE TIERED OFFER IF I AM ALREADY AN EXISTING TASTYWORKS CUSTOMER?
The tiered offer is only open to new tastyworks customers. Unfortunately, if you already have an open and funded tastyworks trading account, regardless of account type, then you are not eligible for this promotion. “
Are these guys ok for buying/holding Treasuries? I know I could do SGOV but ideally prefer being able to pick second-hand Treasuries.
Overall looks like a pretty good promo. $100K looks like a nice 2% addition to no-risk investment.
Does this brokerage have any inactivity fees? I am planning to do an ACAT transfer and then leave it there for an year or more without doing any actual trading. Also, someone mentioned that they will find ways to take all the money they give as bonus. Anyone knows anything about it?