Webull ACAT Transfer Bonus: 2% of Assets, up to $100,000 Bonus (Extended)

Update August 2024: Offer has been extended to 8/31/24. Previous deadline was 7/31/24. You get 1% to hold through 8/31/25 and another 1% when you hold through 8/31/26.

Original post (with old deadlines):

The Webull brokerage app is offering a 2% ACAT Transfer bonus plus up to $100 in outgoing fee reimbursements if you transfer at least $2,000+. Must transfer by 7/31/24. The minimum hold period is 2 years (must hold past 7/31/26). Nice to see another competitive transfer bonus, hopefully they keep coming.

Transfer your investments to Webull and claim a 2.0% cash bonus, plus up to $100 reimbursement fees for a limited time by July 31, 2024.*

As an existing customer, I was a little concerned by this part of the Terms & Conditions:

Offer Eligibility: This offer (the “Offer”) is open to brokerage customers in good standing of Webull Financial LLC (“Webull”) who receive a push notification through the Webull website or mobile application (collectively, the “Webull Platform”) to participate in this Offer (such customers “Eligible Customers”).

But after logging into my account, I saw the banner under Menu and then “Promotion Center”. After enrolling, it gave me a confirmation message. I am assuming it is also open to new customers, as I can’t imagine they would run this while turning away new customers.

You’ll get half the bonus in a year, and the other half after two years.

Offer Rewards will be paid in installments to the applicable Eligible Customer’s Webull Account in the amounts and on the dates indicated below.
July 31, 2025 50% of Offer Reward amount
July 31, 2026 50% of Offer Reward amount

SIPC insurance limits and excess insurance. WeBull Financial is a member of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC), which steps in if a broker fails. From the WeBull website:

Webull Financial is a member of SIPC, which protects securities customers of its members up to $500,000 ($250,000 of cash). Our clearing firm, Apex Clearing, has purchased an additional insurance policy. The coverage limits provide protection for securities and cash up to an aggregate of $150 million, subject to maximum limits of $37.5 million for any one customer’s securities and $900,000 for any one customer’s cash. Similar to SIPC protection, this additional insurance does not protect against a loss in the market value of securities.

From SIPC.org::

SIPC protects against the loss of cash and securities – such as stocks and bonds – held by a customer at a financially-troubled SIPC-member brokerage firm. The limit of SIPC protection is $500,000, which includes a $250,000 limit for cash.

Is SIPC a U.S. Government Agency?
No. SIPC is not an agency or establishment of the United States Government. SIPC is a non-profit membership corporation created under the Securities Investor Protection Act.

My brokerage firm has excess SIPC insurance. How does that work?
Excess SIPC insurance is insurance provided by a private insurer and not by SIPC. The insurance is intended to protect brokerage customers against the risk that customers will not recover all of their cash and securities in the proceeding under the Securities Investor Protection Act (SIPA). Under many of these policies, customer eligibility for recovery is not determined until after the SIPA liquidation of the customer’s brokerage firm has concluded and the amount of the customer’s recovery in that proceeding has been established.

Please note that if you opt into securities lending with their “Stock Lending Income Program”, SIPC does NOT cover lent-out shares. I personally prefer to keep the SIPC insurance.

In my view, there are a few small risks with this deal. For one, WeBull may experience financial difficulties in the next 2 years. They are covered by SIPC insurance, so I’d rather stay within their limits. For another, there is a chance they will make it hard to pay out the bonus (again, especially if they are in financial stress). Now, they’ve paid out my other bonuses in the past, but I don’t like having to wait a year or longer.

Therefore, while I would not be comfortable with WeBull holding all my assets, I am considering moving ~$100,000 of my stable buy-and-hold stocks for a nice ~$2,000 bonus. You may feel differently, based on your own asset levels and risk tolerance.

As with all similar ACAT transfer offers, you can transfer over your existing stock holdings and the cost basis should also transfer over with no tax consequences. You just keep your same shares of Apple or index ETFs at a different broker. If you want to hold cash, you could also own things like Treasury bill ETFs or ultra-short term bond ETFs and earn interest on top of the bonus. But I think these offers are best for those shares that you plan to keep for a long time anyway.

I’ve done a past 2% offer with the Public app ($2,000 bonus on $100k transferred) and the 3% Robinhood IRA rollover offer ($7,500+ bonus on $250,000+), but the holding period for Public was only 6 months. What I usually do is simply move a specific portion of my assets (like 100 shares of ABC stock) into a separate new Fidelity brokerage account, and then transfer that entire side account over.

Found via Doctor of Credit.