The Tradeking promotion that runs through the end of the month reminded me of a conversation I had with a co-worker last Spring about online brokerage accounts. She’s from a different generation and doesn’t feel comfortable opening a stock trading account on the Internet.

Her son suggested she open her own account but she had the whole process built up in her mind to be too complex for her to ever understand. I told her I’d put together an overview of the account opening process to show her that’s it’s really not that complicated.

I went through in the Spring and took screen captures of opening a TradeKing account but then we had a baby so I’ve been a little distracted since then. Anyhow, here is a visual walkthrough of opening an account and the 10 main questions you have to answer to complete to an application for their online brokerage account.

1. What’s Your Basic Info?





2. What Will Be Your Secure Code?









3. Which Type of Account?









4. Who Are You?









5. Where Do You Work?









6. How Much Money Do You Have & What is Your Trading Experience?









7. Do You Have a TradeKing Promotional Code & What Are Your Affiliations?









8. What Are Your Investment Goals?









9. Do You Agree To Follow the Rules?











10. Give Your Electronic Signature









11. TradeKing Application Complete!

Of course, opening an account’s not so bad; it’s actually the easy part. Setting your investing strategy & buying and selling stocks is where the uncertainty comes in. To open a TradeKing account, click here.

The TradeKing promotion has been extended through the end of this month. For some reason, TradeKing likes to run thier promotions in the fall of each year.  Last October Tradeking ran a $50 bonus promotion and despite the turmoil of the stock market had a lot of people sign up to try out their online brokerage.

This year the market has a lot more positive momentum than it did last fall and some of the people that were sitting on the sidelines are getting back in.  TradeKing is offering a $50 bonus if you open a new account and try out their stock trading platform.  You can read more about pros and cons of the online brokerage in this TradeKing review.

I had forgotten that they extended the promotion by a month last year until I recently got an email from TradeKing announcing they were pushing the deadline out a month.  They didn’t push it any further last year so if that’s any indication then this month will likely be the last chance for the bonus in 2009.

There is no TradeKing promo code necessary simply signup here and you get your $50 bonus after you fund your account with at least $2,500 and make your first trade.