TradeKing $50 bonus for new accounts runs through the end of this month. Online stock brokerage TradeKing is running this promotion for new customers that open a TradeKing account before the end of the month. You’ll get your $50 bonus after you make your first trade.

If you’re already a customer be sure to watch for the refer a friend TradeKing promotion because it’s pretty slick.  You can login to your account and recommend TradeKing to a friend or family member, if they like it and sign up then you both get a bonus.

TradeKing Promotions

Typically they pay you $50 for each referral but during the promotion they give both you and the person you refer $100.  In order to qualify for the TradeKing promotion they have to fund their account and make a trade. 

When I first opened my TradeKing account I didn’t fund it right away, and they sent out an email letting me know about their funding options of ACH, wire transfer, check, and account transfer from another broker.  So if your friends are busy and forget to add money they’ll probably get a reminder email from TradeKing.

In the past, we’ve seen the most TradeKing promotions in the Spring and the Fall so are probably your best chances to take advantage of the sign-up bonus.

TradeKing Service

TradeKing was picked as the best discount online broker by Smart Money magazine for two years in a row (2006 – 2007) and as the best in customer service in 2008. TradeKing also scored well in Barron’s in 2008, earning a 4-star rating and beating brokerages such as E-Trade, TD Ameritrade, and Charles Schwab.

It’s good to see they’re consistent with their emphasis on serving investors, they were named the top online brokerage for customer service in 2010.  Kiplinger’s also featured TradeKing as one of the best online brokers for 2011.  

If you’re curious about what makes TradKing so popular with online stock traders, I did some research and listed below some of the reasons I found that TradeKing gets such high marks:

• Low Trading Costs
  • Smart Order Routing excecutes each trade at best price
  • No extra charge for broker assisted trades
  • Reimburse your commission if they don’t get you best available price
• Educational Resources
  • Webinars
  • Video tutorials
  • Podcasts
• Trading Community
  • Online community of stock traders
• Tools
  • Tax Manager
  • Technical Analysis
  • Detailed research reports
  • Streaming quotes
• Options Trading
  • Option trading strategies (multi-leg chain, strike price, & spread)

TradeKing Education

The cool thing about the educational content at TradeKing is that it’s free and open to all investors, not just members.  They cover the topics you’d expect – stocks, options, ETFs, bonds and mutual funds but you can also tailor the information you’re reading based on your skill and experience investing.  So new investors won’t be tripped up by more advanced topics – and experienced traders can read about higher level strategies for stocks and options without having to wade through introductory info they already know.

Something they’re really proud of, that I haven’t made much use of, is their Trader Network – kind of a social network for investors where you can share experiences, ideas and strategies.  I can say that their webinars are really useful.  They have to read through some mandated disclaimers at the beginning of each webinar but once you get past that first minute or two they cover some pretty useful topics.

TradeKing Mobile

The TradeKing BlackBerry app was a big hit for some of the members.  If you’re like me and don’t have a Blackberry this didn’t do you much good but a while back they did come out with a TradeKing iPhone and iPod touch app.

If you’re not in front of a computer all day like I am then I guess these apps can come in handy. The iPhone app let’s you see your balances & holdings, place orders, and make stock & option trades.  It also has news features where you can read market commentary and news and see quotes and charts.

Both the BlackBerry mobile application and the iPhone version are free, there are no minimum balances or trading activity levels required to use them.

TradeKing Bonus

Back to the sign-up offer. It doesn’t sound as though you’ll be able to get the $50 bonus directly through the TradeKing site. There is no promotion code that I’m aware of, you’ll need to sign up using this link through the end of this month and make a trade to get your $50.

ShareBuilder bonus of $50 for opening a new account and making a trade by the end of next month.  You can setup your ShareBuilder account to make periodic automatic investments for only $4 per trade so the $50 should cover you for a while. (Updated August 2011)

ShareBuilder is offering this bonus for new customers, this promotion is double the previous $25 ShareBuilder offer from last month so it’s a pretty good deal.  Your $50 bonus will be deposited after you make your first trade. 

Investing with ShareBuilder

ShareBuilder is setup to allow you to make regular, small investments into the market without spending a fortune on trading fees.  Since there are no account minimums it’s easy to get started investing right away, even if it’s only a little bit of money.

One nice thing about the service is that although it’s setup to invest a fixed amount regularly, if you find yourself needing the money that month you can cancel that one investment.  Obviously, if you cancel it every month then you’re defeating the purpose of automatic investing but if you have a tight month here and there it’s easy to hold that money back to help pay bills.

The cool thing about ShareBuilder is that on the months when you do invest money, you’re not required to have enough to buy a whole share of stock.  For example, let’s say you put $50 into your ShareBuilder account each month.  If you’re setup to invest in some of the best dividend stocks, like IBM or Chevron, the stock price may be over $100.  Even though you only put in $50, ShareBuilder will allow you to buy partial shares of the stock. 

The nice thing about this approach is that you’re not waiting around to buy shares until you have enough money.  If you’re a fan of dollar cost averaging, you know the principle is that you invest regularly into a stock, mutual fund, or ETF rather than trying to time the market and buy on stock swings.  Since you can regularly put the same amount of money into your account, you’re taking advantage of that concept

ShareBuilder Fees

As I mentioned above, automatic investing is really the sweet spot of ShareBuilder and it helps to keep your fees low, just $4 a trade.  If you want to use the service to occassionally buy and sell stocks outside of your regular investments you can but you’ll pay more for the trade.

If you find yourself regularly buying stocks in addition to your automatic investments if wouldn’t hurt to check out their Advantage plan.  The monthly fee is higher but each additional trade you add over your 12 scheduled investments is only $1 a trade.  It also gives you a cheaper rate for any real-time buying or selling of stocks.

Another nice thing about the Advantage plan is that they offer a two month ShareBuilder free trial when you signup.  So you can use the service and see how you like it before committing to a monthly fee.  Based on other deals from online brokers and services, a two month trial is pretty good.  Most times you’ll get a week, maybe two to try it out for free.  Having two months free gives you enough time to get a feel for ShareBuilder Advantage and see how you like it.

ShareBuilder Bonus

If don’t know if you can get a bonus when you signup for the free trial, you’ll have to check during the signup process.  When you signup for ShareBuilder, if you can, include your promo code so that you’ll be eligbile for the new customer bonus.  If you see the coupon code option as shown below, make sure you enter your promotion code:

Click here and enter promotion code 25WO10 to qualify for your ShareBuilder bonus.

Wall Street Journal free trial and $20 savings promotion gives you free access to the online version of the Journal for two weeks and saves you $20 if you decide to subscribe to the business and financial website.

Published by Dow Jones, the Wall Street Journal covers real estate, personal finance topics, small business issues, financial news, and stock market data on a daily basis.  As the world’s leading business publication, the Wall Street Journal gives you so much financial detail that you’ll honestly have a hard time reading and absorbing it all at once.

The nice thing about the online edition of the Wall Street Journal is that its easy to browse and search for the topics that matter most to your money; plus the WSJ online is available for you on the Web at whatever time is best for you. 

As part of their current deal, you can try out the Journal free for two weeks and keep up on market data and business news at no cost while you try it out.

Wall Street Journal Free Access

There are actually some parts of the WSJ site you can access for free just by registering on the site.  All you need is your name and email address to create your free account.

Once you enter in your info you’re taken to a thank you page and sent a confirmation email. You’ll see something like the links off to the left that list out the things available to you as a free subscriber.

You won’t be able to access them quite yet, you have to finish the confirmation process by checking your email. After clicking the email link you’re taken to the last step of registration where you enter the password you just setup to complete the verification process.

You still won’t be able to access all the premium articles, you’ll know which ones they are because you’ll be able to read the first few paragraphs and then there’ll be a link to subscribe to keep reading.

Wall Street Journal Free Trial

The free trial offer’s nice because it lets you see how much you’d actually read the WSJ before having to pay for it.  For example, we were visiting a friend in Palo Alto last month who had signed up for the free trial but was skeptical he’d find time to read it between his busy job, long commute, and new baby.  But once he signed up for the trial he discovered he could read it on his iPad while he ate breakfast.

The way the WSJ has it setup, you can signup for the print version, the online version, or both.  If you’re a lready a print customer then you get a price break when you signup for the online version.  Of course, how you prefer to read it is up to you. 

I’m not a big fan of leafing through papers, I’d rather read it online or on the iPad.  But I have another friend who always sits down with the paper version of the WSJ every morning on the train into work and hardly ever reads it online.

What would be really cool for us commuters is if they could digitize their articles and make them available as podcasts or on iTunes so we could listen to them on our drive into work.  (Update) It looks like the WSJ online has a podcasts page where you can download daily updates.  It’s not the premium articles but it is a nice daily overview of money and markets.

WSJ Trial Offer

So, with their online promotion, if you review the Wall Street Journal and decide it’s worth your money you’ll get it for $20 off the subscription price.  There are no promotion codes for this offer, simply click here to signup for the free trial and savings.