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While they both have green logos, they’re quite different platforms.
Robinhood is the young incumbent and TD Ameritrade is a name that has been around for decades.
But you can’t simply write off TD Ameritrade as a giant investor stuck in the past.
We’ll see that they actually were on the cutting edge of phone and internet trading back in the day.
But have they done enough to keep up with young and hungry investing platforms, like Robinhood?
Meanwhile, Robinhood’s flashy colors and simple UX make it seem like something that you want to be a part of.
But can you even make money on it?
What is Microinvesting?
Once upon a time, investing was something that rich people did after they had paid off their house and fully funded their emergency fund.
Nowadays, millenials and younger generations want to make investing a part of their financial experience earlier in life.
Companies like Robinhood have seen the opportunity to capture a younger audience who expects financial solutions to work on their phone and on the internet with ease.
Swooping underneath older investment platforms, Robinhood quickly grabbed 10M+ users.
But Robinhood and other startup financial solutions rely on more than just cool graphics and catchy logos.
They rely on microinvesting, the concept that you can join the wheel of the stock market with only the price of lunch.
Instead of sinking thousands into a mutual fund, you can actually bet on stocks that you like and be a part of companies that you love, with only $5.
Not to be outdone, many giants in the industry, like TD Ameritrade, are making changes to keep up with the new trends.
They are looking to capture a younger audience and go head to head with companies like Robinhood for the pockets of the younger generations.
Robinhood’s Story
Robinhood started when a couple of Stanford roommates, Vlad and Baiju, moved to New York and made a life building software companies that helped larger firms hedge their stock funds.
During this experience they started to realize that the average American can be charged around $10 for each stock trade that they make.
Meanwhile, bigger firms and richer people pay almost nothing to make individual stock trades.
Hence, Robinhood the company.
While Robinhood doesn’t exactly steal from the rich to give to the poor, it certainly attempts to level the stock market playing field and make it more accessible to the average investor.
Robinhood set out to build products that would help other people trade on the market.
Robinhood knew that to get a younger audience to flock to its solutions, they would have to build something that was simple, elegant, and beautiful.
So they designed an app and a website that guide people through the process of signing up and trading with a confident simplicity.
Signing up and beginning to participate in Robinhood is fast, and keeps your attention the whole time.
Robinhood: Account Minimum
Robinhood account minimums are set at $0.
Yes, one of the things that is really important for Robinhood is access.
So they want you to be able to sign up and get on the app even if you’re not going to spend any money on the service right away.
This free-to-play service has allowed Robinhood to accumulate a larger younger audience.
Anybody can download the app and play around with the system.
While there are no commissions taken out by Robinhood during the trading process, you still pay a standard regulator fee.
These fees come on all trades and are not something that Robinhood is charging in excess of the normal regulator fee.
When ready, people can then easily add money to the system and start trading.
If you set up a margin account with Robinhood—a type of account that basically allows you to trade with borrowed money—then you’ll have to pay interest on the margin that you’re borrowing on, so this is an additional fee.
While there are no minimums, the only type of account that Robinhood offers is a simple taxable non-retirement account, which means you aren’t going to be able to grab the tax-advantages of the IRA with this one.
The $0 minimum is carefully calculated to get you onto the platform without requiring you to buy in right away.
That means that you can fully sign up and get set up without paying any money!
If you don’t like the platform, you can walk away from it.
If you like it, you can easily add money to invest.
How Do I Get up to $1,700 in FREE STOCK with Robinhood?
To open a Robinhood account, all you need is your name, address, and email. To get your free stock you will need to fund your account with at least $10 within a few days of opening so you will also need your bank account routing and account number.
As its current promotion, Robinhood will immediately give you FREE MONEY (between $5 and $200) to invest in a set list of stocks when you open a new account. You will be given your unique referral link. You will receive more free money (again valued at $5 to $200) for each person you refer. The more people you refer, the more you get up to a max of $1,500 a year. To learn more, visit Robinhood's free stock promo page below.
Why do they give away so much free stock? Because they spend their advertising dollars this way instead of buying TV, radio, print, or online ads! They WANT you to refer friends!