Update 3/17/24: Starting May 15, a $3 monthly platform fee will apply to clients with less than $10,000 in M1 assets or without an active Personal Loan. Each billing cycle will last 30 days—meeting platform requirements* at least one day during each cycle will ensure this fee is waived for you. Hat tip to reader Davis
Update 12/15/23: Referral bonus now $250, but requires a $10,000 deposit. Hat tip to ShawntheShawn (No referrals in the comments below)
Update 8/15/23: $15k tier is back, added below
[Below is a guest post from reader A M.]
M1 Finance Introduction
M1 Finance is an investing service with a unique approach: fractional share investing of a “pie” of stocks and/or ETFs (funds consisting of many stocks, like ticker VGT) of your choosing, for no fee. Think of it as making your very own ETF in a way, with no expense ratio (except if you add actual ETFs to it, which have their own expense ratios). M1 has been around for at least a year, and has a fairly active subreddit and a thorough help section with detailed articles on all of the things I will cover below. I’ll then explain the $100-$2,500 brokerage transfer bonus and the current $20 referral bonus for January 2020.
First, the pie. Your entire portfolio is considered your “pie.” When you set up your “pie,” you can break it up into “slices,” each of which you can allocate from taking up 1% all the way to 100% of total dollar value of your pie (you can have a maximum of 100 slices, then, and minimum of just 1). Each slice can be a stock or an ETF, and basically every stock and almost every ETF is available at the same expense ratio as you would find anywhere else (no additional fees from M1 finance). As a neat little feature, your slices can themselves be “pies” with those smaller pies having slices of their own. For instance: Your portfolio pie contains two “slices” that are actually pies called “CAR STOCKS” and “TECH STOCKS.” The “CAR STOCKS” slice can contain TSLA as well as, say, KARS, which is an ETF. Your “TECH STOCKS” one can also have any number of slices with either ETFs or stocks within it, allocated from 1% all the way up to 100%.
Importantly, your “pie” represents your target portfolio. When you schedule an investment into your pie, you invest into your “pie” as it’s set up by you at that very moment. You can change the pie and all of the slices within it at any time — this would mean you are just changing the target allocation of all the slices. It does NOT mean that you’d instantly be selling off any stocks — this only happens when you choose to “rebalance” one of your pies and both sell and buy to get all of the slices at your target allocations. If you increase the target allocation of TSLA, M1 will of course buy TSLA in the allocation you set for it. And, of course, if the value of TSLA rises and it consists of less of your pie than the target percent, M1 will buy more of it for you to bring it up to the target allocation. M1 shows via color-coded and differently sized slices what both your target pie and your current allocations look like in both the app and the website, both of which have essentially the same functionality.
The rest of the app is pretty straightforward as a sort of mix between a robo-advisor that can autoinvest for you during one set trading window daily at 9 AM and a Robinhood type pick and choose stocks and ETFs app. Poke around and it’s pretty easy to pick up how it all works. One note: If you intend to use a pie you make pie as a “slice” in your portfolio, then you make that pie beforehand in the “Research” tab under “My Pies” and then add it to your actual pie as a slice under the “Invest” tab.
For the help section with detailed articles, see: https://support.m1finance.com/hc/en-us. The subreddit is r/m1finance. Also see the full fee schedule here, notably a $50 fee for accounts with less than $50 in them which go inactive for 90 days.
Brokerage Bonus
Direct Link to offer | Another link
- $100,000 – $249,999 for $250 bonus
- $250,000 – $499,999 for $1,000 bonus
- $500,000 – $999,999 for $2,000 bonus
- $1,000,000 – $1,999,999 for $4,000 bonus
- $2,000,000 – $5,000,000 for $10,000 bonus
- $5,000,000 and higher for $15,000 bonus
Note, there is a $100 fee to transfer out your funds.
Referral Bonus
Referral bonus is now $100 for each party. Basic steps from the website for opening with referral:
- Create an account using your friend’s unique referral link
- Fund your account with $5,000 within 30 calendar days of signing up
- Get $100 each in 7-14 business days
Post History
- Update 6/29/23: Bonus extended through 9/30/23. They’ve removed the $15k tier; all other tiers up to $10,000 remain. New Direct Link (There’s also a similar promo for rollover retirement plans – Direct Link)
- Update 5/6/23: They’ve added bonus tiers of up to $15,000 now. They’ve also sweetened some of the tier bonuses. Bonuses are valid through June 17, 2023. I believe everything in the post below is now up to date, please let me know if you see anything that needs fixing.
- Update 1/8/23: Referral bonus is now $100.
- Update 4/10/22: Referral bonus is now $10 instead of $50.
- Update 1/5/22: Updated the brokerage bonus tiers, notably the $500 might for $50k might be interesting to some.
The $50/$50 referral bonus is still going as well,no referrals in the comments below, go here instead. (hat tip to reader Avi) - Update 11/7/21: Referral bonus back up to $50 now.
- Update 9/8/21: Referral bonus is now $30
- Update 7/8/21: Referral bonus is now $50 for each party (link). You can also leave and find referral links on this dedicated page by following the rules outlined there. Hat tip to reader Peek
- Update 1/6/21: They changed the brokerage bonus tiers, and also added a higher
$3,500$4,375 tier. Updated below. Bonus seems to be available in some cases to existing customers who transfer over new assets as well. Also referral bonus increased to $30/$30 through 2/28/21. (ht reader Xatos) - Update 10/7/20: Brokerage bonuses have been increased by 25% (up to $3,250) for October. Hat tip to reader SamL
- Update 9/1/20: Referral bonus back up to $20.
- Update 5/1/20: Offer is back for the month of May. Though the referral bonus is down to $10 for each the referrer and the new customer (down from $20 in January).
Final Thoughts
Thanks to reader A M for submitting this guest post. We’ll add this to our list of brokerage bonuses. Feel free to comment below with your thoughts on M1 Finance. You can also leave and find referral links on this dedicated page by following the rules outlined there.
I was reading over the fee announcement email and there seems to be two conflicting statements in how to avoid the fee:
“Starting May 15, a $3 monthly platform fee will apply to clients with less than $10,000 in M1 assets or without an active Personal Loan. Each billing cycle will last 30 days—meeting platform requirements* at least one day during each cycle will ensure this fee is waived for you.”
–this looks like if you have $10k in assets for at least ONE day in the billing cycle the fee is waived
In the fine print: *You will be charged the $3 Monthly Platform Fee if at any point during the 30 days prior to program launch your total aggregate M1 Earn and Invest balances do not equal or exceed $10,000 or you do not have an active M1 Personal Loan.
-this looks like if you DO NOT have $10k in assets EVERY DAY for at least 30 days before the program launch you will be charged $3
Is this confusing anyone else or am I not reading this right?
Regarding the new promotion tiers on their website, I’m interested in the $250 for $50k tier. What is not clear is how long the funds must remain in the account. The terms state that the deposit must be made within 14 days and that the bonus is deposited after 6 months, but it does not state if the funds must be kept in the account the entire time. Does anyone know?
Link: https://m1.com/new-customer-deposit-1/
The total aggregate Deposited Value1 made to an M1 taxable investment account within the first fourteen (14) calendar days of New User Sign-up Date must remain equal to, or greater than, the value after the net deposit was made (minus any losses due to trading, market volatility or margin debit balances) until the Pay-out Date. Reallocation of any funds transferred externally, or internally to any other M1 services (e.g., M1 Spend), prior to the Pay-out Date will disqualify you from this Promotion. M1 reserves the right to revoke the Promotional Credit2 cash deposit if the total aggregate transferred Deposited Value1 is not retained in your M1 taxable investment account until the Pay-out Date. Pluv
Got it, thanks
Do NOT use the new platform as they keep changing the rules and fees.
I don’t think it’s anything new, same platform they are just changing the fee structure. I hate the change but with the fees to get out I’ll be staying with them until I have enough assets to get Fidelity to forgive the fee. I do like their platform but I have doubts it will survive this change.
Looking for someone’s email of M1 who opened the account before Jan 31 2024, when the bonus was $250. If you can send me your account email to gosocks5bcejz.at.gmail.com it will benefit both of us, remember, it has to be opened before Jan 2024
I used someone’s referral link on the old thread (don’t remember which one) for the $250 bonus back in early February when it was still valid. I met the requirements, but didn’t have the bonus post so I followed up and now they’re asking for the email of the referrer to approve it. Since they’re manually crediting the $250 to both me and the referrer, I’m assuming it doesn’t matter who’s email I put down, only that they have a currently open M1 account associated with it. I opened a burner email at m1referralissues (at) maildrop.cc so if someone can provide me a valid email, I’m betting there’s a free $250 in it for both of us. Figure I should ask ASAP since I’m guessing a lot of people will be closing their M1 accounts now that they going to start charging a fee.
Paul W. Did this end up working for you?
I got referred in discord and the dude won’t answer lol.
Not sure about Paul, but it worked with another user here.
So prepping for May-01… How’s the closing go? Can it be done over chat? How long do trades take to settle before withdrawing?
Cue the outrage at the $3 monthly fee but I think this a brilliant move on their part to weed out the cheapskates (like myself) that only want the account for lucrative referrals.
Outrage is a bit strong, but I am peeved bc I thought I had M+ until September. They could have at least honored it rather than instituting a blanket fee for everyone. Will be closing as well.
I have a nephew with probably $800 invested with M1 who never got a sign-up or referral bonus. He’s going to get hit pretty hard by this $36/year fee. ACATing his investments out would cost $100. So basically he has to liquidate his investments and move elsewhere. Pretty sour deal.
That’s definitely a sour deal. Sometimes other brokerages will cover the transfer fee.
My other brokerage was willing to reimburse me but I couldn’t find any proof of M1 charging the fee. Not sure if they just didn’t charge it but it isn’t in any of my statements.
You taking about the transfer fee? Or the monthly. The monthly fee kicks in in May. The transfer fees are outlined here: https://help.m1.com/hc/en-us/articles/7987205422867-How-to-transfer-accounts-out-of-M1#:~:text=There%20is%20a%20%24100%20outgoing,incur%20a%20fee%20of%20%24100.
Mmm thats a long gamble. I feel they may find out most of their user base are cheapskates (also like myself)… and most folks with plans on keeping $10k+ in a brokerage are going to be at Fidelity or Schwab. And although I do really like their app/web interface, not worth $3/mo, and not enticing/established enough to keep $10k with them or open a retirement account.
I hope they don’t crater too bad though.
And here comes the fee creep, first zero fees, then $3 per month, then……
Got an email that my 0$ balance account will start getting 3$ monthly fee 🫡, sayonara, just sent a request to close it.
Do we need to close the entire account including the login page or just the investment account?
I don’t believe you can close your entire M1 login/profile, only the investment account itself but that should be enough to avoid the fees.
Pretty sure they don’t allow accounts to go into the negative, but maybe that’s another amazing change they have planned.
As moth man said, investment is fine, I didn’t find an option to entirely close the account itself, just the investment accounts, it does says “close all your accounts” on the option to close, they can’t come up with a fee after that.
How they going to pull $3 from you when the account is zero?
Ummm… Most banks don’t have a problem with it. Brokerages… Ummm… Not so sure.
They could make my account go negative? I’m not about to find out lol, rather play it safe and just close it , I’m not gonna use it anyways so no real reason to risk it, like, they literally sent me an email telling me “they will start charging me 3$ a month”
There seems to be two options to avoid to new $3 monthly fee starting May 15:
Robinhood would reimburse up to $75 for transferring at least $7,500, but that’s not enough to cover the fees entirely and I don’t know if Robinhood would issue 1000-MISC for that. I might have to add funds to M1. It just does feel good to have 10k tied to them until I can withdraw from my IRA.
so, the $200 IRA closure & transfer fee equals 5.5 years of M1 annual fees. What’s the probability M1 shuts down (or sold) earlier, and customer accounts will get transferred somewhere anyway?
One strategy to avoid at least the $100 transfer fee is to sell the assets (consider any tax-related issues for taxable accounts) and withdraw all cash via a connected bank account. Any retirement funds can be then re-deposited to a different IRA account within 60 days to avoid penalties, taxes, etc. This could work for smaller and accounts with less diverse holdings.