hey guys it's a month and Christina from
Aries journey in this video we are going
to show you how to open a brokerage
account we get this question a lot
because sometimes people don't even know
where to begin what platform to use or
what they need to do in order to start
investing in stocks so in this video
we're going to show you exactly what you
need to do in less than 10 minutes we're
gonna walk you through step by step the
four steps that you need to take to open
a brokerage account and we're going to
show you online as we do it so the first
thing you want to do is decide where you
want to invest really what brokerage
firm you want to use to buy your
investments so there are three that we
like and we and we actually use all
three of these Vanguard Charles Schwab
and fidelity and so on today's video we
are gonna walk you step-by-step on how
to open a fidelity account now we're not
getting any form of commission through
this and like we said you should really
choose the account that works best for
you but fidelity works basically the
same as Schwab and Vanguard so we're
just gonna walk through fidelity and you
can apply the same things that you
learned from this video with Schwab and
Vanguard also now we actually plan on
doing a video in the future on the
differences between the three but I can
tell you on the surface there aren't a
lot of differences I mean it really
comes down to preference at a certain
point because what we like to focus on
are the fees when it comes to investing
and all three of these firms have really
low fees when it comes to buying index
funds so this is gonna be a very easy
and quick process let's stop messing
around let's get to work let's stop
sitting on our hands let's start
investing so let's go ahead and get
started the first thing you want to do
is go to fidelity's website and once you
get there you'll see an option to open
an account so click on that once you
click on an open an account you're gonna
have two different categories retirement
IRAs and investing in savings we're
gonna focus on investing in savings
accounts so you're gonna want to click
on brokerage account after that you'll
be given an option to open up an
individual or a joint account pick
whatever suits you best in this example
we're gonna open an individual account
when you get to this screen
fidelity is going to ask you if you're
an existing customer click no and then
begin to fill out your personal
information your name your email address
and then click get started
on the next screen you're gonna fill out
more personal information including your
name social security number date of
birth whether or not you're US citizen
your phone number and your email address
again you'll also be required to fill
out your legal or residential address so
fill out your address city state zip
code and whether or not that's your
mailing address there's a survey
question at the bottom of the form that
asks you trades per year you don't have
to worry about filling this out just
click Next then fidelity is going to ask
you some questions to verify your
identity
you'll be given three questions each
question is particularly you but they'll
ask questions related to maybe street
addresses you've lived on specific
individuals that you're related to or
other identifying information that
really only you would know after you do
the identity verification it's going to
ask you for your employment information
you can fill this out quickly and click
Next
once you indicate your employment status
it will ask for more specific
information about your employer so just
fill that out there's also a question at
the bottom that asks your association to
the investment industry if you don't
have any association with the investment
community you can click no and no so
next you want to indicate your email
preferences
first whether or not you want to receive
financial documents electronically and
then next whether you want to subscribe
to the fidelity viewpoints so once
you've done all that you're gonna get a
final screen that says review and
confirm and you are almost there you are
almost at opening an account the next
thing you'll see are a bunch of PDF
documents related to terms and
agreements with your fidelity account
you want to make sure you read through
those documents and click that you agree
assuming that you agree and then after
that you click on open your account so
at this point your account is ready to
go fidelity is going to ask you to set
up a username and password but once
you've done that you can go into your
account and start looking at index funds
stocks bonds CDs whatever you want to do
because this is a new account because
you're just starting with investments we
recommend that you invest in index funds
so let's go ahead and go back to
fidelity and find out the index fund
that we recommend now again we are not
financial advisors but this is just our
recommendation for getting started with
your investments we like to recommend
picking a broad-based index fund the
tracks the total
market or the sp500 so now that your
account is open you're gonna have to put
some money in it or as they like to say
fund the account and you can do that in
a number of different ways one option is
with an electronic transfer or EFT you
can do a wire transfer you can actually
send in a check or if you have an
account somewhere else you can transfer
assets to fidelity let's assume you're
doing an electronic transfer we funded
this particular account with an
electronic funds transfer and we use ten
dollars you can get started with as
little as ten dollars and we've even
done a video on how you can become a
millionaire by investing ten dollars a
day so let's do the next step of
choosing the index fund okay this is so
exciting because ten minutes ago we
weren't investing ten minutes later we
are getting rich okay we're not getting
rich but we are starting to build wealth
with just the ten dollars so on fidelity
site you're gonna want to go to news and
research find mutual funds and we're
gonna do a search for mutual funds so
you might have heard the term mutual
fund and index fund well an index fund
is a mutual fund
it's just that an index fund tracks a
certain segment of the market
whereas a mutual fund is managed by a
mutual fund manager usually with mutual
funds the manager can pick and decide
which stocks and bonds to have in that
fund but with an index fund it is very
straightforward it just tracks the total
group of stocks or bonds so here we're
gonna look for a mutual fund that has an
asset class of a u.s. equity its
fidelity funds only and that there's no
transaction fee so under these criteria
you're gonna see 13 different matching
funds we're gonna select the first one
the fidelity 500 index fund so whenever
you click on a fund you'll get what's
known as the account or the fun snapshot
the snapshot contains all the details
for the fund it talks about its overall
rating its returns its performance it
also identifies what makes up the fund
and most importantly when you're looking
at index funds it also identifies the
expense ratio now the expense ratio is
basically how much it costs to own the
fun
this is basically the percentage of your
investment that you're charged by the
brokerage firm in order to own that fund
they use that money to operate and
maintain the index fund for this fund
you'll see the expense ratio is point
zero one five percent by industry
standards that is super cheap
in fact that's cheaper than vanguards
expense ratio now these are current day
expense ratios so if you look at
Vanguard and Schwab in fidelity you'll
find that these three brokerage firms
typically compete against each other to
offer the best expense ratios so you
should be checking between these
brokerage firms to find the best expense
expense ratio that fits your needs what
we like to focus on when we're looking
at mutual funds are index funds is the
top ten holdings this is what makes up a
large percentage of the actual mutual
fund if you look at the top ten holdings
for this particular mutual fund you'll
see that it's made up of Microsoft Apple
Amazon Berkshire Hathaway those types of
companies very large companies now there
are other funds that track the specific
sectors so you may be able to buy a fund
that tracks the technology sector and so
all of the companies that are in that
fund will be tech companies or you have
a fund that tracks real estate holdings
or REITs so all of the companies in that
index fund will all be real estate type
companies so once you understand the
index fund you can buy it and so you
basically click buy and at that point
fidelity will ask you how much money you
want to invest and where that money will
be coming from in this case we want to
invest $10 into our mutual fund so
that's it you purchase your first
investment it took us 10 minutes to open
this account and to fund this account
and just like that we're investing we're
building wealth now we did this video
because we really wanted to show you how
easy it is to get started and investing
in stocks and specifically how you can
get started in investing in index funds
or mutual funds I think this is a really
simple process but not everyone knows
how to do it so now that you know how to
do it you can begin taking action our
channel is all about taking action
making moves so that you can begin
saving money investing money and
making money so if you liked this video
give us a thumbs up subscribe to our
channel and join the journey