We know that timely money movement is important, especially when unexpected emergencies come up. The exact timing of when your cash will arrive in your bank account depends on what you're doing:
Moving money to your Stockpile account
It usually takes 3 to 5 business days as long as you initiate your transfer before your bank's cut off time.
If you're moving more than $10,000, it will take an extra business day because the government requires us to vet larger transactions.
Moving money to your bank
It will take between 3 and 5 business days if you initiate your transfer before 3 pm ET and as long as the money is already in cash.
Recently deposited funds must remain in your account through the "good funds" holding period, eight business days, before they can be transferred back to your bank.
This depends on the bank or credit union and unfortunately there is nothing we can do to speed up the process on our end. Both "moving money" timelines may be affected by any hold times your bank adds. We are currently working on solutions to speed up this process!
Moving money after selling stock
It takes about a week for two reasons: 1) there’s a settlement period for a stock sale, and 2) there’s a clearing period for the transfer to your bank. A sample timeline looks like this:
Monday at 8am: You place your sell order.
Tuesday morning: Cash is made available to you in your Stockpile account for trading, but not for withdrawals to your bank because…
Wednesday: Behind the scenes, when you sold your stock on Monday, our clearing firm arranged to finalize your transaction two days hence. So it isn’t until now that your cash actually settles into your account. Why does it work this way? You have to imagine a paper-based world where you might sign a contract on Monday agreeing to sell stock at a specific price, and everyone gets 2 days to get their paperwork and funding in order to complete the transaction. Stock trading has moved past the paper, but the clearing process is still how the entire industry works.
Wednesday evening: Now that funds are available for withdrawal, you can move them to your bank. This process, for similar reasons described above, takes about 3 business days.
Next Monday: So 3-5 business days after you made your withdrawal, funds arrive in your bank account.