$55 from Sharebuilder for Costco Members

Yesterday, as I was surfing around the blogosphere I came across a post here on a great deal from Costco.

Costco is currently offering a special for members who open a new account with Sharebuilder. Just for signing up and completing your first transaction you will receive a $55 account bonus and rebates on transaction fees (25% if executive member, 10% everyone else). If you are already a Costco member and were considering starting to invest, this is a good opportunity to get started. Check out the nitty gritty details here. Offer is valid until 4/2/06.

So despite the fact that I am still not out of debt I think I might as well at least sign up and complete one transaction to take advantage of the free money. I'm not yet sure what I want to invest in or how much I should invest but I am hoping this will also be good practice for my accounting class. Part of the class is a group project where we have to choose a publicly traded company and analyze its financial statements so it will be much more interesting if I have a vested interest in the company that we choose.

Any advice on where to start? Of course, there are the big individually traded stocks like Microsoft, Google, General Electric, Pfizer or I could go with an exchange traded fund like the S&P 500. It seems a bit intimidating now, kind of like when you first go to Vegas to gamble. I feel like when I hit buy I will be hitting the big red nuclear button of investing. I'm not sure what is going to happen but it feels nerve wrecking. :)