At Veracity we’re always trying to further educated consumers on all different aspects of credit. We found this question posted online and thought we’d give our insight:

I know with credit cards and such, closing them can have a negative effect on credit scores. But does this apply to standard brokerage accounts like a Charles Schwab or Fidelity?

Generally speaking, closing a brokerage account does not apply to your credit score the way closing a credit card would, and should not affect your credit score negatively.

However, when opening a brokerage account, many firms will do a “hard” credit pull. Technically, you must give permission for a hard credit pull and they are common when seeking most kinds of credit or insurance. The hard credit pull can have a temporary, negative effect on your credit score, though it will usually rebound from hard pulls over time.

Because brokerage accounts have no terms of payment, there is no reporting to the credit bureaus, and thus no affect to your credit. The exception to this rule would be if you were to close your account with insufficient funds and you were to be reported for collections.

Otherwise, standard brokerage accounts, opened or closed, have no inherent effect on credit scores.