Fidelity sells brokered CDs: certificates of deposit issued by hundreds of different banks, bought and held inside a Fidelity brokerage account or IRA instead of being opened at the bank. New issues are sold at par with no trading fee, Fidelity charges $1 per $1,000 CD to buy or sell on the secondary market online, and each CD remains an obligation of the bank that issued it, not of Fidelity.
The structure behind that answer comes from Fidelity's CD Disclosure Statement (dated 2 January 2026), its commission schedule and its product pages. No yield is printed: current offerings sit behind the search links on Fidelity's CDs page and change as issues sell out and prices move. For the product in general, see what a brokered CD is; for the contrast with a bank's own certificate, brokered CD vs bank CD.
What Fidelity sells
Fidelity says it offers CDs from hundreds of different banks, each providing FDIC protection up to the current limits, and its lists typically run to dozens of new issues and a much larger secondary inventory. A new issue is a CD a bank is offering for the first time; a secondary CD is one you buy from another investor.
You receive no certificate: Fidelity keeps the ownership record as your custodian, and you may move the CD to another agent that is a member of the Depository Trust Company, or ask for it to be recorded directly on the bank's books, subject to the law and the bank's terms.
The standard unit is $1,000 of face value, in $1,000 increments; some new issues are Fractional CDs, sold in minimums and increments of $100. The disclosure also covers zero-coupon and variable-rate CDs; this page deals with ordinary fixed-rate, interest-bearing ones.
Rates, prices and the bank's placement fee
There is no single Fidelity CD rate: the disclosure says the maturities, rates and payment terms on offer will vary, and what the screen shows depends on the market a CD is in.
New issues are sold at par, $1,000 for most CDs, with no trading fee. Because the price is par, Fidelity says a new issue's interest rate displays as the same percentage as its annual percentage yield.
Secondary CDs sell at a market price, at, above or below par, so your overall return can be higher or lower than the coupon; on a purchase, the price includes a mark-up set by Fidelity. The yield Fidelity states, its glossary says, is the yield to worst: the lower of the yield to maturity and the yield to call, based on the previous close.
The issuing bank pays Fidelity on new issues. Fidelity and the broker-dealer arranging an offering receive a placement fee from the issuing bank of up to half a percentage point a year of the principal you buy. You are not charged it: apart from secondary-market mark-ups and mark-downs and any handling fee on your confirmation, the disclosure says you are charged no commission when you buy a CD. It does not say whether the fee is reflected in the rate, though it does say a CD bought through Fidelity may pay more or less than the same bank's own deposits. For a neutral baseline, how to read a CD rate table sets out the FDIC's national averages.
What it costs
The schedule is Fidelity's, read on 27 September 2026; the worked example after it uses illustrative figures, not market ones.
| Transaction | Online | With a Fidelity representative |
|---|---|---|
| Buy a new issue | No trading fee; sold at par | Not addressed by the fee schedule |
| Buy on the secondary market | $1 per CD ($1,000 of face value) | Minimum mark-up of $19.95 |
| Sell before maturity | $1 per CD | Minimum mark-down of $19.95 |
| Maximum per trade | $250; $50 if the CD matures in one year or less | The same caps |
| Paid by the issuing bank, new issues only | Placement fee to Fidelity and the arranging broker-dealer of up to 0.50% a year of the principal | The same |
The schedule's footnote adds two points: mark-ups and mark-downs may affect a trade's total cost and effective yield, and on secondary trades the offering broker, possibly a Fidelity affiliate, may separately mark the price up or down and make a trading profit or loss, so Fidelity's $1 need not be the only mark-up in the price. Online, $1 a CD reaches the $50 cap for CDs maturing within a year at 50 CDs ($50,000 of face value).
Worked example: $10,000 of face value on the secondary market
Take a secondary CD with one year to maturity, an illustrative 4.00% coupon and an illustrative price of 100.25 before Fidelity's charge. $10,000 of face value is 10 CDs; accrued interest, reported on the confirmation if there is any, is set aside. The schedule gives no per-CD rate for representative trades, so that column assumes the $19.95 minimum.
| Illustrative | Online | With a representative |
|---|---|---|
| Price before Fidelity's charge, at 100.25 | $10,025.00 | $10,025.00 |
| Fidelity's charge | $10.00 | $19.95 (the minimum) |
| All-in cost | $10,035.00 | $10,044.95 |
| Face value plus a year's simple interest at 4.00% | $10,400.00 | $10,400.00 |
| Gain if held to maturity | $365.00 | $355.05 |
| Return on the all-in cost | 3.64% | 3.53% |
On that assumption, the representative route costs $9.95 more, about a tenth of a percentage point over the year and roughly twice that, annualised, with six months left. Neither the $25 premium nor Fidelity's charge is FDIC-insured: if the bank failed, the FDIC would pay par plus accrued interest. And the $365 assumes holding to maturity; a sale before then is at the market price, less a mark-down.
A new issue has no charge to show: $10,000 buys $10,000 of face value. The bank separately pays Fidelity and the arranging broker-dealer up to 0.50% a year on it: at most $50 a year, or $100 over an illustrative two-year term, paid by the bank rather than charged to you.
Interest: simple, paid out, on a set schedule
Brokered CDs at Fidelity pay simple interest into your cash core account; nothing compounds inside the CD. On new issues, interest is counted on actual days over a 365-day year, so on $10,000 at an illustrative 4.00% a 181-day period pays $198.36 and a 184-day period $201.64; secondary CDs may use other methods. Unless the trade confirmation or a supplement says otherwise, a CD with an original maturity of a year or less pays at maturity, and a longer one pays monthly, quarterly, semi-annually or annually, and at maturity.
For a new-issue order placed as a cash trade, the cash leaves your account on the settlement date, no sooner, earning interest until the day before; the CD earns from settlement. Until the offering closes, when the issue sells out or reaches its settlement date, the order can be edited or cancelled. After it goes to the bank it cannot, and nothing can be added to a CD later.
At maturity: no renewal unless you ask
A CD bought through Fidelity does not renew or roll over by itself: interest stops at maturity and the money is credited to your account.
Auto Roll is the opt-in exception, open to Treasury auction securities, new-issue CDs of five years or less and certain CD strategies. Callable, floating-rate, adjustable-rate and inflation-protected CDs are excluded, as are CD purchases above $250,000. It needs a Fidelity Alerts subscription and can be dropped at any time without penalty. The replacement keeps the same face value, a similar term and the same coupon frequency, and is the highest-yielding new issue meeting those criteria at the time of the search. Only principal rolls; interest stays in the account, and if no new issue fits, the rolling stops and the money stays in the core account. None of those criteria concerns the issuing bank, so a replacement can come from one where you already hold deposits, which matters for the insurance limit below.
Getting out before maturity
The disclosure allows no early withdrawal of an interest-bearing CD from the bank except on the owner's death or incapacity, below, and calls CDs most suitable for buying and holding to maturity. The exit is a sale. Fidelity may maintain a secondary market but is not obliged to, and if it does not, may try another broker-dealer's; it cannot assure you of a sale, and a market may be discontinued without notice. The price will likely reflect rate movements, the time left to maturity and other market conditions, less a mark-down Fidelity retains, and may fall below face value or below your statement's figure, which the disclosure calls an estimate. Fidelity's CDs page warns of a possible substantial gain or loss.
How a rate rise moves a sale price, against a bank's contract penalty, is the subject of brokered CD vs bank CD; the usual shapes of that penalty are priced in CD early withdrawal penalties.
Death, incapacity and the survivor's option
On the death or adjudicated incompetence of a CD's owner, early withdrawal of the whole CD will generally be permitted without penalty; a partial withdrawal is not, and written verification will generally be required.
Fidelity's CDs page adds that most brokered CDs, not all, carry a survivor's option, or death put: if the original investor dies or is permanently incapacitated, principal and accrued interest can be redeemed without penalty, generally at par, which returns nothing of a premium paid above it. Issuers may cap these redemptions at the FDIC limit, limit how much is put back in a given period, or both. On a CD you hold, Fidelity says the option shows in the Survivor's Option row of its Bond Details page, and the estate must invoke it before the account is re-registered or transferred.
Callable and call-protected CDs
Fidelity describes a CD as either callable, possibly at a higher rate in exchange for the risk of being called away, or call-protected, which it says gives more certainty of a rate of return over a defined period. The call is the bank's alone and, the disclosure says, most likely when prevailing rates are below the CD's rate, when you may be unable to reinvest at the same rate. A called CD pays principal and interest up to, but not including, the call date; one bought above par on the secondary market repays only par. The SEC's warning on labels applies: "one-year non-callable" describes protection in the first year, not the maturity.
Insurance: the FDIC at the bank, SIPC at Fidelity
Fidelity says its CDs are FDIC-insured up to $250,000 per account owner, per account type, per institution; the FDIC's own formula is per depositor, per insured bank, per ownership category. The disclosure spells out the catch: every deposit you hold at the issuing bank in the same capacity counts together, whether held directly, through Fidelity or through another intermediary, with individual, joint and IRA as separate capacities. The adding-up is yours: you must monitor the total, Fidelity is not responsible for any uninsured portion, and buying a CD counts as representing that your deposits there, aggregated, are within the $250,000 limit.
A premium paid on the secondary market is not insured, nor is a premium in your statement's estimated value, and FDIC insurance does not cover market losses. Coverage through a broker also depends on conditions, including Fidelity's record-keeping as your agent and custodian; are CDs FDIC insured sets out those pass-through conditions and the BankFind check on an issuing bank.
SIPC is a different protection. Fidelity's documents identify Fidelity Brokerage Services LLC as a member of the NYSE and SIPC. SIPC covers CDs held at a failed member firm as securities, up to $500,000 per separate capacity, and protects custody, not market value; FDIC insurance does not cover a broker's failure.
Brokered CDs inside a Fidelity IRA
Fidelity names the IRA as an account that can buy brokered CDs, and its IRA investment-options page lists FDIC-insured CDs among the fixed-income choices.
Insurance. Fidelity's disclosure says one bank's deposits held in an IRA are insured up to $250,000 in aggregate. The FDIC's certain retirement accounts category works the same way, adding together one person's deposits in those accounts at the same bank, traditional and Roth IRAs alike, separately from single-name deposits there. SIPC treats an IRA and a Roth IRA at the same firm as separate capacities.
Tax. Outside an IRA, the IRS lists interest on certificates of deposit as taxable interest. Inside one, interest is generally not taxed in the year it is earned and is not reported on Form 1099-INT; in a traditional IRA, tax is generally deferred until you take a distribution. The withdrawal and transfer rules are on IRA CD rules, and the basics on what is an IRA CD.
Required distributions. An RMD does not, by itself, unlock a CD early. The disclosure says CDs in an IRA are not eligible for early withdrawal simply because withdrawals must begin, and its own answer is to match maturities to the withdrawal requirements or use the secondary market. For a traditional IRA, the IRS starting age is 73 for most people reaching it now and 75 for anyone born in 1960 or later; a Roth IRA owes none while its owner is alive. With several traditional IRAs, each one's RMD is figured separately, but the total can be taken from any one or more of them; how to calculate an RMD covers both.
Current offerings and model ladders
Fidelity lists its current CDs through the Search CDs and Search secondary CDs links on its CDs page. Its Model CD Ladders come in 1-, 2- and 5-year versions: choosing one filters the new-issue inventory through objective screens so that you build your own ladder, bought in multiples of $4,000 for four rungs or $5,000 for five. The CD ladder guide covers how a ladder works and the decision at each maturity. For how another large brokerage handles the same product, see Vanguard brokered CDs.
What to confirm before ordering
- The issuing bank, and what you already hold there in the same ownership category, directly or through any broker.
- New issue or secondary: a secondary price above 100 includes an uninsured premium.
- Callable or call-protected, and the call dates.
- The survivor's option, and any cap on it.
- The coupon frequency and the settlement date.
- The yield shown, which Fidelity states as the yield to worst.
- The maturity against the date you need the money, since, short of the owner's death or incapacity, the only other exit is a sale with no assured buyer.
- Auto Roll, if you want principal reinvested, and whether the CD qualifies.
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