When I first wrote this I did not know what Stockpile's pitch is, i.e. fractional stocks. I still think it is misleading, but it now makes more sense.
At first blush, if you are not familiar with fractional stocks, they are advertising $5 of Apple stock and this appears strange since Apple's share price at the time I write this is $160 per share. This would appear to mean they are giving approximately a 3% discount on one share of Apple stock that you buy, which does not take into account fees (there seems to be a $0.99 fee, at a minimum).
However, apparently Stockpile pitches the ability to buy fractional shares of stock, "buy fractions of expensive stocks instead of one full share". I'd encourage people to read the Investopedia article on fractional shares, at http://www.investopedia.com/terms/f/fractionalshare.asp.
Granted I am not an expert on stocks, but this does not seem like buying stock as much as it is buying shares in a share of stock. Questions that come to mind include: who gets to vote the share, who gets the dividends, do you have to sell through Stockpile, etc. Actually, thinking about it more, it sounds to me like a mutual fund where the fund only contains one stock.
Re $5 apple stock, you are getting 0.03 apple stock ($5 worth of stock if the stock price is $160/share). You don't need to pay $0.99 for getting this free stock. The trading commission of $0.99 cents is only when you buy or sell more shares.
There are no account minimums or monthly fees.
Hope this answers your question!
