4 ms·

Right on, and if you include account fees, it's equivalent to disturbingly high negative interest.

by jp555 10y ago

mattnewton 10y ago
Not to mention inflation..
djrogers 10y ago
If you've got account fees on your savings account you need a new bank. Hint - just because there's one on every corner and their headquarters is a 40 story building downtown doesn't mean it's a good bank. Local banks and credit unions are almost always better for you and your money..
- jp555 10y ago
  Good advice. Less competition up here in Canada but there's still zero-fees options if you shop around.
- pilom 10y ago
  There are also online-only banks (Ally and CapitalOne360) that offer great rates and no fees but they can't handle cash deposits.
logfromblammo 10y ago
For instance, Wells Fargo's Way2Save has 0.01% interest (compounded daily at 0.000000274%), and a $5 monthly service fee for minimum daily account balances less than $300. So if you deposit $299 on 1 January, and are over 18, you end up with $239 on 31 December. Yay for that -20% interest rate. So make sure you deposit that extra $1 to hit $300. But if the daily-compounded interest is rounded to the nearest $0.01, you don't even get any interest unless you have a balance of $18250.91 or greater. In order to get the minimum possible $3.65 daily-compounded interest on a balance of $300, the APY has to be at least 1.2167%. Just be honest and say the rate is 0%, man. It's no wonder all those Wells Fargo employees had to commit fraud to open more of those accounts. PT Barnum's maxim notwithstanding, there just aren't enough suckers in the world to open a new Way2Save account of their own volition. My spouse recently suggested that we open savings accounts for the kids, so I pointed out the abysmally low effective interest rates on accounts . We're opening investment accounts for them instead. Kids, the way to save is to dump everything in index funds and forget it's there.

Right on, and if you include account fees, it's equivalent to disturbingly high negative interest.

by jp555 10y ago

Right on, and if you include account fees, it's equivalent to disturbingly high negative interest.

mattnewton 10y ago

Not to mention inflation..

djrogers 10y ago

If you've got account fees on your savings account you need a new bank. Hint - just because there's one on every corner and their headquarters is a 40 story building downtown doesn't mean it's a good bank. Local banks and credit unions are almost always better for you and your money..

jp555 10y ago
Good advice. Less competition up here in Canada but there's still zero-fees options if you shop around.
pilom 10y ago
There are also online-only banks (Ally and CapitalOne360) that offer great rates and no fees but they can't handle cash deposits.

logfromblammo 10y ago

For instance, Wells Fargo's Way2Save has 0.01% interest (compounded daily at 0.000000274%), and a $5 monthly service fee for minimum daily account balances less than $300. So if you deposit $299 on 1 January, and are over 18, you end up with $239 on 31 December. Yay for that -20% interest rate. So make sure you deposit that extra $1 to hit $300. But if the daily-compounded interest is rounded to the nearest $0.01, you don't even get any interest unless you have a balance of $18250.91 or greater. In order to get the minimum possible $3.65 daily-compounded interest on a balance of $300, the APY has to be at least 1.2167%. Just be honest and say the rate is 0%, man. It's no wonder all those Wells Fargo employees had to commit fraud to open more of those accounts. PT Barnum's maxim notwithstanding, there just aren't enough suckers in the world to open a new Way2Save account of their own volition. My spouse recently suggested that we open savings accounts for the kids, so I pointed out the abysmally low effective interest rates on accounts . We're opening investment accounts for them instead. Kids, the way to save is to dump everything in index funds and forget it's there.