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I feel somewhat confused; my current Wells Fargo saving account APY is 0.01% where did I go wrong? Seems like I might be shifting my money to a new home. Edit:

• fauxpause_ 3y ago
  You probably didn’t bother to change it when interest rates rose.
• mtoner23 3y ago
  should have switched to a high yield savings account years ago
• mgaunard 3y ago
  Are you sure it's not 1% ?
  • sosuke 3y ago
    Double checked my statement right now "Annual percentage yield earned 0.01%"
  • judge2020 3y ago
    Either because banks don't lend out consumer money, or they do and don't pay the interest back to their savings account customers, tons of regular consumer banks and CUs offer 0.01% on savings accounts they bundle with checking.
• RankingMember 3y ago
  High yield savings accounts are all above 3% at this point- you're getting hosed if you're getting .01%.
  • humanistbot 3y ago
    Most are above 4%: https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/banks/the-highest-savings-account-interest-rates-today-april-13-2023/ https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/banks/the-highest-savings-ac...
    • jaimehrubiks 3y ago
      You are spamming a wrong fact. "Most" are not above 4%, a few are.
      • kristopolous 3y ago
        cool. it takes like 15 minutes to sign up for one such as say https://www.viobank.com/ https://www.viobank.com/ or https://www.baskbank.com/ https://www.baskbank.com/ which are both above 4.5% ... it doesn't have to be "most" just yours. Park 250k in there and you're getting over $950 a month right now. Spread those chunks around multiple banks, assuming you have those chunks, and you'll have a decent modest income while these rates last. And yes, I'm doing exactly this and no, I don't have a day job right now and yes, my overall holdings are still going up. This is an unusually good time to be holding cash. Also I know the trivial inflation arguments about how I'm hypothetically losing purchasing power. But again I don't need hypothetical things to be bought, just mine. Right now it's covering my bills and the number is still rising. This strategy is subject to change without notice.
      • RoyGBivCap 3y ago
        If inflation is above the savings yield no matter what the particular values are, you're still losing purchasing power.
• embwbam 3y ago
  Many banks have high-yield savings accounts, but I think they use them to attract customers, so they don't automatically put you in them if you don't ask. That said, I just looked up wells fargo and I don't see any. Capital One is paying 3.5% right now for "Performance Savings". Note that these rates change in relation to the federal interest rates. You'll sign up for a great rate, and in 3 years it can go back down to a half percent
• cj 3y ago
  Bank accounts are one of the lowest "customer churn" services out there. People typically open a bank account and use it for years and years (which turns into decades on decades). Until someone like Apple comes in with a one click UX to open a bank account and set everything up, existing banks have no incentive to make existing clients happier because they're extremely unlikely to move banks (or even to open a better yielding type of account)
  • rchaud 3y ago
    One click setup isn't going to do it. If Apple is providing banking-type services, they're going to need to have support available at the Apple Store. If they don't, banks will beat them every time. Customer support for noney is not something that can be left to a chat window.
    • petesergeant 3y ago
      Having trouble squaring that with Wise, Revolut, Monzo, Starling, etc. I also don’t think I’ve ever visited Barclays — where I have my primary UK current account — in person ever, other than setting up the account ~10 years ago
      • rchaud 3y ago
        Monzo is the only one in the list that has a banking license, i.e. legal right to take deposits and make loans. Not everyone is a digital native, even today. So when it comes to money matters, there will be a time when interacting with a virtual assistant is not going to do. I don't visit my bank either in most cases. However, I can if I need to. That's a different kind of peace of mind compared to a e-bank that has no customer-facing physical location.
        • johneth 3y ago
          > Monzo is the only one in the list that has a banking license Starling also has a banking license.
    • 3y ago
• toomuchtodo 3y ago
  https://www.bbc.com/news/business-65180130 https://www.bbc.com/news/business-65180130 https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/ Banks capitalize (hah) on unsophisticated deposits to underpay them and profit from the spread. Check if your brokerage has a short dated government securities money market fund (Fidelity = SPAXX [1], Vanguard = VMFXX [2]). Not investing advice! [1] https://fundresearch.fidelity.com/mutual-funds/summary/31617H102 https://fundresearch.fidelity.com/mutual-funds/summary/31617... [2] https://investor.vanguard.com/investment-products/mutual-funds/profile/vmfxx https://investor.vanguard.com/investment-products/mutual-fun...
• sp332 3y ago
  In general I would avoid Wells Fargo since they made up fake accounts for customers to charge them more money, got fined a billion dollars for it, and then did it again while they were still on probabtion from the first time.
• runjake 3y ago
  Bankrate is always a decent source for info. Best high-yield savings accounts in April 2023: https://www.bankrate.com/banking/savings/best-high-yield-interests-savings-accounts/ https://www.bankrate.com/banking/savings/best-high-yield-int...
  • downWidOutaFite 3y ago
    Used to be a decent source until they started letting ads take over their content. In your link you have to get past the "Featured" section and "Offers from banks you may use" section to see the actual content. Many times I've needed an extra click to get past the ads, or been completely unable to.
    • runjake 3y ago
      Thanks for that info. I use uBlock Origin, and I'm not ever seeing these ads, so I was not aware!
      • downWidOutaFite 3y ago
        "Featured Offers" section and "Offers from banks you may use" are not blocked by an ad blocker, it's part of the content.
        • runjake 3y ago
          Interesting. I totally missed that. Thanks for clarifying. Do you have a more preferred financial website?
• slashdev 3y ago
  The big banks are offering 0% on deposits while raking massive profits. They can do that because they’re too big to fail, so people put their money there anyway so it will be safe. They get enough deposits, so no need to offer better rates to attract more. Meanwhile money market funds are yielding over 4%. Interactive brokers is offering over 4% and it’s insured to some ridiculous amount (standard 250k + extra coverage from Lloyds of London). You can buy 3 month or 6 month treasuries with yields well over 4%. I don’t know why anyone would want to keep cash in the big banks, unless they really need it liquid in the short term.
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  • cragfar 3y ago
    The larger banks simply can't offer high interest rates due to the amount of their deposits. For example, JP Morgan Chase has yearly net income of ~$50 billion. The size of their interest bearing deposits is 1.6 trillion. So every 1% rise in savings account rates costs them $16 billion a year.
    • ska 3y ago
      Your two statements don't match up. Sounds like they can offer at least 3% more, no?
      • cragfar 3y ago
        Yes they do. Do you think a company is going to set themselves for a best case scenario of breaking even? Or just take a 25% hit to profit unless they absolutely need to? I just look at Wells Faro, and they have $900 billion in interest bearing deposits. With NI of $16 billion, just going up to 1% will wipe out 55% of profit.
        • 3y ago
• ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
  Why on earth would you still do business with Wells Fargo? I mean big banks are scumbags, but Wells Fargo are PROVEN scumbags several times over.
• subsubzero 3y ago
  I have been getting >4% for most of this year on high yield savings accounts and also 1 month CDs. They are all zero risk(FDIC insured) and money generated from them could pay for my portion(half) of the mortgage on my house(if I lost my job). I would look for bankrate and they list which accounts are paying the highest APR, if you have a brokerage like schwab etc you can look at 1-3 month or even longer term CD's which have rates close to 5%.
  • vlovich123 3y ago
    I have not figured out how to get CDs from the Schwab online UI.
    • subsubzero 3y ago
      You can't do it from the app, its only on the WEB UI. from there click "Trade" and it will be one of the options to select(in the middle column). Hope that helps.
• MBCook 3y ago
  Yeah, obnoxious huh? My main bank is always suggest I open a savings account with them. “Check out our new awesome rate!” 0.3%, or something similar. I’ve been using different banks with real high yield for a long time. My current choice is almost 4% (after climbing a ton last year with all the hikes). A number of banks offer similar rates. Some places are starting to offer non trivial rates on checking. I think AmEx may be paying over 1% interest on their checking accounts (I know, think it’s new) instead of the common 0.0005% if you’re lucky enough to get interest at all. Sadly you have to shop around. Even credit unions often don’t offer good savings accounts, even if better than the big banks.
• babyshake 3y ago
  What I, and probably many of us want, is a way to keep just enough cash in a checking account at a too big to fail bank while the rest is earning yield at Betterment, Wealthfront, other 4% or more APR locations, automatically topping off the checking account as needed.
• zamalek 3y ago
  > where did I go wrong Credit unions are typically more competitive than big banks in general. If you truly want to make the most out of every penny then you should be unbundling your bank services (checking at CU A, savings at CU B, credit at X, etc.). This is especially easy with credit unions because they are typically part of a cooperative that streamlines inter-bank transfers (it usually takes < 24hr to transfer between my savings and checking). There can be higher yield options for long-term savings (depending on market conditions at the time). The classical wisdom is to keep your money in CDs[1], but you're locking in an interest rate for <duration>, so if interest rates go up you could lose out. If you're saving for more than a couple (1-3) of years you really should be looking at handing over some of your money to someone who profits when you profit (money market or brokerage). Remember that even at the current ~5% of CDs, the banks have ensured that they will be making a profit even during moderate market turmoil. It's also not a bad idea to invest in something that is guaranteed to maintain value (such a gold or platinum), to hedge against recessions. [1]: https://www.bankrate.com/banking/cds/cd-rates/ https://www.bankrate.com/banking/cds/cd-rates/
  • gtk40 3y ago
    I definitely agree with un-bundling for the best services over all. The problem with credit unions are most are regional (though some are not). I have the best CU in my area which is fine, but it doesn't have a competitive credit card offering or savings rate. It does have good service and some good other benefits and I use it for my main checking account. I don't agree CUs are more competitive always than big banks. I think for the most part big banks have better credit card offerings for example. There are lots of reasons someone would go for a big bank like Chase for credit cards.
    • zamalek 3y ago
      > The problem with credit unions are most are regional My CUs are west-coast, and I moved to the east coast last year. I haven't run into any problems. On the off-chance I had to walk into a brick-and-mortar bank (depositing cash is about the only reason I'd need to do that, so never), I could visit a coop instead. > I don't agree CUs are more competitive always than big banks Absolutely. We're on a mainstream brand miles reward card because my wife likes traveling. CC rewards at my CU were basically worthless - the rates were pretty competitive, though.
• codersfocus 3y ago
  The federal bank pays 4.9% interest rate right now.[0] This was a new policy enacted in 2008 -- it didn't used to pay interest rates on deposits. That's the "wholesale" savings interest rate. The less you are making compared to that, the more your bank is profiting. As an aside, the interest the banks earn from this is newly created money. With 17 trillion dollars currently deposited, that's $833 billion of inflationary pressure every year. [0] https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/reserve-balances.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/reserve-balanc... [1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/DPSACBW027SBOG https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/DPSACBW027SBOG
  • exabrial 3y ago
    Sorry to ask a dumb question, can you explain this? > With 17 trillion dollars currently deposited, that's $833 billion of inflationary pressure every year. specifically, this part, what do you mean by pressure and which way is it pushing > that's $833 billion of inflationary pressure every year.
• brundolf 3y ago
  I just took a double-look at the Betterment high-yield savings account they'd offered to me previously (I already have an account there for investments), which I'd dismissed because it seemed convenient to keep my savings and checking in the same place (Chase), and it's 4.2%! I've been getting 0.01% at Chase! Needless to say I'm going to be trying it out! Thanks Apple! Edit: It looks like they have a checking account too (https://www.betterment.com/checking https://www.betterment.com/checking), which also has better terms than Chase. People who know more about this stuff than me: is there any reason not to just move over completely? Technically Betterment is not a bank, but it sounds like these cash accounts are backed by accounts at banks that Betterment manages for you, which means they're insured (and in fact, you can insure more than $250k because multiple banks are involved). Is there any downside I'm not seeing?
  • vineyardmike 3y ago
    > is there any reason not to just move over completely? Technically Betterment is not a bank, but it sounds like these cash accounts are backed by accounts at banks There is some small risk that if betterment folds, those funds aren’t protected. It’s afaik never been really tested in court. FDIC would protect only the underlying bank - not betterment. It’s a very small risk though. But a real bank doesn’t have that risk. A lot of these small investment companies like betterment or wealth front are on pretty shaky financial grounds - so it could come up sooner than expected.
    • brundolf 3y ago
      In their terms it sounded like if they close your account for whatever reason, you can still go directly to the banks and recover your funds. They did say the funds would be temporarily uninsured at certain points while in transit (deposit/withdrawal, redistribution, etc) but that seems like a relatively small risk Is it possible they'd try to claim first-dibs on your funds that are living in other banks if they went under and had to pay back shareholders?
      • vineyardmike 3y ago
• scubbo 3y ago
  Cannot stress enough how much you should run, not walk, from Wells Fargo. When I was foolish enough to seek a mortgage with them, they instructed me to sign documents stating that a) my partner was my spouse (and doubled-down on that when I highlighted the error), and b) a loan from my uncle to provide necessary "buffer funds" was in fact a gift that would not be repaid (it wasn't, and they knew that). Any bank that knowingly instructs a client to sign a single fraudulent document should be viewed with caution; twice is unconscionable. I'm currently very happy with the Vanguard Cash Plus account for savings (https://investor.vanguard.com/investment-products/cash-investments https://investor.vanguard.com/investment-products/cash-inves...), though I think it's invite-only. I see you've got plenty of good suggestions in replies, though - you'll do fine. Good luck! :)
  • plagiarist 3y ago
    You do have to admit that when they're urging you to commit fraud, they're at least not asking you to do something they're unwilling to do: https://cnn.com/cnn/2022/12/20/investing/wells-fargo-cfpb-foreclosure-fine/index.html https://cnn.com/cnn/2022/12/20/investing/wells-fargo-cfpb-fo...
• donohoe 3y ago
  I recommend Ally. Very good customer service (on rare occasions I called immediate pickup or just a few minutes). Their banking app is good (used to be simper/better in the past imho) and they are known for competitive interest rates (Savings is at 3.75% right now) https://www.ally.com/bank/interest-checking-account/ https://www.ally.com/bank/interest-checking-account/
• jdlyga 3y ago
  Big banks are absolutely scamming you. Never, ever use a savings account from a big bank.