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No... From what I read people would get rewards from the credit card. So they bought say $10,000 in coins and deposited the coins back before the end of the bil
by reginaldo 14y ago
No... From what I read people would get rewards from the credit card. So they bought say $10,000 in coins and deposited the coins back before the end of the billing cycle, winning a $200 cashback reward. That $200 is what the person doing this would profit.
That "hack" has the nasty characteristic of probably making everybody lose, maybe more than the $200 the guy was getting.
I imagine shipping was not free for the government, which also probably paid the credit card operator a fee. The credit card operator is losing money by paying rewards on a bogus transaction.
- bdonlan 14y agoThe credit card company doesn't lose money. They charge a settlement fee to the government, which more than covers the cost of the rewards program. So only the government (ie, the taxpayers) lose out here.
- WildUtah 14y agoThe taxpayers also don't lose out because the mint makes the coins and mails them and pays the credit card settlement fee for less than the face value of the coins. Nobody loses, except people who object to the subtle inflation by seigniorage. The Federal Reserve can control that anyway.
- sachitgupta 14y agoYou can also use it to get frequent flier miles - a lot of cards offer 50,000+ miles on reaching a certain minimum purchase. Here's someone who bought $15,000 in coins: http://advancedriskology.com/the-day-i-bought-15000/ http://advancedriskology.com/the-day-i-bought-15000/
- saryant 14y ago$15k is pretty small. I think there are some members of Flyertalk.com who managed to churn far more than that during the programs run.
- pavel_lishin 14y agoWhy is the transaction bogus?