The Sun’s Financial Diary

Update: Check out the Dollar Savings Direct review post for more detailed discussion on DollarSavingsDirect bank and my account opening experience. And latest rates can be found on the Online Savings Account Interest Rate History page.
When ING Direct lowered its rate to 2.75% APY last week after the latest 0.50% rate cut by the Fed, [...]

With all the turmoil in the financial market and the increasing number of failed banks, big and small, one of the questions people ask a lot these days is “Is my money safe?” Since we put our hard-earned money in banks as opposed to under the mattress, the question can be partly translated to “Is [...]

Well, it didn’t take long for banks to follow the Federal Reserve’s surprising rate cut yesterday to lower their own rates. As I mentioned early, the rate cut, from 2.00% to 1.50%, didn’t help to save the stock market as the Dow took another 2% hit yesterday, but one thing sure to happen is lowered [...]

One day after the Federal Reserve Chairman signaled that it’s ready to cut interest rate, the central bank, in a coordinated action with central banks around the world, lowered its benchmark rate by 50 basis points to 1.5%. The emergency rate reduction by the Fed came after the Dow Jones Industrial Average Index lost more [...]

Washington Mutual keeps their effort to lure new account, increasing their online savings account rate to 4.00% APY (as of now, their website hasn’t been updated yet). The latest rate change puts WaMu at the top of the interest rate table. To get the 4.00% APY, you need to open a WaMu Free Checking Account [...]

So HSBC Direct’s three-month promotion has ended yesterday and, as promised, the bank rolled back the yield of its online savings account from 3.50% APY to 3.25% APY, a mediocre level. The purpose of the promotion was, I suppose, to attract new customers, but I am not sure how successful the campaign was because, even [...]

When the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) released its second quarter Quarterly Bank Profile yesterday, it didn’t have a lot of good news to offer. In fact, the news is pretty bad if you are concerned about the financial soundness of your bank. In the report, the FDIC says during the second quarter, the number [...]

Dollar Savings Direct Bank is a division of Emigrant Bank, which also owns Emigrant Direct. At $1,000 minimum balance, you can enjoy a 3.50% interest rate with the new online bank.
Update: Check out the Dollar Savings Direct review post for more detailed discussion on Dollar Savings Direct bank and account opening process.
Have you heard of [...]

Hope you got it when it was there. If you didn’t, then it’s too late already.
Just received an email from WTDirect that it has terminated the promotion of up to $250 sign-on bonus immediately.
The promotion was wildly successful, more so than we could have forecasted. Unfortunately, we need to end the promotion early. Effective immediately, [...]

I am not a fan of Certificate of Deposit (CD). In fact, the only CD I ever had was a 1-year $5,000 CD about 10 years ago with my local Summit Bank (which later became Fleet Bank, then Bank of America). Back then, there was no high-yield online savings accounts as we have now. So [...]