Looking back at last night's 1,542-word post on Canadian income tax, there's only one conclusion that I can reasonably draw:
I'm a nerd.
Just thought I should clear that up.
In other news, HSBC Direct has joined the club in lowering interest rates on savings accounts. Effective yesterday, their rate has dropped from 3.70% to 3.30%. They are now exactly on a par with ING Direct. The one upside here is that their promotional rate on new balances until May 2 now represents a 1.45% bonus over their regular interest rate. That's nothing to sniff at, if you have substantial balances to move over.
I'm always reluctant to "chase" rate offers on credit cards, mainly because of the impact that opening and closing credit accounts would have on my credit rating. Case in point: it took me months of fence-sitting to decide to take advantage of the 0% MBNA offer. When it comes to savings accounts, however, I'm far more inclined to "try out" a given account, because there's no concrete downside to having no-fee savings accounts with multiple institutions. Of course, managing these multiple accounts significantly complicates my finances. I have four distinct savings account logins to remember, and four distinct balances to check at the end of each month.
Given that the interest rates on online savings accounts seem to be converging just below the Bank of Canada rate, I'm not sure it's worth my time to chase minor rate advantages from bank to bank. The important thing is, my Emergency Fund and short-term savings are earning more interest than they would in a brick-and-mortar account, and they're with institutions that give me convenient access to the funds as I need them.
That'll have to be enough for now.
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1 comment:
Most online banks are lowering their rates but there is still one option, ICICI bank is still offering 4.1% on their online account. I am giving it a try this month.
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