Originally published at: New Apple Card Savings Account Offers 4.15% Interest - TidBITS
Apple Card users can now direct their Daily Cash rewards to a new Savings account that earns competitive interest rates instead of the interest-free Apple Cash card. But will it be easy to integrate into your personal finance app?
Either this is very popular and overloaded, or it isn’t yet available. I get an error message:
Savings Unavailable
Apple Pay services are currently unavailable. Please try again later.
edit
now (a few hours later), seems to work. I got an email from no_reply@post.gs-savings.apple saying my account is open…
My money (hah!) is on overloaded.
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Same here. I’ve tried a few times during the day.
As a UK reader, what’s the US Fed base rate at right now? (Useful for comparison’s)
EDIT 2: 4.83%.
4.15% seems quite competitive against other banks too.
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Worked fine for me, but I had to upgrade my iPhone to 16.4.1 before the option presented itself. I clicked the “Setup” button (under Apple Card’s Daily Cash section in Wallet), put in my SS# (required for tax purposes), and in a few seconds the savings account was active. Very nice!
I typically use American Express Personal Savings, which is offering 3.75%. Very tempting. But what are the odds it’s some promo rate that will take a dive after they’re happy with the adoption numbers…?
Is there a simple transfer option between accounts and banks, such as Zelle?
Is there any minimum (monthly) deposit?
No minimums or fees. You can pay your Apple Card balance, transfer to your own bank, or instantly transfer to Apple Cash, and send money to others via Apple Cash (nothing has changed there).
Well I don’t see a “Savings account” in my Wallet, but there is a prompt to create an “Apple Account” in there. Unfortunately, after successfully adding it, there are no details that I can find about how to direct Daily Cash to it.
Maybe tomorrow all will be revealed.
If you intend to use the account as a true savings account, beware of the withdrawal limitations:
“Apple Cash Transfers
You may deposit or withdraw funds from your Account into or from Apple Cash. Transfers must be at least $1.00 and can be no more than $10,000. You may transfer no more than $20,000 per rolling 7-day period. We may place additional limits on the amount and frequency of transfers for the security of your Account.” ( page 7 of the Deposit Account Agreement)
Note that the savings account does not appear directly in your Apple Wallet. Instead, you must open the tab for your Apple Credit Card and find a button for the savings account there. To access the agreement that I quoted above, tap the circled ellipsis in the upper right corner and then the Account Details item. Scroll to the bottom to see the Terms and Conditions button. Tap that to open the PDF, which you can then share back to your computer to read it.
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The Savings Account is accessed via a button in the Apple Credit Card Wallet Entry.
That support article says that the Savings Account requires “the latest version of iOS,” which I presume explains why I don’t see the button you refer to; I’m on only iOS 16.4. (I always hold off upgrading an operating system until after it’s been out a week.)
Still, I wonder what an “Apple Account” is.
Oh. Nevermind. Tab the Apple Card → (… button) → Card Details → Daily Cash bar chart → View Daily Cash link → Savings → Set up → “Saving Unavailable. Apple Pay services are currently unavailable. Please try again later.”
Tried again … enter social security number … confirm, confirm, and … application rejected!
Tried again … Success!
Savings Account seems to work.
But that pesky “Apple Account” card is still in my Wallet.
Oh. Apparently it’s an empty gift card.
UPDATE April 18, 2023 5:50 PM
These are them most comprehensive instructions for settting up an Apple Savings account that I’ve found:
I already had a Marcus savings account at Goldman Sachs. Apparently I cannot use that same account, so it’s not worth it to me to set a new account for Apple Cash. But I do wish that I could use the Marcus account…
FWIW, I was able to sign up overnight (Pacific time). I’ve seen no indication this is a promotional rate or that it’s variable, tied to some indicator. Anyone have more info on that? It’s tempting to move some of the cash from my 0.69% APR savings account into this account.
I would think it is a current rate based on what other online banks are paying but once interest rates start to fall, it will probably adjust just like other banks do all the time. There are higher paying banks but one has to look around and a lot of times, the catch is it has to be new money as opposed to shifting funds in the same bank.
In a footnote in Apple’s announcement, the company says:
- Annual Percentage Yield (APY) is 4.15 percent as of 4/14/2023. APY may change at any time. Maximum balance limits apply. Savings is available with iOS 16.4 and later.
That maximum balance limit is $250,000, which is probably to match the FDIC limits for insured accounts. I checked because I wanted to make sure it wasn’t limited in some unusual way.
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For anybody thinking of opening a new account with Marcus, something to know is that Marcus has not been meeting Goldman Sachs’ performance targets. As a result, Marcus is receiving less atttention and resources from senior management and even may be up for sale.
This has been the case over the last several quarters and continues today:
“Goldman is exploring strategic options for its consumer platform business, which has lost about $3 billion in three years, executives told investors in February.
[…]
Goldman reshuffled its businesses in 2022, leaning into its traditional mainstays of trading and investment banking, beefing up its asset management arm and stepping back from its consumer aspirations.”
Great news, Adam “I read the footnotes so you don’t have to” Engst!
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I’ve been wondering if GS’ disappointment with Marcus and perhaps their Apple collaboration could be part of the reason Apple Card usability appears to have degraded. Unreliable notifications, slow balance updates, and odd outages are some of the things I’ve seen here that I did not encounter when the service launched and I signed up. I was wondering if perhaps enthusiasm has waned and with it dedication (and resource allocation) to the project.