Just Leave
Bank of America, Wells Fargo/Wachovia, Citibank, and JP Morgan/Chase are all on the dole. They are the true “welfare queens” of the US. They have been bailed out to the tune of billions, and want to continue on their merry way, as if they didn’t have a care in the world. Well, they don’t, because the US government has proved to them that they will be bailed out regardless of what they do.
All individuals can do is to avoid any contact with them. Move your accounts to a credit union or local bank, and avoid them like the pestilence they are.
I have before me a missive from Citibank, which, for whatever reason, now owns the Citgo gas card business. After receiving billions of dollars in free government money to spur lending to help the economy, they have reacted with the following rates and fees on the Citgo card:
- Rate for Purchases: Prime Rate plus 19.99%, but not less than 24.99%.
- Rate for Cash Advances: Prime Rate plus 23.96%, but not less than 29.95%.
- Fee for Cash Advances: 5% of the amount, but not less than $10.
This is on an account that has been open for more than a decade, and has never carried a balance, i.e. it is paid in full every time there is a charge on it.
The current Prime Rate is 3.25%, and it has been unchanged for months. A good rate on a CD is 2%.
If you look around, you can probably find a better rate at a pawn shop or from a loan shark.
3 comments
If you look around, you can probably find a better rate at a pawn shop or from a loan shark.
what? they haven’t gobbled up all the littler loan sharks yet?
.-= last blog ..Once more unto the breach, single payer advocates, once more =-.
Wow! 😯 The highwaymen of old are running the banks! Ah well… we knew that. 😉 Now they are just being blatant about it since they know nobody can touch them. Bit like the old highwaymen stopping you with “your money or your life”, with the kings guards as their escorts.
What’s wrong with this picture?
A-mazing!
They really are being blatant about it. The only justification is that they are losing money hand over fist, which may be true, but they certainly aren’t interested in providing credit to anyone. If they had to limit themselves to individual states again they wouldn’t be able to get away with this as usury laws would be enforceable again, and these rates certainly qualify.
It obviously makes no difference if you are paying your bills or not, they want every spare penny you can scrape up. You can’t even escape by going bankrupt these days, Congress screwed that law up.