Apple and Goldman Sachs are trying to lure American depositors to a new savings account
The California tech giant and Wall Street bank on Monday launched a new savings account offering an annual return of 4.15 percent, first announcing the product in October.
That’s much higher than the average U.S. savings account rate of 0.37 percent, according to data from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. It beats rivals like American Express, which offers 3.75 percent, and Goldman’s Individual Savings Account, which operates under the Marcus brand, which offers 3.9 percent.
And established banks, particularly regional and smaller lenders, are under increasing pressure to offer better savings rates to depositors to keep them from shifting money to higher-yielding products such as money market funds. Interest rates.
Customers have withdrawn about $800 billion in deposits from US commercial banks since March of last year. Back then, the central bank first started raising rates after lenders kept deposit rates relatively low, charging more for loans.
The new savings account is offered to users of Apple’s credit card product, which also has a partnership with Goldman. Apple Savers have no fees and no minimum deposit requirements. The maximum balance per account is $250,000. Deposits are held with Goldman, which has access to FDIC insurance as a licensed bank.
“Savings helps our users get even more value . . . while giving them an easy way to save money every day,” said Jennifer Bailey, vice president of Apple Pay and Apple Wallet.
The savings account deepens Apple’s offering of financial services products, including a buy-now-pay-later program.
As Apple adds more payments and financial services, commentators have suggested it is becoming more of a bank. But Apple’s real strength is that it makes money through hardware sales and non-banking services, said Christian Owens, chief executive of Padel.
“I don’t think Apple should be a bank,” he said. “I think Apple can demonstrate the economics of banking without actually becoming a bank. They can work with Goldman to empower all of these financial services and be a conduit to consumers for a lot of things, brand Apple, take that high-margin cut and put this kind of fundamental responsibility on Goldman.”
