Apple's savings account upends traditional banking

With all the tumult in banking and interest rates still rising, many bank customers have been moving their money around, looking for safety and a better return on their deposits.

Apple recently launched a new savings account in partnership with Goldman Sachs. According to a report in Forbes, it attracted nearly a billion dollars in just the first four days after launch in late April, with a quarter-million accounts opened in the first week.

The new savings accounts are available to iPhone users with an Apple card, offering an eye-popping 4.15% annual return, much higher than most traditional banks.

Apple didn’t provide a comment by our deadline.

Amanda Jacobson Snyder at Morning Consult isn’t surprised the money’s been flowing in.

“To find a regular savings account that has fairly decent return — there’s not a lot of options,” she said. “So for Apple to offer something with more than 4% is really appealing.”

The average savings account currently pays less than 0.5%.

It is possible to find accounts offering as high interest as Apple, according to Alexander Yokum at CFRA Research, but they come mostly from online banks unfamiliar to many consumers.

“Given Apple’s brand — they have a large footprint, they’re very popular — I would expect them to have more inflows, for sure,” he said.

But there could be risks, said Karen Petrou at Federal Financial Analytics, as consumer-technology brands expand into banking. She worries about financial-data privacy and adequate regulation.

But most important, “It is really vital that deposits are FDIC insured,” she said.

Apple’s savings accounts, managed by Goldman Sachs, are covered up to $250,000.

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