Comments on: WTDirect $50 to $250 Signup Bonus

By: 10-4

10-4 — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 23:02:30 +0000

I misread the detail about the 0.5% returns. Thanks for the correction.

By: Madison

Madison — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 22:06:02 +0000

@ 10-4: As long as you have $10,000 in your account, they still pay the 3.06 % APY after the 60 days. It only drops to 0.5% APY once you dip below the $10,000. So that should be worth about an extra $30.

In addition, they weren’t totally clear on this part, but I think if you execute it exactly as their directions read, you can fund the account with, say $1 on 12/22/08. Then put in the whole $50,000 on 12/31/08.

That would reduce the number of days that you have to tie up the money, by about 9 days (and reducing the total earnings to right around $500 and bringing the rate to just above 6% APY.

In reality, you would have to tie up the money for a few extra days for transfers, so I think the actual rate is somewhere in between yours and mine. Like you said, still a good rate!

By: 10-4

10-4 — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:47:25 +0000

Thanks for the heads-up. I came up with a different return though. I calc 5.338% vs. your 6%+. Please check my math and tell me if I’m wrong. Here are my assumptions:

assume 50K invest.
Open the account as late as possible, i.e. 12/22/08.
Receive 3.06% APY for 60 days or until 2/20/09 (rate not guaranteed, btw).
The average balance formula is from 1/1/09 to 2/28/09 so must leave your money in thru 2/28/09 to avoid reducing your avg bal; Thus from 2/20/09 to 3/1/09 (9 days) you receive not 3.06%, but the lower rate of 0.5% APY.
Withdraw your money on 3/2/09, but keep acct open.
Receive bonus into your acct during the second week in March.

So you earn $248.35 for the first 60 days, $6.18 for the 9 days and the bonus of $250 for a total of $504.53 over 69 days of being invested. 5.338% APY. Still good rate (assuming rates hold).