Through March 31, Citibank is offering 40,000 Thank You Points for:
- Opening a checking account with a minimum of $1000 and then making one direct deposit ot two bill pays each month for three months, and
- Depositing $25,000 into a savings account.
The 40,000 Thank You Points will be deposited within 4 months of meeting the offer requirements.
Normally I’d be reluctant to recommend tying up $25,000 in a savings account currently paying ~3%. But that’s a far sight better return than I’ve gotten in equities so far this year…
And leveraged with the fixed point redemption chart, the 40,000 Thank You Points represent an additional $800 – $1200 retun in about seven months on top of that 3%.
How do you figure that 40,000 Thank You Points are worth $800 to $1,200? The best redemptions I know of are for $100 gift certificates at some popular stores for 10,000 points. That gives me, 40,000 Thank You Points = $400
Ah, never mind. I see now how you get more than $400 for 40,000 Thank You Points using travel awards. But it still looks like the best case is a $400 domestic ticket for 20,000 points or $800 for 40,000 points. How do you reach $1,200?
Fixed point redemption, premium class…
i think it’s lame when people trade comments/tips behind the scenes but don’t share them. i mean, isn’t that the whole point of boards such as flyertalk? especially when it comes to credit card offers….what, is citi going to pull the card because it becomes popular? i thought that was the point of marketing/advertising the card.
Obviously I share stuff pretty broadly, I mean just look back at some of the posts on this blog. But when someone shares something with me I honor the terms under which it was shared.
My understanding is you dont have to tie up the $25,000.00. You just need to open the account with those amounts, there is no time frame on how long the money has to stay in the acct.
For me, there will be a $12.50 monthly fee if my balance in all accts is under $6000.00. I have no problem paying approx $40(12.50 X 3mths)
to get myself 40000 pts. Plus, you don’t have to use the pts for travel, you can use them for whatever you want. So my $26,000 I used to open the accts, will be back on my home equity line 5 days after I took it out to open my accts.
All I can say is read the fine print. I did a similar offer last year and they had me running around in circles trying to conform to all the specific details.
Citi are going through some major challenges. I am seriously thinking about cashing in all my thankyou points before they go bankrupt!