I'm opening an eMoney Market account at VirtualBank today.
The move is mostly triggered by the deteriorating competitiveness of NetBank Money Market account. I have been parking my free cash in NetBank account since November 2002, and for the most of the period, NetBank used to offer very competitive rates. However, yesterday I checked out NetBank, the APY on the Money Market account is only 1.80%. (That actually becomes a highlight in NetBank's most recent earning release: "[i]mprovement in the bank's net interest spread to 175 basis points (bps), an increase of 21 bps from the previous quarter.")
Bankrate.com pointed me to VirtualBank, which offers an eMoney Market account paying 2.15% APY. The 35 basis points difference is not much, but still amounts to more than $50 considering my average balance expectations for the next 12 months. (I will record this as a CFI initiative for 2004.)
Plus, unlike NetBank which does not have ACH transaction interface (and forces me to use Datek as an intermediary to transfer funds across different banks), VirtualBank offers free ACH transaction, which will make my actions to sweep funds to money market account easier.
[8/3/04] If you would like to open a VirtualBank account, please take a look at this referral deal. We can both come $20 ahead if you give me an email before applying to VirtualBank. Thanks!