Cash is King Again and I’m Glad I Saved

It’s been a long time coming, but savers are finally being rewarded again with higher interest rates on savings accounts and CDs. Cash is King again!!

While it’s no match for the 8%+ inflation rate we are dealing with, I’d rather earn 3% on my cash than be losing 25%+ on my investments.

For a long time, especially during the Covid pandemic, it was dumb to save money. You earned next to nothing and the stock market was booming. Outside of your emergency fund, savings was viewed as silly.

Well, I was dumb!

Yep, while I did invest, I didn’t feel right about pushing so much into the market. It just didn’t give me the warm and fuzzies. So I stocked up on cash like a squirrel rounding up acorns for the winter. I had no idea what I was going to do with the cash, but it made me feel protected.

And let’s be honest, I sleep better at night when I feel protected. Earning crazy returns on the stock market is excellent, but now that we are in a bear market, my investments are taking a damn beating.

Saver’s Rejoice

Ever since I got out of my credit card debt debacle, I’ve become a saver. I liked the cushion it provided me and I didn’t want to walk back into thousands of debt again.

So I saved, and saved…and saved some more.

While I realize as I’ve grown older (it’s been 10 years since paying off that last credit card) that I should have been investing more, I’m correcting that now and have been for the last few years. While I know time and compounding interest wins the same, I knew I couldn’t even play that game until I got my money head right. And that is what saving my cash did for me.

Savings Rates Increase

As the Fed continues to push their rates higher and higher, this is kicking back to us savers who have high interest online savings accounts. If you are the crazy people who still save in a traditional bank, you need to wake up and move your money. Traditional banks still pay around 0.10% while online banks are paying around 3% (as of October 2022).

Online Bank	Interest Rate
CIT Bank	3.0%
Ally Bank	2.35%
Live Oak Bank	2.30%
Synchrony Bank	2.45%
Discover Bank	2.30%
Marcus by Goldman Sachs	2.35%
Capital One 360	2.30%

Over the past few months, I’ve been getting email after email from my savings accounts telling me their are increasing their rate. I don’t even have to do anything to earn more.

My accounts went from earning 0.50% back in March of this year to now 3% as of this post (October 2022). That is a massive increase all considering.

But I know there will be several people saying you are still losing out to inflation and they are correct. I am, but this is at least cutting my loss down to 6% or less instead of 20%+ with my investments in the stock market.

Am I stopping my automatic investments into the market though? Hell no! I will keep those going to keep up with my dollar cost averaging that tends to do so well over time. Plus, I have no desire to try to time the market. That’s a game I just won’t even play.

My plan for the end of 2022 and at least into 2023 is to continue stacking cash away in my various online savings accounts and still dollar cost averaging my stock market investments and hoping the latter finally pops back up.

What are you doing with your cash?

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