Canadian High Interest Savings Bank Accounts

I noticed this too. HSBC and some other banks are above this…what happened? ICICI has almost always been the interest leader. Hopefully they put the interest rate back up before they lose people to the competition!

One thing to consider. Because they've been so much higher than everyone else, it may be catching up to them and eating away at their profit margin that it just was not sustainable and now they need to dramatically lower rates to catch up a bit then they'll raise them in line with the leader banks. They may see slower growth in new customers at these lower rates but their loyal, growing base of Indian customers will continue and their rates are still competitive so it won't make sense to move all your money for an extra 0.25%.

I've never had an ICICI Bank Canada account but am merely playing Devil's Advocate here. I continue to recommend the HSBC Direct Savings Account.

Cheers,
Doug

Jeff,

They'll still be higher than ICICI, even with the bonus interest. HSBC is among the strongest global financial institutions in the world and, in Canada, the Canadian operations are among its best performing ones. Even if they drop the base rate by say, 0.25 or 0.5 percent, with the bonus interest, they'll still be higher than ICICI.

Cheers,
Doug

I'd definitely like to see a lot of money move out of ING Bank of Canada. Their surcharge-free ATM network sucks, limited to major cities like Vancouver and Calgary where ING has branches. Their interest rate sucks – right now, RBC is tied with them and Scotia, BMO, HSBC and National Bank are all beating them.

Cheers,
Doug