KeyBank is offering a Canon Powershot A460 camera (5.0 MP, 4x Optical Zoom) for opening a checking account. Specifically, you must

1) Open a new KeyBank personal checking account between February 17, 2007 and March 30, 2007, and

2) Set up Direct Deposit and/or Automated Payments and complete two transactions each of $150 or more by June 1, 2007.

Both of these should be of minimal cost, as they have Free Checking with no maintenance fees or minimums, and you can just do two online transfers of $150 from another bank. Offer available only to individuals in a KeyBank-serviced area and also without an existing checking account as of February 16, 2007. Value of camera will be reported on a 1099-INT as taxable interest.

SunTrust Bank is offering a free roundtrip ticket on AirTran (16 bonus A+ Rewards credits) for depositing $10,000 of new money into a Premium Money Market Performance Account by March 9, 2007. You must keep it there for 90 days, and the account currently pays 2.25% APY. Doing some rough math, the interest rate difference from an online savings account paying 5% APY for this period would be about $75. That seems like a good price for those that could use it.

You must also reside in AL, AR, DC, FL, GA, MD, MS, NC, SC, TN, VA, or WV. Here’s the rest of the fine print:
[Read more…]

ETrade is offering a $25 bonus for opening a Complete Savings account with at least $1. It is currently paying 5.05% APY with no minimum balance and no account fees. For more information, see my E-Trade Bank Complete Savings Feature Review. Expires February 28, 2007.

E-Trade is my financial arch-nemesis. I still have an IRA there with 18 cents in it that I cannot close. I even tried opening one of these savings accounts, filling out the entire application and getting an account number. A week later, they didn’t withdraw my deposit and nothing showed up online. After another week of multiple e-mails and an hour on hold, still no account. I feel like their money-saving model is “ignore them until they give up”. Am I the only one?

Thanks to K via BankDeals via Shraz for the tip.

PayPal is offering a $15 rebate on any single purchase of $30 or more between February 8 and March 31. Valid anywhere PayPal is accepted in the U.S. and Canada, including eBay. You must register your primary e-mail here first.

I always buy my dog’s flea medication from eBay anyways (cheapest price I could find), so it works out great for me. Thanks Tom for the tip.

Added: The page has changed since I first posted this. It appears now to be only open for certain people. For a while, it was available to everyone and even on the front page of PayPal. Bummer.

Right now Skype is giving out 24 free minutes of calling in celebration of Chinese New Year. Yes, it’s only worth 50 cents. But I’d pick up two quarters off the street any day. Kung Hei Fat Choi!

Wachovia Bank is offering a $50 sign-up bonus for opening one of their Free Checking accounts. The account looks pretty good, with no monthly service fee, no minimum balance, and no direct deposit requirement. However you will get a hard credit pull and you need to open with at least $100. You also have to be a little patient:

Account must be opened in good faith and remain in good standing through 04/30/2007 in order to be eligible for the offer. Account must be funded with a minimum opening deposit of $100. Offer expires on 04/01/2007. […] The $50 bonus will appear in the form of a credit to the account within 60 days of the offer expiration date.

Overall, it looks good if you have a lot of Wachovia’s around and need a low-maintenance local bank account. The interest rates on their savings accounts are awful, so link it up to an online savings account paying 5% APY. Thanks to JP for the tip.

For everyone that joined me in the Hedgestreet iPod promotion, your patience should be rewarded shortly. In fact, I’d check your inbox for an e-mail titled “HedgeStreet iPod Shuffle Promotion” if you haven’t gotten it already.

I think I should be getting two more of these puppies later for the referrals I gave out (thanks!), as I got multiple iPod e-mails. I decided that one of these will be given away as a prize for my Make A Goal Experiment. The other one, we’ll have to see…

If you did it right, the $79 Shuffle should have cost under $3 – or maybe you even made money! This is another one of my little activities that nets me an extra few thousand dollars a year. Here’s to free stuff!