Some 650,000 people joined credit unions last month, more than all of last year combined. On “Bank Transfer Day” alone, there were 40,000 new accounts opened at credit unions. And even before #OccupyWallStreet and the Bank of America fee outrage, a summer survey found that the biggest 10 banks stood to lose about 10% of their deposits in the coming year just because of customer disgust — $185 billion out of $2 trillion in “retail deposits.” Imagine what a 20% retreat would do, or 40%. This CNN story has a great suggestion from some credit website guy: “I can see a ‘dump my bank’ as a popular [New Year's] resolution this year.” Might work better on January 3, when banks are open. But it’s still a great idea!
We don’t know anything about the actual amount of retail and corporate deposits in the nation’s biggest banks, but the Top 10 evil Wall Street banks reportedly have about $3 trillion total in deposits — $2 trillion from individuals and small businesses, and another $1 trillion from the big corporations. It would probably hurt the banks plenty if, say, half of all consumers (don’t you love that word, “consumers”?) took their hobo beans out and put ‘em in the local community credit union.
Pretty soon, those Wall Street dildos would have to learn how to do real work for a living, like giving blowjobs in Penn Station for $5 a pop. [Think Progress and CNN/Cryptogon via tipster "Garonymous"]
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Eh, I wouldn't want a blowjob from some Bank of America douche. It'd be all like, extra $5 for tongue. Extra $5 and I'll touch your balls. Extra five bucks … And you see where that's going. Whores.
you should always get the #2: blow job combo. it's always cheaper that way. if you go big for an extra .99 cents they won't take blackmail pics of you during the act.
If it's all the same, I prefer my left hand to having any B of A scum touching my privates. You never know what you'll catch.
Matt Skiba – Good Fucking Bye http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyJDRRvnFFc
I took my money out of a bank and into a credit union several years ago, and this makes me proud that I've been buckin' the system for awhile, but also a little wistful I am not part of the big symbolic action of moving money the fuck out of a bank en masse.
Maybe you could go to a bank and pretend you're going to open an account, or several, and then at the last minute you can yell "Ha, ha, PSYCH!" and run out.
This is officially MY New Year's resolution
But dress real nice, maybe rent an Aston Martin Lagonda to drive up in, and act like you've got a couple million you're going to leave in their vaults, to really get their juices flowing before you pull the rug out.
I'm just going to rent one of those big ass vans and get my roommate to idle outside. Little will they know it doesn't have any gold buttons and smells of disinfectant.
To fuck over my big corporate bank – who I left years ago for the credit union as well – I park in their parking lot whenever I'm in that area of downtown. Free parking bitch! I'll get my money for all those questionable fees back, one hour at a time!
Take $100 in cash, go to a bank and open a savings account. The next day come back and close account. Go to next bank and open saving account, etc etc. The costs to them to open and close will be satisfying to you, presuming you don't have anything much better to do.
As you're waiting for them to process the account-closing paperwork, pull out your cellphone and tell them "It says here you were a prime underwriter of subprime mortgages and you bought billions in CDOs and CMOs! I can't have an account with you!"
[Doesn't matter which bank you do this at, they're all guilty.]
Remember, the underpaid chodney handling you will have to give management a reason why you walked out. This way, you send a message and protect a jerb.
Yeah, like anyone here has a hundred bucks.
I do… but only because I am refusing to pay my mortgage until they "work with me" on lowering my interest rate.
So I figure I will be in the house my kid grew up in for another 6-8 months or so. I have worked extremely hard to keep it on a single dad's income for the past 12 years and I make enough (apparently) to pay $1600 per month but not $1250… Fuck those Assholes… this is MY protest… since I could NEVER sit idly while someone pepper sprayed me in the face.
I joined my credit union / left commercial banks behind 39 years ago, and I'm not wistful at all. There's lots of things I'm not happy about in my life, but banking isn't one.
Me too. I transferred my account to a credit union last year and wish I'd done it years earlier. I thought about reopening an account at my old loathesome bank, then closing it out on Bank Transfer Day, just for the solidarity!
Fuck a bank. In fact, sideways chainsaw assfuck a bank.
I only wish I could be so eloquent… beautiful.
Well, hey, now I don't feel so bad about being too lazy to get my shit together to transfer my accounts on "Bank Transfer Day." The bastards probably thought "oh, hey, only 650K, that's not SO bad." Here's to a frillion more people switching!
(And if I make it my New Year's Resolution, I can be lazy about it for another few weeks.)
Oh, just get on with it.
Really. Do it NOW.
Dump them right before New Years, then they will haz a sad on New Years eve and cry in their 15 dollar swank-tini
Hey bankers, if that blowjob gig doesn't work out for you, there are plenty of jobs in Alabama and Georgia slicing up dead animals or picking tomatoes. Just have your papers handy and get used to working for piece rates instead of wages.
If it makes them feel better, "piece rates" could be renamed "bonuses."
A lot of them get piece rates… however, way too large a rate for the piece.
I joined my local credit union this morning. That's right, I am too cool to do things with the crowd (translation: I procrastinated).
Banks refer to their clients as "consumers."
Credit unions should refer to their clients as preservers.
Actuallly, credit union clients are "members". You JOIN a credit union, become an owner, and get to vote for the directors (one vote per member — no one-percenters making you irrelevant with their millions of votes.)
It sounds almost soshulizmic, so it might be hard to get the teabaggers on board, but it's a great system if you can find one where you qualify for membership.
Also too, as many of us have frequently said, if you're a vet, USAA Federal Savings Bank is better than most credit unions (I do both).
Navy Federal CU is offering 3% on CDs max $3K. Better than anywhere else.
Not hard to find one in L.A. – I found First City CU and the restrictions are that you have to live, work or worship in L.A. Who's going to say you don't fly in from Minneapolis to go to church here every week?
Also, they have no-fee ATMs at every 7-11 in the area.
Soylent Green is…is…credit union preserves!
Q: Who's that green guy in the Santa Suit?
A: Next month's GOP frontrunner.
Any relation to Newt Gingrinch?
I see what you did there.
The Gingrinch.
I propose we start referring to him as Gin Grinch.
That title has been reserved for John Boehner.
I thought we had pegged him asThe Whiskey Weeper?
Turkey… Briner.
Right now, there is some junior banking exec somewhere thinking, "I know what to do. We're losing customers, so let's just raise our fees and make up for the lost revenue that way. I know, brilliant huh?" Of course it won't work! Et viola, another job producer is promoted to upper management with a huge bonus…so he can go out and create more jobs. Everybody wins!
Then: fire a bunch of tellers who aren't scheduled enough hours to qualify for benefits. Become a Republican Hero!
Silly person, you don't fire the part-timer-no-bennies employees. You convert the full-timer-entitlement-suckers into part-timers.
"I can see a 'dump my bank' as a popular [New Year's] resolution this year," said Ulzheimer.
I quit the bank for a credit union over 30 years ago. I think my New Year's resolution will be to take a dump* in a bank.
*not just for NYC police cars any more.
According to greater wingnuttia, democracy is under attack by democracy, we must end democracy immediately!
Teabaggers would happily live under a bridge in a cardboard box and eat rat on a stick as long as whoever they deem undeserving – queers, non-Christians, non-whites – don’t get a rat or a stick.
They're spiteful sumabitches, ain't they?
spiteful and powerful
Wow, hammer, nail head, done.
For you Mr. Norton.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dY-FOI-9SOE
"We fry what you won't touch!"
So, according to the alt-text we know the following:
The Grinch is Jesus.
The Grinch is bad.
The Grinch is green.
This can only mean one thing: The Grinch is Jesús Malverde
not recognized as a saint by the Roman Catholic Church.
Just like Ronald Reagan.
The reverse is actually much more accurate. By his second term he didn't recognize anybody and he called his fucking wife 'Mommy.'
I'd have sworn he was the chupacabra.
Or was that Gingrich?
this New Year's eve everyone instead of getting mega hammered and having random slut sex. Get mega hammered and have a three way with random stranger and credit union.
Slowly, but surely, we're pulling the vampire squid's blood funnel out of us…
damn. this shit feels good.
I read this comment right after Negropolis' comment just above.
Together, they are vaguely disturbing.
The big banks were all "meh, we don't care, smaller depositers like these protesters have puny balances that don't pay us for our trouble." And I'm thinking, even with 12.5-to-1 leverage, they don't? That seems a bit counterintuitive.
Yeah, leverage is sort of the ACL of fractional reserve banking.
Guess this is why they moved all the actual cash into the investment arms and are backing the deposits with notional instruments. Go ahead, take your small money out, we just slowly trickle off some of these derivatives to compensate you and keep the actual cash for ourselves.
And my people said, leadeth me to land of membership and considered input, and cram a red hot poker up their bums, in thy mercy.
Big banks were already constantly pushing anti-CU legislation in the years before this transfer stuff started. When credit unions are outlawed, only outlaws will…
My money is in a credit union now and while I know the banks make the big bucks off of the billions they hold in corporate deposits I also know they make a shitload by nickel and diming the common folks with their bullshit fees. The fewer little guys they have, the more they fuck the ones that are left and that will drive them off as well. Lets see how the corporate account holders like making up that slack. Fuckheads.
Americans when they vote with their feet are unstoppable ! These banks are out of control.
For years I've been been evangelizing the benefits of Credit Unions and finally everyone has listened to me. I take full credit. (However, the banks will try to figure out a way to fuckover the CUs, which they have been trying to do for years now anyway. This will probably get them fired up to renew their attacks.)
Next step: Goldman Credit Union, Chase Credit Union, City Credit Union, Bancamerica Credit Union. Where there's a buck, there's a way. Beware.
HA!! this news is like porn to me.
Here in Noo Yawk, bank branches are as ubiquitous as Duane Reade drugstores, Starbucks, and Staten Island whitefish.
There's a law that requires a bank to have X number of branches in a district before they can underwrite mortgages and real estate development. Joke's on you, f**ktards!
Which doesn't change my view that their management should be collectively a**raped, sideways, with rusty curare-tipped chainsaws.
Pretty soon, those Wall Street dildos would have to learn how to do real work for a living, like giving blowjobs in Penn Station for $5 a pop.
You get $5? Holy shit, which section do you work?
All of them, Katie.
[Well, somebody had to do it.]
I moved the majority of my Ameros on or about Bank Transfer Day, but I still have a few coins rattling around at Chase because I'm trying to ensure that nothing pops up and automatically debits. So I haven't had the satisfaction of giving Chase the double bird … YET.
But I will.
Also too:
http://www.indecisionforever.com/files/2010/05/on…
a dildo giving a blow job. i think you need some kind of adapter for that.
This story reminded me more of Home Alone 2, what with the little guy taking an old empty apartment (the economy) and trapping the bad guys in it and also the hotel folks (of whom I assume are evil, too) than The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, but whatever. You're the snark-experts around here…
There was a Home Alone 2? With what that kid did to survive and what he learned I would imagine the next time his parents forgot and left him somewhere the movie would be called Orphan and I would see it often.
2? there was a Home Alone 3.
with a vengeance.
Was there a "Home Alone 4: Child Protective Services Comes Calling"?
Some may not agree, but it was one of those rare series where the sequel was almost as good as the original.
The third and fourth ones? Well, those were cynical money grabs and nothing more.
Looks like I never saw any Home Alone sequel. That raises the question; “Who else never saw a Home Alone sequel?”
You have to see Home Alone 2. It's every bit the masterpiece the original was, maybe moreso (Kevin outsmarts the regular villains AND the hotel management, as well!)
Home Alone 3 was alright, but it didn't feel like a Home Alone movie. It felt like your average 'spys vs. some kid' movie and the traps were lame and uninspired.
Home Alone 4 is toxic and should not be consumed by people and other living things. It has the actor who played Harry from 3rd Rock From The Sun though…
I said, "Fuck you!" to the bank and now all my money is in a hobo bean can. (I never had a bank account.)
Soldier on, Švejk. But aren't you sorry to be giving up that sweet 0.35% a year in interest? With that kind of return, you could easily cover a tenth of the hidden fees.
For what it's worth, I have accounts with various French banks and one in Switzerland (of course). All except one are either "mutual" or "cooperative" banks, meaning they're depositor owned. The major difference between them is that the latter do not engage in crazy financing and investments, although one of the coop banks is part of a group that includes an investment entity which does some fairly risky business and trading.
Other than that, they charge pretty much the same standard fees and offer similar services, but the mutual and coop banks are more consumer friendly (better terms on mortgages, etc.). If reduced fees is what you're after, in this country nothing beats the Internet banks, but these are part of large corporate groups.
Another, more radical alternative could be bitcoins (wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin).
I have a bank account in France, because I have collaborators there that I visit for at least a few weeks every year. Getting it taught me that what they say about French bureaucracy is true. First I couldn't get one at all until I had actually had an official paying position at a French job for a couple of months. I was only allowed to open an account at one specific branch, associated with the professional category I was in. The bank agent at that branch acted as if my presence was an insulting waste of his time. Every time a Canadianism slipped out of my lips he looked at me as if I had just spit on the floor. (OK, real French people haven't used "pis" to mean "and" since Molière's time. Ben oui, I know that. But 'ostie tabernak, I was jetlagged and tired. Slipped out. Tête chnouteux.) And then on top of that they charge me 25 euros a year for a bank card. Which is necessary because the branch is tiny, has short hours, and is prone to being just suddenly closed for no evident reason, without warning.
So yeah, I can recommend France for many reasons, but I wouldn't bank there unless you have to.
Edit: And as far as this side of the Atlantic is concerned – employee's credit union south of the border and Caisse Populaire up north.
The reason that sounds familiar, is because those are the original credit unions.
Here's to Momma Dollar and Poppa Dollar!….(in the spirit of the season)…
"giving blowjobs in Penn Station for $5 a pop." You need to join the union.
Mr. Potter: [to George Bailey] Look at you. You used to be so cocky. You were going to go out and conquer the world. You once called me "a warped, frustrated, old man!" What are you but a warped, frustrated young man? A miserable little clerk crawling in here on your hands and knees and begging for help. No securities, no stocks, no bonds. Nothin' but a miserable little $500 equity in a life insurance policy.
[Potter chuckles]
You're worth more dead than alive!
What makes me happiest about all this is the money being transferred to institutions called "credit unions." Yeah, that's right, Wingtards! UNIONS! ha ha!
Banks bleeding green is half the Yule Season colors. Onward to getting their ledgers in the red to complete the festive pair.
This should be on bumper stickers and billboards.
Thanks Wonkette for talking about bleeding today, I have a dentist's appointment in a couple of hours, I have to have a tooth pulled, luckily my dentist gave me some valium for my fear , so I will be commenting ,on here ,high as a kite later on today.
Insist on something for the pain as well.
My dentist is fantastic, she is about 35 , very cute and always very generous with the pain medication.
How can I get in touch??
She is on the Upper West Side, she truly is my dream dentist!
Valium with a gin chaser, perhaps?
Hope it ain't a front tooth, though in my fantasies, a British washerwoman with a missing front tooth is as sexy as a French maid is to others. Still got the language hurdle, however.
No, luckily it is a molar, so my beauty will not be diminished.
This just in – Bank of America will now be known as "The Credit Union of US America", and CitiBank is changing to "Small Town Credit Union Cooperative". Also, the cost of the name changes will be passed on to consumers as "f- you, worthless drones – who do you think you are?" fees.
*smug satisfaction*
In addition to credit unions, there are still small local banks who weren't wrapped up in all the mess that BOA, Chase, and the others were.
Yes. I have accounts at Flyover State Bank as well as my CU. Funny, my CU is in an adjacent state and not at all convenient to me, but they're more willing to loan me money that I don't want or need than my bank branch 7 miles from home.
I do the same. I have my checking and savings at a local bank, then a small account at a credit union that is inconvenient but nice as heck and they give me very low interest car loans and the like.
I'd like to say that I made the switch upon my first hearing of Mojo's "I Hate Banks" back in the mid-80s, but in fact I started with the credit union in high school, about 10 years prior to that. I still get the occasional comment from the tellers on my Early Man account number. I tell them that when I opened my account, they (the tellers) were still using abacuses (abaci?).
I am waiting for news of Bank of America's demise without my $185 keeping them solvent.
I'll keep my account with the big bank, but most of my funds are still tied up in a diversified portfolio of Enron and pets.com stock.
Is it true when you cut a banker with a rusty utility blade, that they bleed Kugerrands?
Only one way to find out…
Brecht: "What is robbing a bank compared with founding a bank?"
Now let's fuck with them some more by trying to deposit chickens and livestock in lieu of cash.
I will stay, if only for the $100 customer bonus, double points for waking up every day, and pony rides. And a toaster.
It's eleven fucking O'Clock and finally some good news today.
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