Hi, was is your opinion on this offering from swissquote?

https://en.swissquote.com/sites/swis...itions_en_.pdf

seems quote convenient:

TWELVE
CURRENCIES.
ZERO FEES*.

You need to be a Swissquote trading customer to apply.

First year is free, then CHF100/200 silver/gold card (Mastercard).

So I pay 1.75% to convert to CHF with my current MasterCard. This means I would need to spend 5,714 or 11,428 to make Swissquote‘s deal worth it.

Of course if you pay for your cc, then the deal looks good. Also it comes down to a question of what rate of exchange they use...

Are you sure about that? 1.75% is what they charge explicitly on top of an already ridiculous exchange rate, all in all it's prob 4-5%

Last time I checked they were charging ~ 1% to convert currency, but the point of this card seems to be that you don't have convert money with them, you can bring in your currency from elsewhere then it won't cost any extra, just the yearly fee

It appears not to be a credit card, since you must have the funds in your account.

I had a look a few days back as they sent me the newsletter about it, as I have a trading account with them which I stopped using ages ago due to high fees.

It seems convenient on the surface but the devil is in the detail. The Zero Fees doesn’t hold water. Because they have zero annual fees upfront and then start charging them in later years. Also the 12 currencies have to be on your account with them to pay the bills otherwise they will convert automatically and charge fees on top. If you do exchange money directly and ensure you cash in the right currency, my experience with them is that they charge around 0.5-0.75% per exchange depending on the currency and the amount.

Seems to me like a free call option for them to charge you fees that could be avoided all together and to sucker you into other trading services.

I wouldn’t bother, Revolut beats this offering hands down, even the Transferwise card is probably better.

Nice try Swissquote. Try harder.

Thanks. Revolut has been recommended by someone else as well. I have to try it out.

Do you use Revolut as your only cc?

Can recommend Revolut. It was a blessing last time when I went on holidays in the UK and directly after that had to go to the US. Just swapped my EUR into GBP and then into US. Conversion rates are execellent, although I have heard that these are not as good during the weekend

I have been using Revolut for 6 months and am very satisfied with their offering.


The forex conversion rates are hands down the best on the consumer market.


They do charge a markup of 0.5% on the weekends but the simple solution to that is to just convert your weekend-needed-amount on Friday and then use it over the weekend without paying any fees.


The only downside is that the card is not accepted at certain automated petrol stations.


Topping up Revolut free of cost is a slight hassle. You need to transfer funds from your Swiss bank account to a Transferwise borderless account (CH IBAN) and then load up the Revolut card with the Transferwise debit card.


The transfer to Transferwise takes 1 day and the Revolut load-up is instantaneous.

For my CHF transactions I still mix and match as I get points from my credit card company (Swisscard) and for online bookings / travel insurance it might make a difference. I plan to eventually just use them but haven’t fully switched.

For U.K. transactions I have a UK credit card still so rarely use Revolut.

For everything else I swear by it. In Germany, France or while on holiday in countries where they support the currency and specially where they allow you to hold the currency as this makes it more cost effective when you can convert to the holding currency during the week to avoid the weekend mark-up. I’ve used it mainly for EUR, USD, ISK, HRK, TRY.