You may need to make or receive payments from your clients overseas or you may need to regularly send money to your child(ren) studying abroad or you may need to make or receive payments in foreign currencies. Foreign currency accounts may help you manage one or more foreign currencies in an efficient manner while also saving on foreign currency conversion costs. Citibank offers a variety of foreign currency accounts to meet your needs. Let us examine them in a little more detail:
Citibank’s Foreign Currency Solutions
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Citi Access
This is an interest-bearing US dollar denominated checking account which offers the first cheque book free. You also get a free international ATM card for transactional flexibility and free cheque imaging printed on your monthly statements for better monitoring and tracking of your financial transactions. The minimum initial deposit required to open this account is US$5,000.
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Global Foreign Currency Account
This account allows you to hold money and transact in nine different currencies (Australian Dollar, Canadian Dollar, Euro, Hong Kong Dollar, Japanese Yen, New Zealand Dollar, Sterling Pound, Swiss Franc and US Dollar) from a single platform. Checking facility is also available albeit for the US Dollar only. You get a free international ATM card and free cheque imaging printed on your monthly statements for better monitoring and tracking of your financial transactions. The minimum initial deposit required to open this account is US$5,000.
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US$ Savings Account
This is an interest bearing savings account that enables users to transact in US Dollars and comes with a free international ATM card for transactional flexibility. Being a checking account, this account does not provide checking facilities. The minimum initial deposit required to open this account is US$5,000.
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US$ Checking Account
This is a non-interest bearing checking account that provides significant transactional flexibility through cheques and a free international ATM card. Personalized chequebooks are automatically replenished and you also get free cheque imaging printed on your monthly statements for better monitoring and tracking of your financial transactions. The minimum initial deposit required to open this account is US$5,000.
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Foreign Currency Time Deposits
This deposit product allows you to make deposits in 11 available currencies (Euro, Australian Dollar, New Zealand Dollar, Sterling Pound, Canadian Dollar, Swiss Franc, Japanese Yen, Hong Kong Dollar, US Dollar, Offshore Renminbi and South African Rand) for potentially higher interest rates than are available with Singapore Dollar-denominated deposits.
They are available for the following tenures: 1 week, 1 / 2 / 3 / 6 / 9 / 12 months. The minimum deposit required is S$10,000. Pre-termination of deposits incurs a penalty fee and may resulting in you getting lesser than the principal deposit amount. No pre-termination of the time deposit is allowed for CNH and ZAR currency.
Deposit Insurance
The Deposit Insurance Scheme of the Singapore Deposit Insurance Corporation protects depositors in the event a DI Scheme member (all full banks and finance companies licensed in Singapore and supervised by the Monetary Authority of Singapore are members of the scheme) fails by compensating insured deposits up to a maximum of S$50,000.
Singapore dollar savings accounts, fixed deposits, current accounts, and monies and deposits under the Supplementary Retirement Scheme are covered by the DI Scheme. Foreign currency deposits, dual currency investments, structured deposits and other investment products like unit trusts are not insured.
Citibank is a DI Scheme member and a number of Citibank’s Singapore dollar-denominated account products are protected under this scheme; however, the above listed foreign currency accounts are not covered by this scheme.