What a racket
Monday, December 20th, 2004I keep a jar where spare change accumulates. After about 2 years, the jar fills, I take it to the bank, and cash it in.
Until now. It turns out that none of the Bank of America branches have coin counting machines. I found that to be ridiculous. They all referred me to the grocery store where I could use the Coinstar machine.
Coinstar, of course, takes 8.9% of your cash to give you cash. On my $72.05 saved over 2 years, they charged a whopping $6.41 service charge. That’s quite an ATM fee.
As I look at their website, I noticed that just last week, they announced their IPO at an astounding $25 / per share. Surprise, surprise - Bank of America is one of the underwriters along with JP Morgan. (I know, I know - the investment bank is supposed to be separate from the consumer bank. But we’ve seen hints that the separation isn’t very strong.)
So, what’s the best way for me to recoup my 8.9%? I could either buy my own coin counter or I could buy some shares of their stock.
At my current savings rate ($6.41 every 2 years), it would take me 17 years to pay off a personal coin counter. On the other hand, Coinstar’s latest financials show a significant accumulated deficit so it may be a while before my $6.41 would come back to me as a dividend.