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Comment by lemcoe9 | Hacker News Reader

There are already dozens of secured credit cards for the credit-challenged: https://www.creditcards.com/secured/

The 5% back on Amazon.com purchases would give a slight edge to this new secured card.

5% back on only Amazon with a $120 annual fee (prime) is not very good.

Sure, if you weren't otherwise gonna get Prime, you'd have to spend $2400/year to break even. If you're one of Amazon's millions of Prime subscribers, it's a no-brainer.

Plus 28% APR, though I can't imagine holding a balance on a secured card.

Secured cards are held by irresponsible people who carry balances. Otherwise they would get unsecured cards.

Holding a balance does not mean you're irresponsible, it just means you will be paying interest.

Most secured cards have no rewards and many have a yearly fee. If you have prime anyways it's an amazing deal.

The target demographic might overlap with the set of people who are candidates for discounted prime membership.

Are there any other secured CCs which would have similar benefits?

If you buy anything on Amazon, but don't have a CC this may be better than 1% back.

CreditCards.com does a great job comparing different cards, and if I was in a credit-challenged situation I would go for the Discover It Secured card, which offers 2% back on all purchases.

The downside to that is that Discover is accepted at significantly fewer online vendors and retailers than Visa or Mastercard.

Futurama S1E06:

Fry: "Do you take Visa?"

Clerk: "Visa hasn't existed for five hundred years."

Fry: "American Express?"

Clerk: "Six hundred years."

Fry: "Discover Card?"

Clerk: "Hmm...sorry, we don't take Discover."

In many cases you may be able to obtain a secured line of credit from one of your local credit unions if you’re the type who likes keeping your money local. They tend to be more amenable to helping their members with credit rebuilding goals.

That was the path I took, but as with all things ymmv

Discover IT Secured is a great option.

https://www.discover.com/credit-cards/secured/

>Earn 2% Cash Back at gas stations and restaurants on up to $1,000 in combined purchases each quarter. Plus, earn unlimited 1% cash back on all other purchases

I hear it auto-converts to a regular, non-secured Discover IT after like six months or so.

This would only be worth it if you pay it off each month, as it has an insanely high interest rate of 28.24%- you can get a secured Discover card at 25.24% or 21.24% with Wells Fargo. You can do even better if you do with a credit union- DCU has secured cards around 13.75%.

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