Bank of Montreal (BMO)

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Ranking the Credit Card Portfolios of Each Canadian Financial Institutions (updated May 1, 2019)

ByMatt

I have been debating how often I should update this post. I decided on 6 months, and it has been the latest trend anyway. There has been several changes (though mostly in the bottom half of the rankings) to the industry in that period of time to warrant an update anyway. Most significantly, it was time to include Brim Financial and Cuets.Every time I write up an update, I generally try to have a theme throughout the post. This time around, I am going to emphasis more on the gap between the rankings.Below are my personal rankings of each company, along with a commentary and a list of some of my top credit card picks for each financial institution.

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Best Current First Year Fee Waived Cards for April 2019

ByMatt

For this month’s list, you’ll notice many promotions that ended in February that are off this list. There are times when promotions get extended, but other times not. This goes to show that if you do see a promotion that you like to go for it, and not necessarily risk waiting for a better offer.As March comes to an end, this was the first full month where we started a new trend of featuring a top credit card on our monthly lists. See the other two monthly lists on how we highlighted the featured card:Top Cash Back Credit C

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Top Cash Back Credit Card Offers for April 2019

ByMatt

We are well into 2019 now and most of the 2018 offers expired by the end of March. Going forward, we are looking at new offers. The reason I mention this is because there tends to be a theme each other. For example, high sign up bonuses (2013, 2017), strong cash back (2018), etc. So I am trying to figure out what the theme is. For now, it seems like we are still riding the momentum of a strong 2018 cash back year. 

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Top Credit Card Higher than Normal Sign Up Bonuses for April 2019

ByMatt

As we get deeper into 2019, we have a better idea of how things are shaping up. Till now, 2019 is shaping up to be a strong year for higher than normal credit cards sign up bonuses. If you’re looking for another round of credit card sign ups, to boost your miles and points portfolio, there may be some cards below to consider.

Featured Card
Personally, I am enjoying picking featured card(s) of the month, as it requires me to put more thought into my personal research when I consider my next cards to sign up for. For this month, I am going to give this honour to the TD First Class Travel Visa Infinite Card only with its 80,000 sign up bonus and first year fee waived offer.

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Best Current First Year Fee Waived Cards for March 2019

ByMatt

For this month’s list, you’ll notice many promotions that ended in February that are off this list. There are times when promotions get extended, but other times not. This goes to show that if you do see a promotion that you like to go for it, and not necessarily risk waiting for a better offer. 

As March comes to an end, this was the first full month where we started a new trend of featuring a top credit card on our monthly lists. See the other two monthly lists on how we highlighted the featured card:

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Top Cash Back Credit Card Offers for March 2019

ByMatt

In my last top credit cards post, I started a new trend of mentioning featured cards in each list. I thought I’d keep it going. For this month, there are actually two cards that are tied.

Also keep in mind that we also have an going Top Cash Back Credit Cards page which consists of permanent and temporary offers, while this post focuses primarily on temporary offers.

Featured Cards
The Meridian Visa Infinite Cash Back Card and Scotia Momentum Visa Infinite Card have virtually the same offers, features and benefits. The two key are the first year fee waived and 10% cash back on the first $2,000 in purchases. The main difference is that the Meridian card does not seem to have an end-date on its offer, but the cards is only available to Ontario residents. The Scotiabank card is more widely accepted.

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Credit Cards which offer Free Airport Lounge Access (updated March 9, 2019)

ByMatt

Due to the popularity of this post, I think it was due for an update. Along with several changes to the industry since the last time. The most significant addition is the CIBC Aventura cards. The most significant change is that BMO left Priority Pass in favour of MasterCard Airport Experiences.

Just to avoid confusion, this post refers to only cards that give at least 1 free lounge pass. It does not refer to cards that give you Priority Pass membership, but a fee to access the lounge.

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Top Credit Card Higher than Normal Sign Up Bonuses for March 2019

ByMatt

Quite a few promotions that were carrying over from 2018 came to an end last month. Some were extended and some were changed. This month is the beginning of many new 2019 offers. Several other 2018 promotions are coming to an end this month.

Featured Card
This is going to the be the first time that I give this idea a try. Every time I post a monthly top credit cards post, I will try to feature at least 1 credit card that I think is worth mentioning. There could be some months that I do not mention any cards. For this month, I would take a second look at the Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite Card.

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Top Cash Back Credit Card Offers for February 2019

ByMatt

This is the first cash back list of the year. Just like our other two lists…

Best Current First Year Fee Waived Cards
Top Higher than Normal Sign Up Bonus Offers
… most of the current offers are carried over from last year. Last year was probably the stronger cash back offers ever in Canada. As we begin the new year, I am a little torn. I like seeing the competition elevate in the credit card rewards industry. However, the more emphasis there is on cash back, the less there will be on miles and points.