Here’s another long-term CD with such a small early withdrawal penalty that it’s a better bet than the top-paying short-term CDs.

It’s Ally Bank’s 5-year certificate of deposit.

The online bank of GMAC Financial combines an above-average interest rate with the most lenient early withdrawal penalty we know of — just two months worth of interest.

That allows savers to cash out after just a year or two, pay the penalty, and still out-earn the best 12- or 24-month CDs.

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Think of your mailbox before the Great Recession. You got bills, grocery store circulars, invitations and magazines, but crowding them all out, we bet, were credit card offers.

Credit card issuers mailed five to seven billion offers a year from 2004 to 2007, according to Mintel Comperemedia, which tracks such things.

But when the economy tanked, default rates soared and billion-dollar losses caused banks to become much stingier with new cards.

After hearing that only 2 billion offers went out last year, we wondered who was still on the mailing list.

The answer, it turns out, is older adults with lots of money and good credit.

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The best CD rates on the five terms we’ve regularly tracked held steady over the past week.

We can only hope that remains the case with the Federal Reserve reiterating its determination to hold interest rates at record lows for the foreseeable future.

We’re also adding 60-month CDs to our rundowns of the top-paying certificates of deposit.

Some 5-year CDs have such lenient early withdrawal penalties that it’s possible to make more money with them than with short-term CDs, even if you cash them in after just one or two years.

Here’s an up-to-date rundown of the leading, nationally available CD rates:

3-month CD: 1.25% APY from Fortune Bank with a $1,000 minimum deposit.

6-month CD: 1.50% APY from Country Bank with a $500 minimum deposit.

12-month CD: 1.90% APY from Doral Bank Direct with a $1,000 minimum deposit.

24-month CD: 2.30% APY from Atlantic Coast Bank with a $1,000 minimum deposit.

36-month CD: 2.75% APY from Alliance Bank with a $1,000 minimum deposit.

60-month CD: 3.36% APY from EverBank with a $1,500 minimum deposit.

Click here to see how much you can earn with these rates using our certificate of deposit calculator.

We’re adding the high-yield checking account at Danversbank to our list of favorites.

It’s paying 4.01% APY on balances up to $25,000 — a rate that’s almost impossible to find these days, even on 7-year CDs — with free ATM use and no monthly fees.

Although the rate on these accounts is always variable, Danversbank hasn’t changed its return since April 2008.

That’s admirable stability from the 150-year-old bank in Danvers, Mass., that has more than 30 branches in the Boston area.

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We thought the Chase Freedom Visa card had one of the best cash reward programs when we wrote about it last fall.

Now Chase has increased the bonus rebate for its “seasonal rewards” from 3% to 5%. (The standard rebate for all other purchases remains 1%.)

Each quarter of the year represents a season, and this spring (April through June) the big rebate will be available on furniture, home improvement and gardening products.

This summer (July through September) the emphasis switches to travel, and you’ll get 5% back on airline tickets, hotel bills and rental car fees.

In the fall (October through December) you’ll be rewarded for shopping at grocery stores, movie theaters and department stores — which is handy if that’s where you do your Christmas shopping.

We still don’t think Chase Freedom is quite as good a deal as the Cash Plus card the bank stopped offering several years ago.

It offered 5% cash back on purchases at gas stations, drug stores and supermarkets, and 1% on all other spending, which seems like a more consistently lucrative rebate for most consumers.

But with many cards scaling back their reward programs, Chase is making a good offer even better.

The new, improved rebate starts today. Click here to apply for, or learn more about, the Chase Freedom Visa card.

Fortune Bank, with a single branch in suburban St. Louis, held onto the top spot in our 3-month CD rankings for the second straight month.

It continues to pay 1.25% on this certificate of deposit with a $1,000 minimum deposit.

Only six months ago TotalBank was paying a top rate of 1.85% on 3-month CDs and other top-ranked banks were offering 1.5%.

But as disappointing as that may be, all of today’s top rates are three times better than the national average of 0.33% — which is practically like giving the bank your money for free.

Here are the other top nationally available rates:

1.14% APY with a $10,000 minimum deposit from Golf Savings Bank, with 38 branches in Washington, Montana, Idaho and Oregon.

1.11% APY with a $1,000 minimum deposit from Nexity Bank, an online bank based in Birmingham, Ala.

1.11% APY with a $10,000 minimum deposit from Excel National Bank, a single-location bank in Beverly Hills, Calif.

1.11% APY with a $10,000 minimum deposit from BankDirect, an online bank based in Dallas.

Click here to see how much you can earn with these rates using our certificate of deposit calculator.

Here’s a trick Citibank pulled before the Credit Card Accountability and Responsibility Act took effect last month in an effort to circumvent the new regulations.

Two of the act’s most important provisions require credit cards to:

• Provide 45 days notice before raising rates, and the new higher rate can’t be imposed on existing balances, just new purchases.
• Wait until customers are 60 days behind on their payments before imposing a higher penalty rate on their accounts.

But Citi mailed a change of terms letter to some customers before the act took effect that allows it instantly raise the interest rate from 8.99% to 29.99% despite the new regulations.

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A couple of months ago we advised against buying long-term CDs at the bottom of a rate cycle.

The common wisdom is to go long at the top of a rate cycle and short at the bottom.

Some of our readers disagreed with that strategy, arguing that it’s possible to make more money with long-term CDs than short-term CDs even if you have to bail early and pay a penalty.

So we decided to test that theory with the best nationally available 5-year CDs.

One would indeed pay more than the best short-term CDs if you cashed it in after just one or two years.

But the early withdrawal penalties on the other two are so onerous that you could actually lose money if you take your savings out too soon.

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The nation’s largest bank, and biggest issuer of debit cards, is finally doing the right thing.

Bank of America will stop letting customers overdraw their checking accounts just so it can zing them with hefty overdraft fees.

Starting this summer, it will decline purchases that overdraw a customer’s checking account and inform them that they’ll have to pay an overdraft fee before allowing them to withdraw more money than they have in their account from an ATM.

With Citigroup already pursuing a similar policy, we can only hope other banks will get the message and follow suit.

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