A Florida bank has received a fair amount of digital ink over a clever marketing ploy.

Open a 5-year, $1 million CD and drive home a Mercedes-Benz.

You’ll earn no interest, but you’ll get the car up front, with sales tax and other fees paid for (although you’re on the hook for the income tax hit, and you’re only individually FDIC insured up to $250,000).

Good for you if you have a million bucks to pour into a CD. Just don’t pick this one. It’s a gimmick that will cost you.

Instead, put your money into the top nationally available credit union deal on our list of the highest CD rates.

After five years, you’ll have earned enough cash to pay for two Mercedes.

As for the rest of us, our weekly list is just as valuable. Click here to read more

Capital One has blanketed the airwaves with the message that its Cash Card pays “50% more” than other cash-back rewards cards, most of which pay only a 1% rebate.

Now Bank of America has taken the “50% more” concept to travel points with its new BankAmericard Travel Rewards credit card (www.bankofamerica.com/creditcards).

The idea is to reward your loyalty: the longer and more frequently you use the card, the more points you get. Click here to read more

Here’s hoping HomeBanc’s special 3-month CD rates bring short-term deals back in style.

It pays 1.15% APY with a $5,000 minimum deposit of new money.

That’s half of a percentage point higher than the top nationally available 3-month CD rate on our CD Rates Leaderboard. Click here to read more

If you live in Indiana, Michigan or Ohio, you can earn 1.40% APY on your savings account — well above the best nationally available offer — though you’ll also need to open a rewards checking account to earn the top rate.

Farmers & Merchants State Bank (www.fm-bank.com) based in Archbold, Ohio, pays 1.40% APY on balances up to $40,000 with its Kasasa Saver account.

But to take advantage of that savings rate, you must also open a free Kasasa Cash rewards checking account, which pays 2.50% APY on balances up to $15,000. Click here to read more

A couple months back, we wrote about all the great deals on CD rates available to Iowa residents.

Texas is another state where yields are plentiful — especially in this environment of low interest rates.

There are even some institutions that still have offers approaching (and, in one case, hitting) 3%.

Remember, we lost the last nationally available 3% yield in September 2011. Click here to read more

Credit card issuers are notorious for charging their customers extra fees, either for bad credit behavior or, well, just because they think they can get away with it.

In recent years, however, Congress has passed a number of laws that make it more difficult for issuers to charge hidden fees, either by banning them outright or by making banks give their customers the choice to “opt in” to accept the fees.

But one practice the federal government hasn’t curbed is the use of foreign transaction fees — an extra charge credit card companies impose when one of their cards is used to make an international purchase in person or online. Click here to read more

Michigan savers can score two great deals on CD rates at mBank, including a 48-month certificate of deposit that pays well more than the best 5-year CDs.

With a $250 minimum deposit, mBank pays:

• 1.75% APY on 36-month CDs.
• 2.25% APY on 48-month CDs.

The 3-year deal pays two-tenths of a percentage point better than the top nationally available 36-month CD rates on our CD Rates Leaderboard. Click here to read more

A number of banks have offered rate guarantees on deposit accounts lately.

These are good hedges against falling interest rates — at least temporarily — even if the yields are lower than the best nationally available deals.

I thought we’d review some of the available deals we’ve come across in recent months.

You should compare these with the top nationally available money market account and savings account from TIAA Direct, the online bank of financial services giant TIAA-CREF. It pays 1.25% APY. Click here to read more

Workers’ Credit Union has 54-month CD rates for its 67,000 Massachusetts members that are fine without a checking account but, as is not uncommon, better with one.

It pays:

• 2.15% APY with a $500 minimum deposit and an active checking account with direct deposit.
• 1.90% APY with just a $500 minimum deposit (no checking account required).

Workers’ also has a 72-month CD special that pays 2.50% APY with a $500 minimum deposit. Click here to read more