“Fair credit” is not easy to define, because different banks will treat customers in different ways. FICO defines fair credit as those having credit scores between 580-669. But some credit card issuers consider fair credit to be in a higher range, topping at about a 700 credit score. The cards below may accept fair credit customers, but this is not an exact science! (Don’t know your credit score? It’s easy to get it for free with no strings attached.)

• Capital One Platinum Mastercard – No frills credit card but no annual fee. No rewards.
• Capital One QuicksilverOne Cash Rewards Credit Card – Good rewards card offering 1.5% cash back on all your purchases, but it comes with a $39 annual fee.

By Adam Jusko, ProudMoney.com, adam@proudmoney.com

In today’s video, I caution you about biases (or even conflicts of interest) that may arise when you take financial advice from me or anyone else. As an example, I demonstrate one of my own potential blind spots in giving advice: my comparison of the Citi Double Cash credit card vs the Capital One Quicksilver card might lead me to a conclusion that is not best for you based on your circumstances.

By Adam Jusko, ProudMoney.com, adam@proudmoney.com

Regional banks BB&T and SunTrust announced today that they will merge, creating the sixth-largest U.S. bank based on assets and deposits. Instead of one company name going away after the merger is completed, they will both go away — the combined bank will have a new name that is yet to be determined.

While it’s too early to say whether this merger is anything more than the typical bank consolidation, the fact that the combined entity will be similar in size to US Bank (though still far behind Chase, Citi, Bank of America and Wells Fargo) suggests that we may see some different and hopefully innovative products in terms of credit cards, savings products, etc.