Look at the other side, or what happened to McGraw Hill that owned S&P then? It self-destructed. It now exists as private McGraw Hill Education and public S&P Global/SPGI.
FWIW, no other rating agency followed S&P.
One consequence of this was that no other US financial has been rated better than AA+ on the logic that none could be sounder than the US Government. In fact, only JNJ and MSFT now are 2 AAA rated US companies.

Friday, slightly higher monthly Producer Price Index and Core PPI dinged yields to move a bit higher; although the 12 month PPI's trend continues to move lower. Survey says, inflation expectations lowest since 2021 .......only a survey of humans, Univ. of Michigan consumer data and economists, too; .....absorb the information with caution. Most bond sector prices were positive for the week, until Friday; when prices had the largest daily move down.
As with all investing, a lot of moving parts affecting a variety of shorter term movements. For me, the hardest decisions are attempting to discover bottoms along the way and try to determine the 'why's. Why is a particular sector 'oversold', or 'overbought'; and how long will this last. Age old questions, eh?
Perhaps the recent (since October 25) price strength in the longer duration bond areas is a prelude of what is to come; if/when there is a FED induced recession, and/or the need to again back down on yield increases. Normal expectations, IMO; although the market place(s) remain in a 'this time is different' financial mode. AND next week brings CPI numbers and FED speak on Wednesday.
And if you were wonding, but hadn't taken a peek; both of the below links also have various internal tabs for other data.
Long duration bull and bear bond etf's, list 1
Long duration bonds, list/view 2
---Several selected bond fund returns since October 25.
NOTE: I've kept the prior dated reports in the beginning of this thread; and have added YTD to this data.
For the WEEK/YTD, NAV price changes, December 5- December 9, 2022
--- AGG = -.5% / -11.6% (I-Shares Core bond etf) widely used bond benchmark, (AAA-BBB holdings)
--- MINT = +.08% / -1.31% (PIMCO Enhanced short maturity, AAA-BBB rated)
--- SHY = -.11% / -3.9% (UST 1-3 yr bills)
--- IEI = -.51% / -8.8% (UST 3-7 yr notes/bonds)
--- IEF = -.84% / -13.5% (UST 7-10 yr bonds)
--- TIP = -1.6% / -10.9% (UST Tips, 3-10 yrs duration, some 20+ yr duration)
--- STPZ = -.85% / -4.3% (UST, short duration TIPs bonds, PIMCO)
--- LTPZ = -2.8% / -27.3% (UST, long duration TIPs bonds, PIMCO)
--- TLT = -.71% / -26.8% (I shares 20+ Yr UST Bond
--- EDV = -.4% / -33.3% (UST Vanguard extended duration bonds)
--- ZROZ = -.39% / -34.8% (UST., AAA, long duration zero coupon bonds, PIMCO
--- TBT = +.8% / +70% (ProShares UltraShort 20+ Year Treasury (about 23 holdings)
--- TMF = -2.4% / -66% (Direxion Daily 20+ Yr Trsy Bull 3X ETF (about a 3x version of EDV etf)
--- BAGIX = -.31% / -12.3% (active managed, plain vanilla, high quality bond fund)
*** Other, for reference:
--- HYG = -.69% / -9.8% (high yield bonds, proxy ETF)
--- LQD = -.51% / -15.5% (corp. bonds, various quality)
--- FZDXX = 3.81% yield (7 day), Fidelity Premium MMKT fund
*** FZDXX yield was .11%, April,2022. The rate of rise in the yield remains stagnate again for this past week, versus the past six months.

Remain curious,
Catch

I was happy with Washington Mutual (WaMu) for a number of years.
They had many branches close to my home, their personnel were friendly, and customer service was great.
Under Kerry Killinger in the 90s, WaMu expanded from 84 branches in 1991 to 248 in 1995.
The following decade Washington Mutual became the country's largest savings-and-loan bank
and also the largest mortgage originator. Subprime loans accounted for some of this rapid growth.
When the subprime lending crisis culminated, the Office of Thrift Management seized the bank on 09/25/2008.
Washington Mutual was sold to JPMorgan Chase hours later. This was the largest bank failure in U.S. history.
I was not pleased with JPMorgan Chase.
They were much more "corporate" than WaMu.
Their lobbies felt sterile and their associates were impersonal.
I switched to a local credit union in 2010 and haven't looked back.
Most of my banking is conducted online with other financial institutions
but it's nice to have an option with a nearby physical presence.
When a medallion signature guarantee was needed to transfer my Roth IRA a few years ago,
the credit union provided a convenient avenue to obtain this guarantee.

On Tuesday Gal Pal received info on class action suit. To much legal mumbo jumbo so she reached out to financial consult to figure it out. Thinking the lawyers tracked her down to make another $ or 2 ? It seems the person in charge of her IRA at that time had her invested at some % in this fund.
@TheShadow : thank you for the update @hank for starting this thread.

While my personal perspective is very much in empathy with the comments above, I would gently remind everyone that commentary such as this has, in the past, caused significant problems for the folks who maintain MFO.
As a result of past contention it was well established that the majority of MFO members are primarily interested in financial matters, and do not appreciate excursions into politically contentious arenas.
Those of us who have been very long-term MFO participants will recall that this tension resulted in such divisiveness among MFO posters that management decided to disallow virtually all non-financial commentary. It took a lot of persuasion to create the Off-Topic section as an arena for such discussions. The commentary in that section does not migrate to any of the other discussion sections, so as keep those sections primarily confined to purely financial matters, honoring the preferences of the majority of MFO posters.
It's in the best interests of all of us to keep this in mind as we post. I realize that sometimes it's hard to do that- occasionally I find myself compelled to go a bit over the line. The previous presidential administration certainly made it very difficult to insulate financial commentary from the stench of political reality.
Anyway, try to keep all of that in mind as we wade through life.
Thanks- OJ

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/929521/000119312522300645/d426006d497.htm
497 1 d426006d497.htm WANGER ADVISORS TRUST
Supplement dated December 8, 2022
to the Prospectus, Summary Prospectus and Statement of Additional Information (SAI) of the following Fund:
Fund Prospectus, Summary Prospectus and SAI Dated
Wanger Advisors Trust
Wanger Select May 1, 2022
In December 2022, the Board of Trustees of the Fund, having determined that a reorganization of the Fund was in the best interest of the Fund and its shareholders, voted to approve an Agreement and Plan of Reorganization to reorganize the Fund (the Target Fund) with and into Wanger Acorn (the Acquiring Fund).
Pursuant to applicable law (including the Investment Company Act of 1940) the reorganization may be implemented without shareholder approval. The reorganization is expected to occur in the second quarter of 2023 and is expected to be a tax-free reorganization for U.S. federal income tax purposes. Additional information about the reorganization will be made available to shareholders in a Combined Information Statement/Prospectus prior to the reorganization date.
The foregoing is not an offer to sell, nor a solicitation of an offer to buy, shares of the Acquiring Fund, nor is it a solicitation of any proxy. Because the Target Fund will reorganize into the Acquiring Fund on its reorganization date, you should consider the appropriateness of making a new or subsequent investment in the Target Fund prior to its reorganization date. You should consider the investment objectives, risks, strategies, fees and expenses of the Acquiring Fund and/or the Target Fund carefully before investing. To obtain the Acquiring Fund’s current prospectus, shareholder reports and other regulatory filings, contact your financial intermediary or visit columbiathreadneedleus.com.
Shareholders should retain this Supplement for future reference.

Vanguard is quitting the Net-Zero alliance NZAM/GFANZ.
GFANZ (Global Financial Alliance for Net-Zero; 04/2021- ) includes 550 members with $150 trillion AUM. Mark Carney (BOE) has been the prime mover for GFANZ; Michael Bloomberg is Co-Chair. Within GFANZ, there are 7 sector specific alliances and NZAM is for asset-managers.
Vanguard said that in managing its index funds, it didn't want to be constrained by Net-Zero objectives; it also didn't want its investors to be confused by contradictions from its membership in NZAM/GFANZ. Some other US companies are also thinking of leaving GFANZ after a rush to join this new alliance.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-07/vanguard-quits-net-zero-alliance-marking-biggest-defection-yet
GFANZ https://www.gfanzero.com/
NZAM https://www.netzeroassetmanagers.org/

@Lewis
Forecasting, having and using cash reserves + line of credit to prevent a run on the bank is a common practice amongst seasoned managers.
Managers who have spent a decade or more to build a reputation will "generally" not resort to ethically questionable practices at the risk of the fund blowing up. You've described a few BDC's taking a 50% haircut but this is anecdotal stuff as opposed to the hard 4 bips and $1.2B loss numbers estimated (as an overall market aggregate) in the article link you provided.
Any financial investment outside of FDIC guaranteed CD's and US Govt guaranteed bonds can blow up. During the last crisis some MM funds broke the buck which was deemed unthinkable.
The ghost of Bernie can emerge anytime and anywhere and a dozen or more things can go wrong outside of CD/USG bonds.
Should all of that result in one investing only in the guaranteed stuff? Personal to everyone of course and clearly you and I have different views on this.
Investing beyond the guaranteed stuff entails risk of partial or full loss even if the auditors are one of the Big 4. It comes down to investing based on an individual assessment of the risk/return tradeoffs.

Source: Barrons
"Small-caps outperformed during recessions in the 1970s and early 1980s, when the Federal Reserve was fighting high inflation, as it is now. The group has higher proportional exposure than large-caps to inflation beneficiaries, like energy. It’s also more domestic and more tied to capital spending, which is a plus if U.S.-based manufacturers continue moving factories home. But small companies generally have less financial flexibility than large ones, which is a negative if borrowing rates stay elevated.
One way for investors to add small- cap exposure is with a low-fee index fund like the iShares Russell 2000IWM –2.75% exchange-traded fund (ticker: IWM). Then again, switching indexes might be an upgrade. The S&P SmallCap 600SP600EQ –2.60% index has outperformed the Russell 2000 index by more than a percentage point a year over the past five, 10, and 20 years, and has generally been less volatile. The biggest reason: S&P uses a profitability screen to admit index members. SPDR S&P 600 Small CapSLY –2.81% ETF (SLY) is one fund option there.
If a profitability screen helps, how about a value tilt? The aforementioned indexes weight small-caps by market cap. Asset manager Research Affiliates has an index that weights them by fundamental measures of value like sales, cash flow, and dividends. Investors can buy in through Schwab Fundamental U.S. Small Company Index ETF (FNDA). It’s more expensive than the other funds, but still cheap, with yearly expenses of 0.25%. Since inception in 2013, the fund has returned 7.4% a year, beating the Russell 2000 by nearly a point through Sept. 30."
"For actively managed funds that are open to new money, Columbia Small Cap Value II (NSVAX) and Wasatch Core Growth (WGROX) get high marks from Morningstar. Each costs a little more than 1% a year and has beaten its category by about a point a year over the past decade."

Banks & financials can count preferred as Tier 1 capital only when they are noncumulative; some exceptions may apply. So, there are rarely any bank/financial preferreds that are cumulative.
https://content.next.westlaw.com/practical-law/document/I21061766ef0811e28578f7ccc38dcbee/Tier-1-Capital?transitionType=Default&contextData=(sc.Default)

@Observant1, interesting info about REFLX REIT under the newer interval-fund structure, not the older, opaque Nontraded-REIT structure.
So, DAILY valuations, DAILY purchases at NAV at market close (may include applicable sales load), minimum 5% REDEMPTION per quarter. Purchase MINIMUM of $1 million mentioned in the prospectus but not in other web or PR documents (brokers and financial advisors may have other minimums); institutional class only for now.
Prospectus

"A federal judge in New York formally dismissed the last remaining indictment against Huawei's chief financial officer after prosecutors agreed Meng had abided by the terms of her deferred prosecution agreement."
Apparently arrested, arguably under sketchy circumstances, under the past administration. Struck a deal with prosecutors. Held up her end of the deal and the government, under a new administration, held up its end? I mention that "both Trump and Biden era" part because much of the online chatter implies that the judge was a political tool doing the bidding of one or another of those administrations, which doesn't immediately seem to be the case.
For what that's worth, David

Cash fines for tech firms that are cash gushers is the equivalent of fining somebody 1 bottle of water after they broke in and raided all of the drinks and snacks from the break room vending machine. It is a flick on the wrist. A threat of booting them out of the market would focus the mind.
This is entirely anecdotal but I have personal experience working in a Top 3 bank in the US where one aspect of ranking the priority of compliance projects was the size of the regulatory fine.
Once you remove jail time from the worst case penalty, all kinds of malbehavior occurs. To cite a real life example, several execs from Countrywide Financial were fined by the SEC for the toxic trash loans originated by Countrywide but the vast majority of the actual fines were paid by insurance firms and not by the culprits. The execs collectively parachuted out with more than $1B, were collectively fined less than $100M and paid less than $10M out of pocket. Heads I win, tails you lose. Staff and investors got pennies to the dollar.

Congressional bills regarding cryptocurrency (S. 4760 / H.R. 8730) have at most a tangential relation to DOL's regulation of 401(k) plan investments.
Here's a brief negative critique summarizing the bill(s): https://ourfinancialsecurity.org/2022/09/news-release-cftc-should-have-narrow-role-in-crypto-to-preserve-sec-primacy/
For more specifics, that links to a letter detailing several concerns:
https://ourfinancialsecurity.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/AFR-Letter-Stabenow-Bill.pdf
And a similar letter with some different items described:
https://www.nasaa.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/NASAA-Letter-to-Committee-Leadership-Regarding-the-DCCPA-9-9-22-F.pdf
Finally, a set of slides on the state of cryptocurrency regulation in the United States, "Brought to you by the Connecticut Department of Banking and the Securities Advisory Council to the Banking Commissioner", dated November 15, 2022.
Among other things, it explains how cryptocurrencies can be viewed as securities by the SEC, as a commodity interest by the CFTC.
https://www.daypitney.com/wp-content/uploads/2022-11-15-Unmasking-Crypto-Presentation-Final.pdf
The Congressional bills were referred to the House Committee on Agriculture and to the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry. I suppose given the risks involved, it makes a kind of warped sense to lump crypto in with pork belly futures :-)
As to DOL fiduciary duty, my feeling is that it doesn't go far enough. The standard is what a prudent investor would do, not what each individual employee would do.
While I would personally be delighted with a brokerage window, I do not think that it serves a typical employee well. Studies have shown that employees when faced with a myriad of options (even without a window), are paralyzed. They may dump everything into cash, or divide their money evenly among all options, or not even participate. More choice is not necessarily better choice.
See, e.g.
https://www.marketplace.org/2022/01/11/default-options-are-popular-in-financial-decision-making-but-are-they-effective/
https://www.wsj.com/articles/are-too-many-choices-costing-401-k-holders-1454900917

With all due respect to Elizabeth Warren, Dick Durbin and Tina Smith, IMHO cryptocurrency is no more unsuitable today for employer-sponsored plans than it was a month ago. Their current letter is more or less a followup to a similar but more extensive letter sent by Senators Warren and Smith in May. That in turn came after DOL issued guidance on cryptocurrency in 401(k) plans in March, emphasizing its risks.

Fidelity isn’t the first company to give 401(k) participants access to cryptocurrency assets. Another industry provider, ForUsAll Inc., has linked workers with cryptocurrency exchanges through brokerage windows for several years. Fidelity takes a different approach with its Digital Asset Accounts product, which doesn’t rely on outside exchanges or brokerage windows.

Employee Benefit Plan Review, October 2022, Volume 76, Number 8, pages 16-19. CCH Incorporated.
(Published before FTX's collapse)
The genie has been out of the bottle since brokerage windows were allowed. Fidelity just provided another route to the same investments. That's not to say that plan sponsors have no responsibility for how those windows are used. The DOL guidance hints at that. Quoting again from CCH:

DOL provides a clear and definite warning to plan fiduciaries:

The plan fiduciaries responsible for overseeing such investment options or allowing such investments through brokerage windows should expect to be questioned about how they can square their actions with their duties of prudence and loyalty in light of the risks described above.

While the focus of this guidance is on 401(k) plans, the DOL’s warnings also extend to plans and plan fiduciaries responsible for allowing cryptocurrency investments through self-directed brokerage windows.

One way of addressing this is to set limits. As stated in the OP, Fidelity sets a 20% limit. So the 20% Bitcoin decline in value lamented in the senators' letter would have resulted in a 4% or less decline in a participant's plan value. Significant but not catastrophic. And ForUSAll sets an even tighter limit, just 5%.
Finally, note that while some senators are advocating caution, others welcome wild west investing in retirement accounts.

Update: A Partisan Divide

The Department of Labor's cryptocurrency guidance has provoked contrasting responses on Capital [sic] Hill.

On May 5, Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala. introduced legislation that would prohibit the DOL from limiting the kinds of products workplace retirement savers can invest in through self-directed brokerage accounts.
A day earlier, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., criticized Fidelity Investments for its decision to launch a new 401(k) cryptocurrency product, in a May 4 letter to Fidelity CEO Abigail Johnson.

https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/benefits/pages/dol-guidance-could-crimp-401k-brokerage-windows.aspx (Limit 3 free articles per month)

Nov 25th

This week’s guest has long been an avowed enemy of inflation and an outspoken critic of the Fed’s inflation-boosting policies. How is he feeling now? Grant will discuss the Fed’s about-face on inflation, the battle it faces to bring it under control, the implications for financial markets, and two investment ideas for this new investment era.

and listen to:

That stinks! There must be financial incentive for these software companies to sell your personal information. Just like Amazon and other online stores.
I believe the online version is more susceptible to have all your personal information stored on their servers. The downloaded version may not be any better since the electronic filing of 1040 form would have all these information on it.

FDIC coverage is at owner level rather than at the product level. If you have a CD and a MMA at the same bank each with $250K (and each with same type of ownership), then if the bank fails you're only covered for $250K. If you have $500K in a MMF at a brokerage and the brokerage fails, then the SIPC will cover any brokerage losses.
Case 1 - Vanguard's Cash Plus' underlying bank fails. You're covered by the FDIC, but only up to $250K. That's total coverage not only for the Cash Plus account but for all other money you might have in the same underlying bank.

You are responsible for monitoring the total assets you hold at each Program Bank for FDIC coverage and limitations. These total assets will include not only Eligible Balances under the Bank Sweep but also any other deposits you may hold at those banks.

https://investor.vanguard.com/accounts-plans/vanguard-cash-plus-account
Case 2 - Treasury MMF fails. That means that the underlying securities fail, i.e. the Treasury fails. No resemblance to Lehman paper going to zero. A Treasury failure is effectively case 4, a complete financial system meltdown.
While government MMFs can impose gates/fees, they have to explicitly declare this. AFAIK, there isn't a single fund that has done so; certainly not Vanguard's government MMFs.
From Vanguard (click on liquidity gates and fees):

The fees and gates rules only apply to retail and institutional funds, although government funds may voluntarily adopt them if the fees and gates are previously disclosed to investors.

https://investor.vanguard.com/investor-resources-education/mutual-funds/money-market-reform#modal-understanding-liquidity-fees
Case 3 - VBS fails. Then securities in the account (including MMF shares) are covered up to $500K.
Case 4 - total financial system meltdown. Not worth too much thought, though I am curious about the mechanics of moving sweep money back through the failed brokerage. There's a fair amount of legerdemain with brokerage sweep accounts, including short periods of time (between daily sweeps) when new cash is held not in an FDIC-insured bank, but by the brokerage. Might the same risk manifest itself in reverse, i.e. might the FDIC "payout" move back through the failed brokerage?
Here's some of what Ken Tumin (DepositAccounts.com) had to say about sweep accounts between brokerages and banks:

SoFi, Aspiration, Betterment and Wealthfront ... define their accounts as either cash management accounts or cash accounts that are considered to be a brokerage product. All ... describe how deposits that have been moved into the program banks are FDIC insured. The coverage that exists while the deposits are in transit into or out of the program banks is complicated. Most state that the funds are covered by SIPC

https://www.depositaccounts.com/blog/banking-fintechs-safety-money.html
Regarding Robinhood, consider that brokerages routinely offer interest-bearing checking accounts with SIPC coverage for free credit balances (e.g. E*Trade's CBP account and Fidelity's FCASH). The difference is that they don't loudly promote these accounts as savings vehicles, though they can be used this way.
However, you do so at your own risk. Continuing from Ken's column:

It should be noted that there’s no guarantee that SIPC will cover a cash management account if the SIPC determines that it’s being used for banking purposes. Below is a relevant excerpt from the SIPC FAQs:

I have a securities account. Isn’t everything in my securities account protected by SIPC?
Not necessarily. In general, SIPC protection is determined on an asset-by-asset basis and extends only to: (1) cash in a customer’s account that is on deposit for the purchase of securities; [...]

It's all about marketing. Slap an FDIC label on a service and you'll get more customers. Regardless of whether it is actually safer than T-bills (securities underlying Treasury MMFs). And regardless of whether its after-tax yield is better or worse.

Vanguard Cash Plus savings is a FDIC insured banking product that allows ACH withdrawals (for money transfers to brokerages/banks or bill pay)

More spin. VBS accounts, like the vast majority of brokerage accounts, allow external financial institutions to push and pull money from them. Creditors pull their money from VBS, not directly from the banking product.

Checks, ACH payments, wire transfers, and other transactions and items for Your Account are processed through Your VBS Account rather than directly with any Program Bank under the Bank Sweep. VBS will withdraw Your Sweep Deposits with the Program Banks to satisfy any net debit position in your Account on the Business Day following the debit’s posting.

Vanguard Cash Deposit Terms of Use
In all of this, I'm not saying that this is a bad service, just that it is one designed for the purpose of retaining/holding assets as opposed to one providing something of significant additional value. If you linked a VBS account to an online bank account, why? You could have been using VUSXX, whose assets (Treasury obligations) are backed directly by the Treasury, and likely gotten a better return, even before considering VUSXX's tax advantages.
Side note: the ticker for Vanguard's Treasury MMF is VUSXX, not VMSXX. VUSXX is yielding 3.49% as @Sven noted. I've changed the ticker to VUSXX in both of my posts.
https://investor.vanguard.com/investment-products/list/mutual-funds?assetclass=money_market

FDIC and SIPC coverages are quite different.
Federal FDIC related to banks and nonprofit SIPC relates to brokerages.
Confusion arises for brokerage cash, money-market funds, brokered CDs.
To begin with, consider brokerage firm A and financial product B (cash, market fund, CD). Then, the SIPC coverage is at the brokerage firm level (for fraud, failure; total $500K including $250K for brokerage cash) while the FDIC coverage is at product-CD level ($250K).
Case 1 - Firm A is fine, but product-CD fails. The FDIC coverage kicks in (if the issuing bank is covered by FDIC). The SIPC is not involved.
Case 2 - Firm A is fine, but product-money-market fund fails. The SIPC coverage doesn't kick in; the FDIC has no business in this. There has been only one major money-market fund failure - Reserve Primary Fund. Much of the money was recovered after being frozen for several years. That situation was not covered by the SIPC or FDIC. More realistic risks of money-market funds today are not failures, but gates and/or redemption fees (least likely for government money-market funds) but those situations are also not covered by the SIPC or FDIC.
Case 3 - Firm A fails, CD is fine. The FDIC isn't involved. The SIPC coverage kicks in for securities and brokerage cash. The SIPC coverage of $500K would be for the total account value (net equity for margin account) including $250K for brokerage cash.
Case 4 - Firm fails, CD fails, money-market fund fails. A total disaster, may be an economic collapse. In that unlikely and absurd case, the SIPC will cover $500K and the FDIC $250K, for a combined total of $750K, more if the brokerage firm has excess insurance coverage beyond SIPC (most major brokerages do).
Securities are stocks, bonds, money-market funds, Treasuries, CDs, options; excluded are futures, warrants. While we may think of money-market funds as cash equivalents, for the SIPC, they are classified as securities. It goes without saying that there is no FDIC or SIPC coverage for the money-market fund itself, and the SIPC coverage will kick in for the total brokerage account only if the brokerage firm fails.
Brokerage cash is the cash held from securities sales or that waiting only to be deployed for purchases of securities (and for no other purpose). When in 2018, Robinhood foolishly launched an interest-bearing checking account with SIPC coverage, the SIPC rejected that notion immediately and publicly - because that Robinhood money wasn't really waiting to be deployed for security purchases only. Robinhood mistakenly thought that it could stretch the definition of brokerage cash into an interest bearing product (i.e. a banking product without really saying so). The SIPC wasn't amused, nor was the FDIC. An embarrassed Robinhood withdrew that product, and a couple of years later, relaunched a cash management product in partnership with banks with FDIC coverages.
In conclusion, Vanguard Cash Plus savings is a FDIC insured banking product that allows ACH withdrawals (for money transfers to brokerages/banks or bill pay) but there won't be any credit/debit card associated with it at this time. If your brokerage account is linked to an online savings account now, then VG Cash Plus can be a better alternative.