Synchrony Bank

Is Synchrony Bank safe?

For savers, yes. Synchrony Bank is an FDIC-insuredDeposit insuranceA government-backed scheme that repays bank customers up to a set limit if their bank fails, such as the FDIC in the US or the FSCS in the UK.More in the glossary online bank, and Synchrony estimates that only about $7.1 billion of its roughly $83 billion of deposits were above the insurance limit in June 2026. The group's CET1CET1 ratioA bank's highest-quality capital (mainly shares and retained profits) as a share of its risk-weighted assets. Higher means more room to absorb losses.More in the glossary capital ratio was 13.2% against a 7.0% requirement, a wider cushion than at most large US banks. We score it 75/100, between Ally at 70 and American Express at 76. The score is held back by credit ratings in the BBB range, which reflect a business built on high-rate store cards, and by a $225 million consumer case from its time as part of General Electric.

What Synchrony does with your savings

Synchrony is two businesses in one bank. On one side it lends through credit cards and instalment plans for retailers and brands such as Lowe's, Sam's Club, Amazon and PayPal, plus health care credit through CareCredit. On the other it raises the money for those loans from savers, offering high-yield savings, money market accounts, CDs and IRA CDs online.

That model matters for depositors in two ways. Card loans earn high interest but also carry high losses in a recession, which is why rating agencies keep Synchrony at BBB despite its capital. And as an online bank, it competes for savings on rate. In the second quarter of 2026 it paid an average of 3.4% on savings and money market balances and 4.0% on CDs.

Capital and liquidity

The capital buffer is about six points. Synchrony took part in the Federal Reserve's stress test for the first time in 2026, but because the Fed has frozen stress buffers, it keeps its initial 2.5% buffer until 2028. Synchrony has been returning capital through a $6.5 billion buyback programme approved in April 2026, so the ratio has been edging down from 13.5% in December.

Liquidity is the strong side. Almost all deposits come from households and are insured, the kind of money that tends to stay put in a panic. More than half are CDs, which cannot be withdrawn early without a penalty. Synchrony also holds $19.8 billion of liquid assets, mostly cash, and has $13.1 billion of borrowing capacity at the Fed's discount window.

The conduct record

The main case dates from 2014. In June that year the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ordered GE Capital Retail Bank, which had renamed itself Synchrony Bank on 2 June, to provide about $225 million in relief. Examiners found that it had sold five debt cancellation add-ons with misleading claims, including telling customers they were free, and it had to refund $56 million to about 638,000 people. In a joint case with the Justice Department, it also had to give $169 million to about 108,000 borrowers left out of debt relief offers because of their national origin. The bank had reported that problem itself.

The CFPB ended the order in May 2025, saying the bank had paid at least $259 million in redress and a $3.5 million penalty and had stopped the practices. It also cited a 2025 executive order against disparate-impact liability, on which the order partly relied. The bank's only other CFPB consent order, from 2013, has also been terminated. Synchrony's 2025 annual report says it is not party to any legal or regulatory matter it expects to have a material effect.

How to keep your money safe at Synchrony

1. Keep each ownership category under $250,000 across all your Synchrony savings, money market and CD accounts.
2. Do not leave large credit balances on a Synchrony-issued store card; they are not savings.
3. Log in only through synchrony.com or the official app, and turn on two-step verificationTwo-factor authenticationSigning in with a second proof of identity on top of your password, such as a code from an app, a security key or a passkey.More in the glossary. Store-card phishing often copies retailer branding.
4. If you need cash at short notice, keep some in savings rather than CDs, which charge a penalty for early withdrawal.

How we scored it

Deposit protectionDeposit insuranceA government-backed scheme that repays bank customers up to a set limit if their bank fails, such as the FDIC in the US or the FSCS in the UK.More in the glossary (85) and liquidity (82) are Synchrony's strongest factors: deposits are overwhelmingly insured and backed by large cash holdings. Capital (70) combines a wide buffer with only BBB ratings. Conduct (72) reflects the 2014 CFPB and Justice Department case, which falls just outside our ten-year window but whose order ran until 2025.