Just wonder if anyone knows if the initial Fidelity and TD Ameritrade deposits are immediately swept into an interest-bearing account? I have made these deposits, but I quickly buy mutual funds with the cash.
If Fidelity and TD Ameritrade were required to issue 1099-INTs, it would be quite the data point for a low value of miles as an industry standard in the financial world, since the threshhold for filing 1099-INTs is quite low, like $10 or something.
As SS pointed out, banks might take the position that a Form 1099-INT is not the correct form if the account does not pay any cash interest. As the articles I linked, pointed out, if there is a requirement for the depositor to utilize a service such as direct deposit or bill pay, the Form 1099-INT might not be the correct form. I'm not sure that either of these exceptions is true for Fidelity or TD Ameritrade. If that is the case, neither of these institutions could be valuing the miles at an amount that exceeds $0.00 per mile, since it sure doesn't take much value to get over $10 (unlike the relatively higher value that might not cause a filing requirement for the $600 1099-MISC threshold). If this is the case, we can add Fidelity, TD Ameritrade and Bank Direct to the list of financial institutions that value the miles at $0.00 per mile.
I suppose that Fidelity and TD Ameritrade could cite the letter ruling holding that the miles reduce the basis of mutual funds or stocks purchased with the deposits, but that wouldn't seem correct since some depositors never leave their position of cash.