Michael Phelps will be trying his hardest to win 8 Gold Medals and the onlookers will be cheering him on. Excitement reigns - but all must wait until another few days before we can see if he breaks the record held for so long by Mark Spitz. Luckily, with term deposits, you don’t have to wait for a particular start time before winning. The gains begin as soon as you choose the product that suits you best and invest your money in it.

However, just as the Games have a finishing point beyond which no more gold, silver or bronze may be won, so some term deposits have a cut-off point. Some investment products are only available until August25th, the last day of the Olympics. If the investor is not quick with his investment, then that offer of good interest will close and it will be too late to purchase that particular product.

And just as athletes must research to do their training in the most efficient way possible, so does the investor need to research his product to make sure that the investment will return exactly what he wants. Reading the fine print and making sure you understand it is just as necessary to the investor as proper training is to the athlete.

With good training and diligent practice, the athlete is quite likely to gain something at the end. Even if not a medal, then the honour of competing in the Olympic Games is something to be valued. In the same way, the investor does his research and places his money in a term deposit to gain something valuable. Not a medal, but a return on his investment. But - unlike the Olympic Games - the investor can see that return coming to him not just during ten special days, but all year.