Tooth Fairy Gives Canadian Kids a Raise This Year

TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - August 17, 2015) - The Tooth Fairy has officially revealed the going rate for a baby tooth in Canada. According to a Visa Canada survey released today*, Canadian children under the age of 13 will receive an average of $3.44 per tooth under their pillows, a 23 per cent increase from last year's Tooth Fairy payout of $2.80 per tooth. The survey, conducted separately in the United States during the same period, revealed the American Tooth Fairy will leave an average of $3.19 USD per tooth, a decrease of 6 per cent from the 2014 average.

Baby teeth are a hot commodity for Canadian kids. With a price tag of $68.80 for a full set of 20 baby teeth, piggy banks across the country are poised to profit. While some lucky kids (5 per cent) will receive more than $20 per tooth, 30 per cent of survey respondents indicate that their kids can anticipate a toonie under their pillow. Fifteen per cent of kids can expect at least five dollars, and 12 per cent of children will receive less than a loonie.

"The Tooth Fairy is paying a premium for Canadian baby teeth, which gives parents a great chance to start a conversation about money with their kids," said Carla Hindman, Director of Financial Education, Visa Canada. "Our new Tooth Fairy App can help parents by showing how much pixie dust the Tooth Fairy is leaving under pillows in similar households."

Launched as a companion to Visa's online Tooth Fairy Calculator, the new Tooth Fairy Apple iOS App allows prospective Tooth Fairies to enter demographic information including gender, education, province, age, and household income, to determine how much money other Canadians with similar stats are distributing for teeth. The App also features a "Tooth Booth" to take selfies of those toothless grins, and an option to send your child an email from the Tooth Fairy. The App is available in English and French on the iTunes App Store, and can be found online at http://practicalmoneyskills.ca/toothfairy.

The Moment of Tooth
The survey examined the amount the Tooth Fairy intends to plunk under pillows across Canada. Notable regional findings include:

• The Tooth Fairy is the most generous in Quebec, leaving an average of $4.08 per tooth.
• Children living in the Prairie provinces can expect around $3.59 under their pillows.
• Children in Ontario and Atlantic Canada both receive less than the national average, with Ontarians receiving an average of $2.95 per tooth and Atlantic Canadian kids receiving around $2.79.

The Tooth Fairy App and Calculator are a part of Visa's ongoing mandate to promote financial literacy in Canada. Practical Money Skills is a free financial literacy program that helps Canadians understand the fundamentals of money management. The program features online tools including various budget calculators, games and information. To learn more please visit: www.practicalmoneyskills.ca

Infographic
To download a high resolution image of Visa Canada's Tooth Fairy infographic please click here: http://www.practicalmoneyskills.ca/downloads/pdfs/2015ToothFairy_infographic_en.pdf

About the Survey:
*The survey results are based on 2,003 telephone interviews conducted nationally of parents with children 13 years and younger from June 3 to June 18, 2015, in cooperation with Research House National Telephone Omnibus.

About Visa
Visa Inc. (NYSE: V) is a global payments technology company that connects consumers, businesses, financial institutions, and governments in more than 200 countries and territories to fast, secure and reliable electronic payments. We operate one of the world's most advanced processing networks -- VisaNet -- that is capable of handling more than 56,000 transaction messages a second, with fraud protection for consumers and assured payment for merchants. Visa is not a bank and does not issue cards, extend credit or set rates and fees for consumers. Visa's innovations, however, enable its financial institution customers to offer consumers more choices: pay now with debit, pay ahead of time with prepaid or pay later with credit products. For more information, visit corporate.visa.com and @VisaNewsCA.