03/20/2016 - German Response To Negative Interest Rates: Safety Deposit Boxes
Article highlights the natural response by German bank depositors to negative interest rates in Europe – take your money out of the bank & put it into safety deposit boxes to avoid the negative interest rates .. “The Japanese response to negative interest rates was to buy personal safes. The German response is to pull money out of bank accounts and stick it in safe deposit boxes. Both are perfectly understandable reactions to the prospect of having to pay interest to a bank for holding deposits. It is particularly interesting in Germany, where the Bundesbank a few years ago admitted that the average real rate of return on savings deposits has been negative for nearly the past 40 years. Now that nominal rates have turned negative too, the facade of savings accounts as a safe place to park money to earn a little bit of income has finally been ripped away.” .. the article warns of a dire potential: “All it takes is just one more rate cut, one more move into further negative territory to push enough people off the edge, to get them to withdraw their deposits, which will result in a severe banking panic. Central banks are playing with fire when they institute negative interest rates and we’re all at risk of getting burned.”
