Most Popular
1. Banking Crisis is Stocks Bull Market Buying Opportunity - Nadeem_Walayat
2.The Crypto Signal for the Precious Metals Market - P_Radomski_CFA
3. One Possible Outcome to a New World Order - Raymond_Matison
4.Nvidia Blow Off Top - Flying High like the Phoenix too Close to the Sun - Nadeem_Walayat
5. Apple AAPL Stock Trend and Earnings Analysis - Nadeem_Walayat
6.AI, Stocks, and Gold Stocks – Connected After All - P_Radomski_CFA
7.Stock Market CHEAT SHEET - - Nadeem_Walayat
8.US Debt Ceiling Crisis Smoke and Mirrors Circus - Nadeem_Walayat
9.Silver Price May Explode - Avi_Gilburt
10.More US Banks Could Collapse -- A Lot More- EWI
Last 7 days
Stock Market Volatility (VIX) - 25th Mar 24
Stock Market Investor Sentiment - 25th Mar 24
The Federal Reserve Didn't Do Anything But It Had Plenty to Say - 25th Mar 24
Stock Market Breadth - 24th Mar 24
Stock Market Margin Debt Indicator - 24th Mar 24
It’s Easy to Scream Stocks Bubble! - 24th Mar 24
Stocks: What to Make of All This Insider Selling- 24th Mar 24
Money Supply Continues To Fall, Economy Worsens – Investors Don’t Care - 24th Mar 24
Get an Edge in the Crypto Market with Order Flow - 24th Mar 24
US Presidential Election Cycle and Recessions - 18th Mar 24
US Recession Already Happened in 2022! - 18th Mar 24
AI can now remember everything you say - 18th Mar 24
Bitcoin Crypto Mania 2024 - MicroStrategy MSTR Blow off Top! - 14th Mar 24
Bitcoin Gravy Train Trend Forecast 2024 - 11th Mar 24
Gold and the Long-Term Inflation Cycle - 11th Mar 24
Fed’s Next Intertest Rate Move might not align with popular consensus - 11th Mar 24
Two Reasons The Fed Manipulates Interest Rates - 11th Mar 24
US Dollar Trend 2024 - 9th Mar 2024
The Bond Trade and Interest Rates - 9th Mar 2024
Investors Don’t Believe the Gold Rally, Still Prefer General Stocks - 9th Mar 2024
Paper Gold Vs. Real Gold: It's Important to Know the Difference - 9th Mar 2024
Stocks: What This "Record Extreme" Indicator May Be Signaling - 9th Mar 2024
My 3 Favorite Trade Setups - Elliott Wave Course - 9th Mar 2024
Bitcoin Crypto Bubble Mania! - 4th Mar 2024
US Interest Rates - When WIll the Fed Pivot - 1st Mar 2024
S&P Stock Market Real Earnings Yield - 29th Feb 2024
US Unemployment is a Fake Statistic - 29th Feb 2024
U.S. financial market’s “Weimar phase” impact to your fiat and digital assets - 29th Feb 2024
What a Breakdown in Silver Mining Stocks! What an Opportunity! - 29th Feb 2024
Why AI will Soon become SA - Synthetic Intelligence - The Machine Learning Megatrend - 29th Feb 2024
Keep Calm and Carry on Buying Quantum AI Tech Stocks - 19th Feb 24

Market Oracle FREE Newsletter

How to Protect your Wealth by Investing in AI Tech Stocks

Will Pensioner Bonds Election Bribe Lift General UK Savings Interest Rates from Catastrophic Lows?

Personal_Finance / Savings Accounts Feb 15, 2015 - 06:33 PM GMT

By: Nadeem_Walayat

Personal_Finance

The recent news for the extension of the Coalition Government's 4% Pensioner Bonds election bribe for a further 3 months to at least Mid May 2015 looks set to soak up at least £25 billion of the savings held by interest rate starved pensioners at an estimated cost to the tax payer of at least £1.2 billion. Whilst the bond is only open to the over 65's, nevertheless it will result in a flow of funds away from the commercial banks and to the government run NS&I that should prompt at least a limited rise in savings interest rates, especially for the directly competing fixed rate bonds such as the 3 and 4 year bonds that could now nudge above 3%.


UK Savings Catastrophe

The 4% Government bond may mark the start for the end or for a pause in Britain's savings catastrophe as a consequence of the banking crime syndicate suckling on the teat of the Bank of England for over 6 years now through a myriad of schemes (scams) that results in effectively providing the banks with unlimited funding that has resulted in the collapse of savings interest rates the latest phase of which began in May 2012 and has in large part been kept at sub inflation rates that amounts to systemic theft.

The table below illustrates the cash ISA rates offered by apparently the often reported on as best buy accounts of the Halifax mega-bank that in reality crashed in response to the Bank of England's Funding for Lending Scheme that started in July 2012.

Halifax ISA's May 2012 Sept 2012 Nov 2012 Mar 2013 May 2013 July 2013 Mar 2014 June 2014 Feb 2015 % Cut
Instant Access
3%
2.75%
2.35%
1.75%
1.35% 1.35% 1.5% 1.30% 1.05% -66%
1 Year Fix
2.25%
2.05%
2.05%
1.75% 1.75% 1.65% 1.5% 1.4% -38%
2 Year Fix
4.00%
3.25%
2.25%
2.5%
2.10% 2.10% 2.05% 1.8% 1.6% -60%
3 Year Fix
4.25%
3.75%
2.35%
3.00%
2.25% 2.25% 2.25% 2% 1.75% -59%
4 Year Fix
4.35%
3.80%
2.40%
3.05%
2.30% 2.30% 2.40% 2.10%   -52%
5 Year Fix
4.50%
4.15%
2.60%
3.10%
2.35% 2.35% 2.5% 2.20% 2% -56%

The table shows that the tax payer bailed out Halifax continues to across the board pay abysmally poor rates of interest that compare against average RPI inflation rate of 2.4% for 2014.

Therefore the Halifax, along with most banks should by May 2015 have at least marginally raised their savings interest rates from the current catastrophic lows. For instance the Halifax 5 year ISA awful rate of of 2% should be at least back to the marginally less awful rate of 2.2%.

Though the bankster crime syndicate of other countries such as that of Denmark are laying the ground work to start charging customers interest on funds deposited at their banks - NEGATIVE INTEREST RATES! Where banks go from real terms theft of customer deposits purchasing power to outright theft of funds on deposit.

Negative interest rates are as a direct consequence of central bank rampant money printing, flooding the financial system with free money that destroys purchasing power of currency, destroys the value of savings, destroys investment and instead encourages casino capitalism with borrowed free money that ofcourse stokes housing bubbles.

Pensioner Bonds Recap

15 Jan 2015 - New 4% Pensioner Bonds Election Bribe - Grab it While You Can

Election Bribe

As a comparison the best 1 year fixed rates average about 1.8% and the best 3 year fixed rates average about 2.4% gross!. So these bonds are paying 60% premium to the market rate, hence why they are an election bribe. Therefore the £10 billion tranche converts into a potential bribe of at least £500 million as the NS&I usually tends to under pay market rates.

Bond Details
  • For 65+ only
  • Invest between £500 to £10k
  • Interest is taxable.
  • 1 year pays 2.8% gross (2.24%net)
  • 3 year pays 4% gross (3.2% net)
  • Fixed rate term bonds

As mentioned earlier, if you miss applying for the current £10 billion offering then there is a better than 50% chance that the Government will make an additional tranche available later on as the purpose of these bonds is literally to BUY VOTES, especially as NS&I rates tend to be at the bottom end of the market i.e. the 5 year Issue 102 fixed rate bond carries a rate of 1.6% gross.

Savers What to do ?

In my opinion savers either continue to effectively hand over their hard earned cash to the banks to systematically siphon off through persistent loss of purchasing power or they look at alternative asset classes such as the UK housing market that is currently trundling along at an average annual percentage rate of THREE times the pittance that the likes of Halifax pays as covered at length in my UK Housing Market Ebook available for FREE DOWNLOAD (Only requirement is a valid email address).

Source and Comments: http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article49446.html

By Nadeem Walayat

http://www.marketoracle.co.uk

Copyright © 2005-2015 Marketoracle.co.uk (Market Oracle Ltd). All rights reserved.

Nadeem Walayat has over 25 years experience of trading derivatives, portfolio management and analysing the financial markets, including one of few who both anticipated and Beat the 1987 Crash. Nadeem's forward looking analysis focuses on UK inflation, economy, interest rates and housing market. He is the author of five ebook's in the The Inflation Mega-Trend and Stocks Stealth Bull Market series that can be downloaded for Free.

Housing Markets Forecast 2014-2018The Stocks Stealth Bull Market 2013 and Beyond EbookThe Stocks Stealth Bull Market Update 2011 EbookThe Interest Rate Mega-Trend EbookThe Inflation Mega-trend Ebook

Nadeem is the Editor of The Market Oracle, a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication that presents in-depth analysis from over 1000 experienced analysts on a range of views of the probable direction of the financial markets, thus enabling our readers to arrive at an informed opinion on future market direction. http://www.marketoracle.co.uk

Disclaimer: The above is a matter of opinion provided for general information purposes only and is not intended as investment advice. Information and analysis above are derived from sources and utilising methods believed to be reliable, but we cannot accept responsibility for any trading losses you may incur as a result of this analysis. Individuals should consult with their personal financial advisors before engaging in any trading activities.

Nadeem Walayat Archive

© 2005-2022 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.


Post Comment

Only logged in users are allowed to post comments. Register/ Log in