Is Your Money Safe?

MrRee_2

G20 Finance Meeting currently - nothing coming out of it, except - let's talk next week!!

Protests and riots across the developed world.

Bankers getting richer by making the poor poorer ... the poor lose their jobs, take pay cuts and suffer high bills - yet, those who 'have' grab still more!

This will all reach a tipping point - not sure when, but you cannot hope that those without will just stand by while the Bankers and others reward themselves with taxpayers money!

If the fabric of the society in which we live starts to fray at the edges we will have runs on the Banks as those who have saved for decades fear losing all they have worked for.

Is there enough money to compensate us all? I doubt it! Most are reasonably intelligent and have ensured that not more than £85,000 is invested in each institution - there is a lot to pay if the worst happens.

If the worst does happen I doubt that these guarantees will be honoured.

Just my opinion - looking for others? I, for one, am very concerned about the world events as they unfold and of the complete powerless efforts of the Governments to go against vested interests in the name of the common man.

Linton

MrRee wrote: »

If the fabric of the society in which we live starts to fray at the edges we will have runs on the Banks as those who have saved for decades fear losing all they have worked for.

Is there enough money to compensate us all? I doubt it! Most are reasonably intelligent and have ensured that not more than £85,000 is invested in each institution - there is a lot to pay if the worst happens.

If the worst does happen I doubt that these guarantees will be honoured.

These doom mails are getting sillier and sillier. If the worst does happen it wont matter anyway.

MrRee_2

I am fully aware of the content of my post .... I don't consider losing my lifes savings a silly thing, I will kindly request that you do not post if you have absolutely nothing of value to add.

I am also aware that it is, at the moment, a hypothetical hypothesis ..... but it may be better people venting their concerns here than suppressing them and getting very stressed about the prospects.

If the worst - in Banking terms - does happen, I would suggest that it does matter - very much indeed - to those impacted by the situation ...... to suggest that it won't matter shows you up, in all honesty.

Andystriker

MrRee wrote: »

If the worst - in Banking terms - does happen

There is more chance of Blackburn Rovers winning the Premier League

Ark_Welder

Linton wrote: »

These doom mails are getting sillier and sillier. If the worst does happen it wont matter anyway.

I assume that 'doom mail' is something that online-gamers wear?

ChiefGrasscutter

MrRee wrote: »

I

If the worst - in Banking terms - does happen, I would suggest that it does matter - very much indeed - to those impacted by the situation ...... to suggest that it won't matter shows you up, in all honesty.

Wrong,
If the worst comes to the worst and the banking system totally collapses......whether or not you get your £85K back or not will be totally and completely inconsequential to you.

This is because Tesco and other supermarkets won't be getting any supplies as they cannot pay, nor will any fuel stations be getting any fuel, nor will any cash machines be working.......need I go on?
So within a matter of days the UK would collapse into something like the pre-industrial period.

In the meantime you will be wondering how to get some food for you and your family....to survive just the next few days. Mind you if you had any stored in preparation you would be rapidly strung up from the nearest tree by those who wanted to steal it from you, because the police force would have ceased to operate in the UK as well.

Under such circumstances I don't think you'd be very bothered about your £85K owed to you by the FSCS.
For the above reasons and as we have an independent currency HMG can and will always print money to keep the system going.

PS how did we survive in the 1970's? Inflation touched 26%, the stockmarket fell by 92% from 1972 to 1974, the £ was dropping rapidly. Can you imagine the postings if the internet had been around then.

pqrdef

I think the public will demand nationalisation of any banks rescued in future, with no payouts to shareholders and no payoffs or pensions for directors. Directors should also be banned from directing anything else. Their assets should be confiscated on the same basis as if they were the proceeds of crime. And there should be more prosecutions.

The danger is that those with a lot of money in banks will also get lumped with the rich and greedy.

MrRee_2

To those who say that the only thing we will be concerned about is getting food on the table ..... maybe even more reason to extract the money from the banks and keep it somewhere else, where you can access it quickly?

oldvicar

Andystriker wrote: »

There is more chance of Blackburn Rovers winning the Premier League

But isn't that quite likely?

I don't believe everythig I read on wikipedia, but apparently this last happened in the 1994-95 season.

Andystriker

oldvicar wrote: »

But isn't that quite likely?

Well, when they do I'll then take the OP seriously.

JayBrun

If one bank fails without substantial or full compensation being paid there would be a run on the banks and all the others would also fail since they obviously couldn't re-pay all depositors.

It seems inevitable that like any other 'advanced' country we need a functioning banking system otherwise economic activity and many aspects of daily life as we know it would cease, or at best become somewhat crude to put it mildly.
The number of financial transactions conducted daily using the current banking system involving private individuals, business, government and other organisations etc is beyond most people's imagination and difficult to contemplate being replaced effectively by an alternative 'system'.

There are doubtlessly major International implications of a country not having a working banking system.

Therefore there is an argument that the government would do whatever it had to in order maintain at least a reasonable level of confidence in the banking system by substantially or fully compensating depositors.

If that means printing a lot of money, some argue they would, and live with the consequences, including inflation, in the belief that this would be less harmful than not doing so. How inflationary that would be is guesswork but a falling pound wouldn't help.
Exactly what the government would do and how effective it would be is a matter of conjecture but any suggestion that they would sit back and do nothing and deliberately allow civilisation as we know it to collapse seems farcical.

Which scenario you are inclined to believe is perhaps, at least in part, down to whether you are an optimist or pessimist, or perhaps how cynical you feel towards the government in terms of providing savers with compensation.

I'm a cynic, which in this context means I believe they would very reluctantly pay compensation as the consequences of not doing so would be untenable - there could however be some sleepless nights waiting for the cheques to arrive and trying to work out how much the compensation was really worth.

One concern to me is that the expression 'civilisation is skin deep' seems increasingly applicable to this country so we might see the troop pull out from Afghanistan being brought forward
It might also curb the PM's desire to strut the world stage showing how generous he is with our money in terms of rapidly increasingly the already generous International Aid budget.