So much for €100,000 protection - Cyprus bailout

Speculator

from bbc

UK government and military staff with Cypriot bank accounts subject to bailout levy will be compensated, George Osborne tells BBC

evenasus

ColdIron wrote: »

It's hard to see the difference between this and simple theft

If you had a hunch it was upcoming and had a few days to prepare what would you do with cash in the bank - that part that wasn't fixed anyway? You could take it out as cash, OK if you only have a few grand but not feasible if you have £100k+. Property - not enough time.

My thoughts too.

I have more money in fixed term/interest rate accounts than I have as available.
Just tied up, between us, £100K of our ISA funds - husband & myself in the Santander 2 year Major ISA.

ColdIron

Glen_Clark wrote: »

isn't it more honest to take it directly, like the Cypriots plan to do?.

I take your point re deflation but I'd stop short of calling it honest. Direct perhaps but about as honest as the state waiting for you to go shopping then nipping into your house and having it away on their toes with your telly and laptop

mark55man

when will you all accept that there is a connection between looking for a few extra basis points - sometimes as much as 0.5% extra over a full year - with countries which we have known for years has greater uncertainty than the UK, and that this connection carries with it a greater risk of bad things especially asset loss.

Its like Iceland all over again - actually in Iceland your risk taking paid off mainly because of the craven attitude of the government (all recent governments btw) in recompensing people and not actually exposing people to the consequences of their actions. Its been like a stockmarket where you can complain and get restitution if things go down. And don't give me that sanctity of the financial system rubbish - most of the posters on this board have been slagging bankers off for years, and really don't we all know that its all at the mercy of unaccountable euro and financial technocrats

I can't say I particularly approve of the action taken by the EU for the reasons of consumer panic, contagion and fairness, although if it gives anonymous global financiers/crooks a bloody nose then that's a +1. However something had to be done - and politics is the art of the possible.

Most level headed commentators are focussing on the exceptional nature of Cyprus structure, and that a depositor haircut was not being considered for other bail-outs/bail ins. Cyprus itself had gone all-in on financial services with consequent distortion to its own economy - so it needed to pay something, and not the poor german population.

I think the financial markets will not be spooked by this, although I suspect that the general populace may be.

Glen_Clark

ColdIron wrote: »

I take your point re deflation but I'd stop short of calling it honest. Direct perhaps but about as honest as the state waiting for you to go shopping then nipping into your house and having it away on their toes with your telly and laptop

No it isn't. Its like the state telling you they are going to help themselves to your telly and laptop before they took it, same as any other form of taxation. The only shock here is politicians being so upfront and honest with savers.
What is dishonest is the Bank Of England quietly shifting their pension fund into index linked bonds before cranking up the printing presses and slowly trashing our savings, all the time maintaining the charade of the Governor writing endless letters to the Chancellor claiming inflation would fall below their 2% mandate in the 'medium term' - whatever that means.
All the time hiding the identity of the owner of the Bank of England who is benefiting from the rise in asset prices caused by QE, and fiddling the inflation statistics by adding luxury technology items that are bound to fall in price, whilst all but ignoring basic essentials like housing, fuel, and basic foodstuffs the poor struggle to afford.

JohnRo

Basically a bunch of thieves, why people think it would be different anywhere else, if push came to shove, is beyond me. Its the same with people who gloat about bailouts in Greece and Spain, like they're corrupt third world !!!! holes, we make them look like amateurs but that gets conveniently ignored.

The thing is the unholy alliance have effectively done the same here with pensions and savings but in a way most people are either unaware of or don't care because it doesn't appear to directly affect them, through manipulated interest rates and currency devaluation.

Just one more reason to ditch as much bankster monopoly money as I can and only hold the bare minimum, politicians are like m a f i a henchmen and we all know who the boss is. Scum, the lot of them.

mark55man

Glen_Clark wrote: »

The majority of those who voted did not vote for Blair/Brown (or Thatcher)
And nobody has voted for the Queen.

Steady on - I know Tony and Gordon made mistakes, but if you look hard the graphs of irrepressible public spending start well before 1997.

Also I seem to recall Mrs T had something to do with the exuberance (by which I mean recklessness and criminal negligence) of the city and the banking system. I lay a lot of blame on her (by which I do mean the conservatives) for the death of manufacturing, the breakdown of mutual responsibility in society. All these started before 1997

You can't put all the blame on politicians for being short term, when comments like that try to put all the blame for generational issues on the current or previous lot.

And by the way - as we are talking politics, had the government pursued more of a growth strategy and less of a self righteous faux-austerity we would be in a better position - more like America than Spain. Even Italy don't have a structural deficit - unlike us where Dave and Gideon have spent more money in 3 years than Labour did in three terms

arcadia00

They could have done what Iceland did. (Forgetting that Landsbanki ended up being nearly solvent.) That is, move domestic owned deposits into a new 'good' bank and default on all foreign deposits.

I don't see this as a grab on Russian money. It's the opposite, it's a way to protect the Russian money and has best chance of being sold to the Bundestag as fair to the german taxpayer.

Glen_Clark

mark88man wrote: »

Steady on - I know Tony and Gordon made mistakes, but if you look hard the graphs of irrepressible public spending start well before 1997.

Also I seem to recall Mrs T had something to do with the exuberance (by which I mean recklessness and criminal negligence) of the city and the banking system. I lay a lot of blame on her (by which I do mean the conservatives) for the death of manufacturing, the breakdown of mutual responsibility in society. All these started before 1997

You can't put all the blame on politicians for being short term, when comments like that try to put all the blame for generational issues on the current or previous lot.

And by the way - as we are talking politics, had the government pursued more of a growth strategy and less of a self righteous faux-austerity we would be in a better position - more like America than Spain. Even Italy don't have a structural deficit - unlike us where Dave and Gideon have spent more money in 3 years than Labour did in three terms

All True. The effects of the damage done by Thatcher have been delayed by the income from Privatisation sales and North Sea Oil Revenues, so weren't fully realized at the time.
I just wanted to point out that Britain is the least Democratic country in Europe. We only vote for a third of our Constitution, we don't vote for the House of Lords, or the Head of State - where the ultimate power lies in case we plebs vote for the 'wrong' people.
Even then, all recent Governments have got into power on a minority vote - about 36% of those who voted.

ColdIron

So it's all Fatcher's fault?

Good grief