USD & EUR investments in UK

ErikOfige

Hi All,

My parents are looking around for options how to invest in UK about 80K EUR and 80K USD preferably at fixed rate.

They were in touch with high street banks and were told that they only have sterling deposits.

Any ideas?

Thank you in advance! :beer:

Voyager2002

If they want bank savings accounts denominated in Euro or USD then there are several options: Citibank is one that I have used. Don't expect much in the way of interest.


If they want to invest (buy shares and bonds denominated in these currencies) then most major 'platforms' can help. I use Interactive Investor and Fineco for this: in both cases I have a multi-currency account (so I hold cash in different currencies, but sadly this does not earn any interest).

AnotherJoe

Your post is confusing.

investments = stock markets.
fixed rate = currency.

Which do they want ? What do they actually have now? Do they want to buy $80k and €80k starting from £ equivalent, or do they already have the $ and € ? Are they looking to invest in US and Euro companies, or just buy currency and become currency speculators? In which case there are bonds denominated in foreign currencies they could buy but they wont be getting any significant interest.

ErikOfige

Thank you for your replies and apologies for being confusing.

They want to save existed ~USD 80K & EUR 80K at fixed rate and with an insurance against a company/bank bankruptcy case, something like FSCS.

They already have that money in USD & EUR currencies, so, they are not looking to invest into US/Euro companies nor be a currency speculators.

gm0

Feedback from Citibank user - GBP, EUR, USD. Offer FPS/BACS current accounts, some savings accounts. Interest rates low. Couple of multi-currency cashpoints in the smoke - Canary Wharf and West End (though one branch recently shut I believe though the ATMs may still be there. Citigold has retreated to higher net worth having tried mass affluent for a bit and found it unprofitable - the UK customer helper bees couldn't do much to help you when the global edifice chewed up a transaction anyway.

The FX rates should you need are variable value (can be poor) with channel, currency and transaction size. USD was historically better than EUR. Branch service/wait can be a bit hopeless as everybody in there is doing something complex and long winded.

Have had some issues with being a big, global player - call centre info leakage and card clone fraud. Try not to phone them - somebody in the US bought ipads on my account. Fraud dept handled it quickly and well though which is half the battle. Still use the online - less likely to have your account and card spotted

One multi-currency card thing - doesn't really work that well. You can repoint it to each of the accounts but don't travel with it and try and flip the currencies too fast between transaction and settlement or FX happens to their benefit when it shouldn't.

It's clearly lashed together from multiple systems and instances (as most are) which weren't built that way from the start

Others:

HSBC may be able to help (but again "global" marketing ahead of retail substance. Opening accounts in the relevant countries can get sticky - addresses, KYC etc,

UBS UK used to do it but stopped.