Switzerland Banking

HeatSeekingMouse

Hey.

I have some money in a high interest account with a UK based bank. A six-figure sum.

I wanted to know if it would be any good to me if I transferred this offshore to Switzerland bank in Geneva. I have heard they have the best interest rates and highest savings rates in the world. Its a shame Google won't reflect my concept in its search results.

Anyone help?

Cheers

Aegis

HeatSeekingMouse wrote: »

Hey.

I have some money in a high interest account with a UK based bank. A six-figure sum.

I wanted to know if it would be any good to me if I transferred this offshore to Switzerland bank in Geneva. I have heard they have the best interest rates and highest savings rates in the world. Its a shame Google won't reflect my concept in its search results.

Anyone help?

Cheers

I doubt you'll ever get really decent long-term growth with cash. You might want to talk to an IFA instead, unless there's a very specific purpose for just transferring the cash offshore.

purch

I have heard they have the best interest rates and highest savings rates in the world

No they don't

The Swiss might have the highest rates of savers, but the actual interest rates are comparatively low

The main benefit from this type of deal I assume would be from holding CHF which is one of the more stable currencies, less likely to lose value over time

The Swiss National Bank has an unusual way of setting monetary policy, mainly as they do not have a Discount Rate or Base Rate like most Central Banks. However they do set penal rates for Banks not meeting Reserve Requirements.





They do set a target range for 3 month CHF LIBOR which currently stands at 2.25/3.25 ( 3 month LIBOR is set at about 2.9% currently)

Here are the private customer interest rates of UBS

They pay 0.875% for a Swussy savings account

http://www.ubs.com/1/e/ubs_ch/private/interests.html

ScarletBea

^ that's what I was going to say.

I lived in Switzerland for 3 years and I always transferred my money out, because the interest rates there were so crap. It's only if you're a millionaire and can negotiate rates with banks (so going beyond normal accounts) that you get any good return.
At the moment I still have an account there but it's only to cover the tax that I need to pay on 2007 - after that I'm going to close it, as on top of a paltry <1% interest rate, you get charged £1.50 every month if your average monthly balance is less than around £5,000!

Even the pension accounts are only giving about 1.5% interest
(you have to keep half the money you paid into a pension fund while working there in Switzerland until you retire)

Voyager2002

If you're feeling adventurous, you might like to look at Colombia. When I lived there, it was easy to get interest rates of 17 per cent or more on a peso-denominated bank account. At the time the peso was fairly stable against most major currenices, although domestic inflation was around 25 per cent.

And of course you could earn spectacular nominal rates in Zimbabwe!