Lack of Interest -- Banks

[Dusty Devil Dale]

Is there a banker out there who can explain why bank savings or checking account interest has temained at rock bottom, as the Fed has raised the Prime Rate?

Just curious.  Banks are charging higher rates now to lend my saved money, but not passing any of it along.  

Is there a reasonable explanation?

I guess when people start closing accounts and pulling their money out to invest elsewhere, then the banks will have to compete.   Sad that it has to work that way. 

 

 

[Marshal Dan Troop 70448]

My neighbor was just mentioning that yesterday. They have a savings account for their child after selling a summer home last year and getting under a dollar each month on 25,000.00 savings account interest.  CDs don't pay any better either.

[Pat Riot, SASS #13748]

Banks only look out for banks. There is no service that doesn’t cost. There is no loyalty to customers. The government and their laws favor the banks and Wall Street. 
 

 

When I retired I cashed out a 401a and put my money in savings. The day I went into Chase Bank to verify the routing number (I didn’t want my money beamed to the wrong place) the girl behind the counter could have just given me a routing number, but she called over a manager. She told him what I was doing and he got all excited about helping me. Why? Not because I was a good customer. No, because he wanted to sell me on their recommended money market schemes. I politely declined and left. 
Later that day I got two more calls from upper managers because “we want to keep you and your money safe.”

I asked them both, “Is this a free service?”

Then came the stammering. I told them “Thanks but no thanks.”

 

Have you ever read Federal Banking Laws?

Incredible how the banks are more protected from the government than the citizens of this country. 
 

In my opinion it’s only a matter of time before RollerBall becomes reality. Corporations become government. 

[Badlands Bob #61228]

I only keep emergency funds in bank savings accounts.  The emergency fund's purpose is not to make money.  It's to be there, intact and available in case of an emergency.  The rest of the funds are invested in other places.  Not banks.

[Patagonia Pete]

You need to put your excess "bank" balance in a "High Yield Savings Account". I use AMEX and it is paying 1.5% right now.

There are lots of them and all easy to set up and maintain. 

 

Soooo … instead of getting 15 or 20 cents interest every month from Wells Fargo I get $100+.

 

Once you set up the account you simply transfer excess funds from your regular savings account to the high yield account … If you need some bucks back you transfer what you want back.

No fees or anything … transfers usually complete in 2-3 business days.

 

We still have a checking account but instead of leaving a "large" balance in it's associated "bank account" we transfer off anything beyond what we would consider emergency funds.

 

If you want bigger bucks and can wait 15 months to get your money back then do "I Bonds" … ($10K per year limit).

IMHO ... 

[Rip Snorter]

Try your local credit union.  I set up a local emergency account with them and get better than bank interest.

[Sedalia Dave]

I have 3 CDs with Navy Federal CU. Getting between 2.5% and 3.5% on most of my emergency cash funds. The remainder is in a savings account. If I need more money than what's in savings, I can easily access it in 24 hours or less. The only penalty is I will loose a small portion of the accrued interest. 

 

All monies beyond my emergency fund are put into my retirement accounts.

 

I gave up on banks over 30 years ago. Horrible experiences with Wells Fargo and BofA cured me of ever using anything but a credit union.

[Sgt. C.J. Sabre, SASS #46770]

I've heard a lot of bad about Bank of America over the years, but I have to say that any time one of my cards got hacked, they were on top of it. 

They notified me, and if I said that I didn't make the charge, they stopped the charge, shut off the card, and sent me a replacement fairly quickly. 

[Rip Snorter]

Dumped a long held credit card when BAM went Woke.  Look up their contributions and release of user info.

[Dirty Dan Dawkins]

The answer is simple: you're money is worthless. It is all a scam. Only the foreign backing of our debt through junk government bonds, which are not ultimately exchanged for the cash, but for a trade imbalances and control of minerals/mineral rights and/or mineral/petroleum leases, along with control of large expanses of water and real estate. The other only currency of worth is the assurance of corporate bailouts.  The bailouts go not to depositors, but our own form of oligarchs- financiers and social puppeteers with political influence and power. The currency itself is really worthless. I wonder if there is even any gold at Fort Knox.

 

I will pose these questions to my brother next time we speak. He is a supervisor at the FDIC with bachelors in accounting and masters in finance, and has been auditing and supervising audits of banks for about 17-18 years. Sits in on FDIC and federal reserve board meetings.

He always told me the big banks are crap, treat clients like crap, have crappy books and crappy accounting methods, and are barely solvent. Their sole existence is being "too big to fail" and we all know what that means- crony capitalism and bail outs. He repeatedly says small town banks and credit unions are the way to go, if you want to be treated right and not worry about bank failing. He was involved in the FDIC handling of the Indymac failure of 2011 and always contended the multiple bank failures of that era were perpetuated under bank "reforms" and bad lending and bookkeeping practices that were incentivized by the government, while good practices were punished. All of this he says started mostly under Clinton and carried on through Obama, perpetuated on through today by both parties. Though Indymac's failure ( and others) was certain, he repeatedly contends Chuck Schumer personally pushed Indymac over the cliff accelerating the failure and causing the unnecessary loss of tens of millions to depositors, rather than allow the FDIC and Indymac  to carry out the banks planned dissolution and pay depositors off (which he was involved with prior to the bank failure).  He told me recently that the same bad accounting goes on in large banks today as did through that era. It is potentially worse today for ordinary folk, he states, due to the ever-decreasing value of the dollar, but of no consequence to those "too big to fail." Those "too big to fail" perpetuate this fleecing of the working class since their behavior is generally incentivized to do so.

This all leads to fascist economic practices- socialism with a capitalist veneer. But they will put candy sprinkles on it and call it progressivism or democratic socialism.

 

But hey, that's just his and my opinion. YMMV

[Muggle]

Hahah, My bank give you $5 and takes back $10 for god know why.

[Dirty Dan Dawkins]

19 hours ago, Dusty Devil Dale said:

Is there a banker out there who can explain why bank savings or checking account interest has temained at rock bottom, as the Fed has raised the Prime Rate?

Just curious.  Banks are charging higher rates now to lend my saved money, but not passing any of it along.  

Is there a reasonable explanation?

I guess when people start closing accounts and pulling their money out to invest elsewhere, then the banks will have to compete.   Sad that it has to work that way. 

 

 

Neo-feudalism.

The Steve Bannon interviews on Frontline in 2019 delve into a lot of the stuff the fed has been up to from Bush through Obama. Whether you like or dislike Trump or Bannon, it really gets to the what has gone on at the Fed and with finance, foreign trade and immigration. It's pretty lengthy but the first episode really digs into things and explains things in a way I never heard before.