Cyprus deposit over 100K

sixshooter

Registered User
Messages
15
Hi,
There's one thing about the Cyprus 100K deposit limit I'm not clear on. Maybe someone could help. It seems that deposits < 100K will be essentially untouched and kept accessible to depositors, whereas deposits > 100K will be moved to a "bad bank", transaction restrictions will be placed on access to the funds for maybe months, and eventually there will be a haircut/tax of approx 40% (tbc).

Does the envisaged 40% haircut apply just to the amount > 100%? Even if this is the case, after the Dijsselbloem gaffe if you believe that this could happen in our EU countries, the transaction restrictions alone seem reason enough to always keep the amounts < 100K. Maybe it's best to put no more that, say, 95K in any account so that you're sure of never going over 100K (even after interest is accrued)...?
 
....and what about the person who has €99,999.00 on deposit retaining all their funds while their neighbour who had €100,001.00 loses a big chunk.
OK, we don't know the details at this stage and there might be some marginal relief for those on the fringes. But given the arbitrary way this whole process was put in place, I won't be holding my breath.
 
From what I can see, the Eurogroup statement on Cyprus notes that “All insured depositors in all banks will be fully protected in accordance with the relevant EU legislation.”. The relevant EU legislation is the EU Directive on Deposit Guarantee Schemes as amended in 2009. Under this directive, aggregated deposits per bank per depositor to a limit of 100,000 EUR are covered by the terms of the directive, i.e. are (by and large) guaranteed. As far as I can see (and note I'm not an expert in EU law), if you have a deposit above 100,000 EUR it would appear you’re not covered by the provisions of the directive, so national and not EU law would apply.
 
The EU directive has been entered into local law in most EU countries. The local interpretation of the EU directive protects the local deposits.

Below 100,000 EUR you are covered by a local law and not the "EU law". The local law in Ireland provides for the Deposit Guarantee Scheme or deposit insurance below 100,000 EUR.

Deposits over 100,000 EUR become part of unsecured creditors in the event of the failure of the institution.