The German neobank N26 has announced to its customers that it will henceforth tax at 0.5% deposits over 50,000 euros from its new users in 25 countries, including France, we learned from the bank on Tuesday.
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The measure is due to come into effect at the end of the month and will be aimed at customers who opened an account after October 1, ie "
a tiny fraction
" of some 1.6 million French customers, an official told AFP. of the neobank, present only on the internet.
Customers with a "
Metal
" account, billed monthly, will be exempt.
"
This new fee applies in all the markets where we operate except Spain and Portugal where this is not legally possible
", added the manager, specifying that he informed his clients before the entry into force of measurement.
This 0.5% rate is in line with the deposit remuneration rate set by the ECB at -0.5%, and which therefore resembles a tax for banks, since September 2019.
This is the first time that such a measure has been introduced in France by a general public bank, the precedents being confined to private banks, whose activity focuses on the great fortunes.
A year ago, the private bank Lombard Odier was the first to say it was officially ready to apply a penalty to certain large customers, especially when they had more than one million euros in their current account.
In December, UBS bank said it wanted to pursue the same policy for its wealthiest clients.