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ATM in Cologne: Negative interest rates can spoil the fun of saving
Photo: Christoph Hardt / imago images / Future Image
The world is still all right on the island of Knax: The two comic twins Backbert and Steuerbert are saving on a new fishing boat and dutifully "brought part of their income to the Sparkasse every month," explains the Sparkasse in this video for children.
The two seafarers are "rewarded with money" by the bank for their loyalty.
This is how it works with interest - usually.
But the history of the Knax empire has to be rewritten.
If Backbert and Steuerbert took their money to a real savings bank, it might not turn out to be more money, but less.
More and more institutions are collecting negative interest rates - and savings banks and Volksbanks of all things are particularly fond of access, new data from the Bundesbank show.
The industry speaks of custody fees or custody fees.
Stadtsparkasse Düsseldorf, for example, recently introduced a custody fee for savings amounts of more than 250,000 euros.
Other banks are still researching.
The cooperative Bodenseebank wants new customers to receive a custody fee of 0.5 percent from the very first cent.
If you invest 100 euros, after one year you only have 99.50 euros in the account.
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