Assets frozen
Posted in Opinion on 05-11-2008 3:11 p.m. | 1274 Readers
When I returned from my vacation to Mexico , was the financial crisis in Europe and the U.S. just at its peak. Among the Icelandic bank Landsbanki, known in the Netherlands under the trade name Icesave, had fallen. To my horror, for I must confess that I also had savings in Iceland are.
It will do that. You go three weeks in a well-deserved vacation, it appears to return your savings to be gone. On the plane to the Netherlands I could read all the impending doom, but then did not really register with me. Only when I came home and out of curiosity, the website of Icesave opvroeg but once I saw that it was serious.
Fortunately, I read very quickly that the state would assume an amount far above the savings was inserted by me. For the first time I was genuinely pleased with Finance Minister Wouter Bos.
And yes, a few weeks later there was a neat letter on the stationery of the stately Dutch Central Bank, at my home. This I have neatly filled out and now I hope only the best.
Dom?
Naturally, I asked myself, am I stupid? In a sense, of course. Because putting money in a bank you do not know, is not smart. But on the other hand, what we know today are actually banks?
Icesave presented himself as a Scandinavian, reliable bank and had a wonderful website that aroused a lot of confidence. In several news magazines and newspapers were the Icelanders touted savers with Icesave and were put down as a smart consumer who made clever use of the European competition in order to get the highest interest rate.
I believed in that message and as a reward I get now the coming months no interest anymore. But I can not complain, the deposit will neatly be refunded by the state and that is more than I follow the rules of the liberal economy actually due to me.
November 9th, 2008 at 6:43 p.m.
Anyone who expects something now. If the Dutch Central Bank approves that they are on the Dutch market moves than you'd assume that all is well. In retrospect it now appears (see http://www.geldenrecht.nl/nieuws/2696810/DNB_kon_niets_uitrichten_tegen_IceSave.html ) that it really was not right. Well.
December 24th, 2008 at 5:58 p.m.
With this I Bos (and the Dutch taxpayer) have to thank: my savings are paid back before Christmas!
