Often we take the ability to access our funds in the bank for granted. But it wasn’t always this way. Throughout history, there have been runs on the bank. People fear that they won’t be able to get their money out and all rush to the bank at once to try to get theirs first. After all, that is what fractional reserve means, i.e. only a fraction of the people can get their money at any one time. In ancient times before official banking was established people would loan their gold to the local goldsmith and he would give them a depository receipt and they would be able to come back at any time and get their gold back. Then rather than go to the goldsmith every time they wanted to buy something they just started trading the receipts. After a while, the goldsmith figured out that not everyone would ask for their gold at once so he could use some of the gold instead of buying his own. But if his reserves got too low his customers would grow suspicious and then everyone would begin rushing in to claim theirs and he would be lynched.
Classic movies have touched on the theme of runs on the banks. Do you remember the scene in “Mary Poppins” where the little boy causes a bank run? (If not, you can watch it by clicking the first image). Another one was in the Christmas Classic “It’s a Wonderful Life” in this case George Bailey was able to prevent the bank run by using his own money and carefully explaining the fractional reserve system. (Click Second image to see it). Incidentally, there are recent real-life examples of banks not having enough cash on hand and doing exactly what George Bailey did to prevent a run.
In one case the manager did exactly the opposite of what they did in Mary Poppins and pulled all the cash out of the vaults and stacked it behind the tellers where everyone could see it, to instill confidence in the people that there was plenty of money. On the first day, he instructed the tellers to take their time and pay everyone in small bills so they wouldn’t run out of cash. That night he wired for reserves to be brought in and the next day to prevent lines he instructed the tellers to pay everyone with large bills and pay them as quickly as possible so lines would not form. By the third day, the possible run was over. That is one advantage of the Federal Reserve System, in a situation like that the banks can borrow from the Federal Reserve and prevent a bank run.
Does that mean that Bank Runs Can’t Happen- Right? Hardly, Ask Argentina or Cyprus. In today’s article, Leif Simon editor of the Offshore Living Letter tells us what lessons we can learn from Cyprus. ~Tim McMahon, editor
Crisis In Cyprus—What You And I Can Learn
By Leif Simon
Cyprus is dominating the financial news this week. The details of any bailout seem to change so fast that the media can’t keep up. The suggestion of imposing a one-time tax on deposits in Cypriot banks hit hard opposition from Cypriots, although the tax seems to have been targeted at the many Russian account-holders at banks in this country. Still, the mere discussion of such a tax should have those in the offshore world scrambling.
Meantime, residents in Cyprus have bigger and more urgent concerns, as banks, there have been closed since last Saturday and lines at ATMs snake around corners.
Talks of Russia buying out the entire banking system in Cyprus may be largely rhetoric; regardless, they’re absurd. Regardless, I’d say that the offshore banking industry in Cyprus is dead no matter what happens from here. As soon as bank accounts are unfrozen, I expect to see funds fleeing to other jurisdictions as quickly as wire instructions can be issued. No one will want to keep money in the country even if no “one-time” tax is imposed (it does now seem that that subject is dead).
As the Cypriot government continues to try to find a workable solution to satisfy EU officials and the IMF, the rest of the world watches. How could something like this happen? And…if it could happen in Cyprus…where else?
As you watch, wonder, and ask yourself those worrying questions, I strongly recommend that you also take some lessons from all of this as to how to structure your personal affairs.
One word: Diversification.
It’s my ongoing mantra. Diversify currencies, economies, banks, and investments. Anyone who had funds in a Cypriot bank and needed that money this week was out of luck. Account-holders had no access to wire money out of the country and limited access to their own money in the country (if they happened to be in the country), as cash in ATMs has been scarce.
For some folks, this has meant that they have been shut out of access to all the money they have…period.
On the other hand, those who kept some money in another country had a back-up.
Note, though, that, in this crisis case, even those who had money in other countries couldn’t access it from Cyprus, as, again, ATM disbursements have been limited and restricted. So let’s add cash on hand to our list of things to be diversified in.
With the ubiquity of ATMs and the prevalence of credit card usage around the world, most of us no longer worry about how much cash we have in our pockets. I used to travel around the world carrying as much as US$7,000 or US$8,000 in cash. Moving from one country to the next not sure when I’d see my next ATM or if the hotels in rural Latin America or Asia would take credit cards, it was the only prudent thing to do, despite the risks of carrying that much cash around. In addition, I used always to keep a few hundred dollars of local currency on hand for the countries I visited most often. This way I didn’t have to worry about arriving late after currency exchange offices had closed, for example.
Today, I travel with less than US$100 in my pocket. The first thing I look for at the airport when I land anywhere is an ATM. Sadly, that wouldn’t have helped me in Cyprus this week, and I’m planning to bump up my travel cash for future trips. Probably not to levels pushing the reporting requirements for cash, as I used to carry, but enough to cover a night or two at a hotel and a couple of days of meals.
Banking diversification is a necessity that I remind you about regularly. Anyone banking offshore should have at least two accounts, each in a different country. My point is that banking diversification comes at different levels. You want to bank in different jurisdictions…but you also want to bank with different banks. A few years ago, one of my accounts in Panama was frozen when the bank was taken over by Panama’s Banking Superintendent. Fortunately, the business associated with that account had another account at another bank in a different country. The business was able to continue to operate, to pay bills, and to receive payments from clients. Eventually, the bank was reopened and all depositors (including me) received the full values of our accounts. Meantime, however, had all the cash assets of that business been in the Panama bank, I would have been in a real bind.
Having accounts with two different banks in Panama would have worked in that case, as the issue was bank-specific. However, the events in Cyprus this week show that country diversification is necessary, as well. Don’t keep all or most of your cash or investments in any one bank or in any one country.
Yes, more accounts mean more bank fees, which start to add up. In the scheme of things, though, this is a small price to pay for the security of knowing that you can access at least some of your money all of the time.
Don’t let what’s going on in Cyprus turn you off from offshore banking. It is indeed an anomaly (and, hopefully, will remain one). Do learn from this week’s debacle, though. If you haven’t yet begun the work associated with setting up your personal offshore infrastructure in a way that protects you from crisis events like this one…get started right now.
Originally published under the title Crisis in Cyprus–What You And I Can Learn
Reprinted by permission of The Offshore Living Letter.
See Also:
- Bank Runs Can’t Happen- Right?
- Germany Will Exit Euro
- How the Golden Reset Button Could Drive the Price of Gold to $20,000.
- Do You Have Enough Retirement Income to Not Worry?
- Germany Removing Some Gold Reserves from US
- Doug Casey: A Eurocrash Is Baked in the Cake
- Will the U.S. Government “Pull a Cyprus”?
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