Red toms

Hi I just wondered if Portugal has been affected by the Greek crisis. Are there any bank worries in Portugal? Many thanks Louise

Red Eric

You've lit the blue touchpaper there, Louise. Hope you're standing well clear.

Red toms

I hope it isn't too much of a worry, I wondered how it would affect the Portuguese day to day banking for expats. Many thanks Louise

Red Eric

To my mind, it doesn't. All Portuguese banks have a deposit guarantee so as long as your money is in a current or deposit account, it's guaranteed to the value of 100,000€ per named account holder.

You can now expect a couple of posters to come along and sow all sorts of doubt on this provable truth. The thread may run for several pages and will almost certainly contain references to BES, BPN and BPP, complete with badly-written articles from the Algarve Daily News to back up these posters' claims.

However, the Greek situation is entirely different from the Portuguese. Despite the fact that Greek depositors have been removing their money from their accounts for months, if not years, it is only very recently and only because of highly questionable decisions of the ECB that there is any restriction at all on Greek banking - and as it was so predictable we can see that this sort of situation doesn't occur overnight or without warning.

Over to the naysayers....

not2old

guaranteed when the government has the money to cover the banks & where is that money, where does it come from should the government need it to pay its bills or creditors.

Not saying its will never happen or cannot happen, then imagine over time slowly but slowly things get worse [bit by bit], tax increases, price increases, folks believe things will righten themselves 'we have faith', government keeps on borrowing, raises interest rates, Banks offering great interest to folks for 3- 5 year Bonds that they would never get anywhere else [the greedy public see big euro signs in their eyes, lets go for that]... then the day comes when the banks close their doors, the ATM 's only dish out 60 euro/day. Could a Pexit ever happen in Portugal - that's the question?

It can never happen because the belief is depositors funds are guaranteed by the government

Compare the Portugal national debt to Greece...

http://www.nationaldebtclocks.org/debtclock/portugal

http://www.nationaldebtclocks.org/debtclock/greece

Do you trust your bank, the government or the merchants where you live?

.

dickydog

Its a very good question Louise, one Ive been wrestling with too. Is it too simplistic just to keep your money in british account and transfer in as needed into a Portuguese account?
To add context, I intend to live in central Portugal soon.

Red toms

Hi dickydog, that is what I was thinking, we want to move to portugal after the sale of our house but would like to keep our accounts open in the uk and transfer money as and when needed, we had also considered the idea of renting out the uk house to fund our living expenses in Portugal, just wondered what would be the best plan. Many thanks Louise

Fredbargate

The United Kingdom National Debt Clock 2015 Counter >> nationaldebtclock.co.uk

Portugal and Greece in Euros, UK in pounds

mfesharne

That's what we do and it works for us....... actually, to be more precise, we keep ours in an offshore UK (pound) account and just bring it across as we need it and/or just use the ATMs.

dickydog

Thank you,this is really helpful do you need to have a uk address to have a uk bank account or is that why you use an offshore account.

mfesharne

No problem to have an overseas address and an offshore (Isle of Man or Jersey etc) bank account......... we lived in Africa for many years before we came to Portugal and have had offshore accounts for donkey's years.

Garbatellamike

I can't see anyone disagreeing with you on this Eric, it looks a spot on assessment to me; however, I think in fairness I would point out (semantics I know) that the capital flight in Greece has accelerated exponentially in the last 5-6 months.

Methinks it would be strange to find a naysayer on here as what you wrote about the situation being entirely different from Greece is exactly right.

Red Eric

You don't know the Portugal forum, Mike

Garbatellamike

I will now be watching with interest Eric

EMR

If Greece had followed the examples of Portugal and Ireland the depth of the Greek crisis would be very different.