It now costs us money to lend the bank our money and the more we lend them the more it costs us!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-27717594

The idea is to force us to take our money out of the bank and spend it.

Hmmm very uninteresting.

I think it is quite interesting. But it applies to banks doing transactions with the ECB, not to individuals.

The idea appears to be to force, or at least encourage, the banks to lend to companies.

Not according to my TV.

http://blogs.channel4.com/paul-mason-blo......life/911

Your TV link says the same thing I did. "Europe’s key deposit rate is now -0.1 per cent. Mr Draghi says they will offer £400bn of cheap loans to banks, to encourage them to lend to business."

Did you watch the report and hear him explain what it meant?

I have.

My original comment is just that the ECB move applies to banks doing transactions with the ECB, not directly to individuals.

The reporter is correct insofar as the banks may try to pass the negative interest rates onto its customers, but that's not for certain. He's being inaccurate when describing the ECB move in that manner.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/05/upshot......ean.html

"The theory is that when it becomes more costly for European banks to keep money in the E.C.B., they will have incentive to do something else with it: Lend it out to consumers or businesses, for example. Or if negative rates make it less attractive for global investors to park money in Europe, it could cause the euro to fall on currency markets, helping reverse a rise in its value that has made European exporters less competitive."

"Banks will most likely pass these negative interest rates on to consumers, or at least try to. They may try to do so not by explicitly charging a negative interest rate, but by paying no interest and charging a fee for account maintenance."

"On the other hand, if the interest rate is only slightly negative, banks may just eat the loss in order to avoid alienating customers. If they do that, however, it will cut into bank profitability."

Thanks.

Or you can put your big bucks in Gringott's!