Word: passbook
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...depressed stock prices? Frustrated savers and unhappy investors are turning to the same solution. In record amounts, Americans are buying into the relatively new money market mutual funds. They offer minimum risk and yields of 10% to 13%, double or more the low rates set by the Government on passbook savings accounts...
With inflation running at 13.1% for the first seven months of this year, the saver has discovered that he is throwing his money away if he puts it in a passbook account paying the federal maximum of 5¼% to 5 ½%. The real interest rate is usually less than that because it is clobbered by federal, state and city income taxes. Since interest is considered "unearned" income, the federal tax alone can go as high as 70% for wealthy people...
...small saver need not keep his money in a passbook account, but he has fewer choices than large investors. If he is willing to tie up his money for a long time, he can buy four-year bank certificates linked to the Treasury note rate, now paying over 8%. But depositors with $10,000 can earn 10% from six-month money market certificates, and people with $100,000 can pick up 11% from three-month bank certificates of deposit...
Once again, it is hand-wringing time at the thrifts. With a 13% inflation rate, people are being driven into investments that offer more than the paltry 5¼% or so that savings banks and savings and loan associations are allowed to pay on passbook accounts. The result is that these traditional homes of the small saver are fairly scrambling for deposits. New customers are being lured by both familiar freebies (toasters, tickets to shows) and new appeals. For example, New York's big Bowery Savings Bank (assets: $5 billion) now has its longtime pitchman, Yankee Slugger Joe DiMaggio...
Federal interest rate ceilings limit the payout on their passbook accounts to 5% in commercial banks and 5.25% in savings institutions, which is less than half the current rate of inflation-and much less than a higher-roller gets for investing $ 1,000 or more in a money market mutual fund. The small saver's squeeze is summed up in a Citibank anti-ceiling advertisement: "Deposit $500 with us today and we'll give you back $475 next year...