FX.co ★ “Weekend phobia” helped a Cypriot pensioner salvage savings

“Weekend phobia” helped a Cypriot pensioner salvage savings
A Cypriot pensioner salvaged her savings from levy as she withdrew money on Fridays and put it back on Mondays, says RIA Novosty, citing Cypriot mass media.
A woman says she did it according to her son’s advice, who lives in Russia. He warned the pensioner that confiscation occurs exactly at weekends.
On Saturday, March 16, Cyprus government announced it had introduced levy, which was 6.75% of all deposits up to 100,000 euros and 9.9% above that. It was proposed as a part of an EU-IMF 10 bn-euro bailout package. That day transactions on deposit accounts were blocked and the banks were not opened yet. Thus, depositors could not get access to the deposits which totaled tens of billions of euros.
Cypriots regarded the decision as being a negative one. Besides, it was strongly criticized by many economists and market experts, as well as representatives of Cyprus trading partners, primarily Russia. On March 19, the Cypriot parliament rejected the controversial levy on bank deposits. After that Cyprus officials and representatives of different political parties started to work out a Plan B. Meanwhile, EU finance ministers had warned that Cyprus had to introduce the tax in order to get bailout.