benaj
Member of DD Central
Posts: 4,856
Likes: 1,591
|
Post by benaj on Oct 2, 2018 10:53:27 GMT
Anyone got any idea why Goldman are bothering with retail savings in general and expanding into the UK in particular? It seems like a strange move. Goldman started Marcus in US around 2016, offers loans and saving products in the US. Saving rate is higher in the US, 1.9% www.marcus.com/us/enAccording to this article below, trading has become less reliable income for Goldman Sachs. www.kimt.com/templates/AMP?contentID=494827421
|
|
bigfoot12
Member of DD Central
Posts: 1,817
Likes: 816
|
Post by bigfoot12 on Oct 2, 2018 11:15:37 GMT
Anyone got any idea why Goldman are bothering with retail savings in general and expanding into the UK in particular? It seems like a strange move. Cheap money? Thanks and benaj, it seems that whenever I read about it they compare themselves (in the UK) with Zopa and Ratesetter. I think that they see themselves eventually lending to consumers like they do in the US, paying borrowers 1.5% and lending out at 10% ish. Obviously savers get FSCS protection and Goldman has to take the credit risk and maturity risk. Might be bad news for some P2P sites if GS can do it well. Maybe they'll get some scale and then let institutions lend alongside themselves.
|
|
|
Post by df on Oct 2, 2018 20:44:07 GMT
Thanks and benaj , it seems that whenever I read about it they compare themselves (in the UK) with Zopa and Ratesetter. I think that they see themselves eventually lending to consumers like they do in the US, paying borrowers 1.5% and lending out at 10% ish. Obviously savers get FSCS protection and Goldman has to take the credit risk and maturity risk. Might be bad news for some P2P sites if GS can do it well. Maybe they'll get some scale and then let institutions lend alongside themselves. I don't know much about borrowing, but I constantly get letters and e-mails from banks offering me 3.2%-3.5% loans. Somehow P2P platforms lending to consumers survive charging much more interest for longer term loans. So I guess if Goldman lends to consumers, it shouldn't make much difference. Best thing about instant access products is that you can instantly withdraw and redeploy your cash elsewhere when a better offer comes along. These type of products seem to be responding better to BoE interest rises than others, so I won't be surprised if some bank will offer 1.55% in near future.
|
|
cb25
Posts: 3,521
Likes: 2,665
|
Post by cb25 on Oct 3, 2018 8:43:12 GMT
Would help if I could log in this morning, but I get "Sorry, something seems to be wrong"
edit: problem still there, rang 'Marcus', "ah, yes, we have a bit of a problem with our website"
edit 4 Oct: now back
|
|
zlb
Member of DD Central
Posts: 1,412
Likes: 331
|
Post by zlb on Oct 7, 2018 12:46:41 GMT
My application was turned down before I'd even entered the final authentication code from email. Their email, timestamped at exactly the same time as the authentication code email said they'd given 'careful consideration' to my application but it had been denied and that they don't discuss this with applicants. I think it's because I'm registered, for my security, with an anti-identity-fraud agency. Any one had this with Marcus or others?
|
|
aju
Member of DD Central
Posts: 3,484
Likes: 917
|
Post by aju on Oct 15, 2018 14:58:36 GMT
Mrs Aju set herself up yesterday and she was most impressed - did her usual £10 test transfer in and £2 transfer out - she reckons it works using less obvious numbers rather than a £1 both ways that seems to trigger some banks security flags. Also seemed that on a sunday everything went in both directions relatively quickly - mins rather than hours.
One thing she did query was her username seems to be of a specific format that would be easy to check if she had a breach across some popular systems. It also seemed to only have single level security not even 2 step once set up.
Shes now moved all her funding that was in a less favourable account to this one. Improves her yearly take by about 36% and shes not a tax payer. Sadly it still means she is suffering inflation tax to a lesser degree admittedly.
(She has most of her free assets invested at better rates than this and this is just her backstop fund, after her day to day funds.)
One interesting thing is that they are using the max FP allowed for outgoing transfers, better than the measly amounts of some high street banks. That said Lloyds max is 25k per day and it can last for days if done on the wrong day. Of course if one has a breach of any kind then the smaller sums that can be transferred are much more favourable I guess its swings and roundabouts.
With the news stating the high numbers of take up I wondered if they might be suffering website bottlenecks but it did seem to be very quick and smooth for her. I guess the biggest gripe is reading the T&C's, they are using those bloody annoying, only one block of page open at once things, so it's almost impossible to open them all at once and print them off. I helped her check the online t&C's against the PDF version and they are quite different to say the least. She gave up reading it, assuming they must be FCA approved and moved on to accept them.
Apart from that it was very quick and easy, despite being told that there would be checks made and potential docs to be produced. I guess as long as she passed the credentials checks then all was ok - perhaps there will be and afterthought documents set to be provided via snail mail in the next few days or so. Time will tell.
|
|
benaj
Member of DD Central
Posts: 4,856
Likes: 1,591
|
Post by benaj on Oct 15, 2018 15:48:19 GMT
|
|
aju
Member of DD Central
Posts: 3,484
Likes: 917
|
Post by aju on Oct 15, 2018 16:12:34 GMT
Thanks benaj , the bonus lasts until 13th Oct 2019 so we sorted unless Sachs decides to drop the main rate earlier We have already got the max black horse ones we can have but to be honest we lost our main source for any interest on these any way when Tesco pulled their savings accounts DD capabilities earlier in the year. BH are 1.49%/1.5% but they insist on DD's which we no longer have or are being used on other accounts. Also Lloyds have max £5000 at the same rate, we could have 250,000 in the Marcus, if we had that much which we don't. We do get the benefit still in the Lloyds but no interest so we just use them until we get round to closing some of them. We do a standard £1500 round robin to negate the fees. We do use them for the cinema tickets but as we don't have the right cinema in our town we give those to our offspring who do. The mags on offer are not really of much interest for us, Mrs Aju tried the Prima but switched to a gourmet card after she wasn't actually reading them or worse found them not very interesting. I do tend not to be rsed with the goodies part of the accounts generally although we do have a BS account that has a good annual travel insurance on them, we have to add pre-existing conditions on but its still cheaper than buying external of the shelf stuff. Sadly we have used up most of the front ended incentive accounts a long time ago now but we get by. As I said we are just picking up the dross on money we don't need immediately but want as an emergency fund. As long as we can get as close as necessary to inflation levels then great - we are not about too much risk at our point in life's travels. We do have other stuff that beats inflation so that makes up for the slight losses (Inflation Tax) in the less risky areas.
|
|
|
Post by df on Oct 15, 2018 16:42:23 GMT
Not only Lloyds. There are more current accounts that pay 1.5%+ interest: BoS 1.5%, Santander 1.5%, TSB 5%, Nationwide 5% (for the 1st year), Tesco 3%. Some of them allow more than 1 account per person. I have all of them as well as all available 2.5%+ regular savers filled up to their maximum allowance. This is when something like Marcus becomes handy.
|
|
benaj
Member of DD Central
Posts: 4,856
Likes: 1,591
|
Post by benaj on Oct 15, 2018 20:20:48 GMT
Recently, I like the Chip app. It's a e-wallet. It offers up to 5% interest with successful referrals. Now I earn quarterly interest @ 5%. Withdrawal is on processed on the same day.
The only downside is £100 daily deposit limit.
Well, I wouldn't bother with Nationwide again. I have been offered 5% for the 1st year a couple of years ago. I closed the account and opened a new Flex Direct recently. Then I found out the 5% introductory rate can be only offered once in your life time but never again.
|
|
aju
Member of DD Central
Posts: 3,484
Likes: 917
|
Post by aju on Oct 15, 2018 22:37:09 GMT
Not only Lloyds. There are more current accounts that pay 1.5%+ interest: BoS 1.5%, Santander 1.5%, TSB 5%, Nationwide 5% (for the 1st year), Tesco 3%. Some of them allow more than 1 account per person. I have all of them as well as all available 2.5%+ regular savers filled up to their maximum allowance. This is when something like Marcus becomes handy. Yeah i didn't want to go too far as to reveal all but we did have all of those and the ones that don't have DD requirements we still have a considerable amount of skin in the game with. I was amazed the Halifax benefits lasted as long as they did I made some serious dosh on those alone. To be honest the DD thing is a pain so we dropped those that needed DD's and moved out ISA to better performing p2p ones. Whilst p2p stuff may be problematic for some we have been relatively lucky ok we are getting much higher default rates now we have a lot more skin in the p2p game but so far we are still getting 4-5% annualised despite considerable default increases. Mins you I only ever try to lend at max £10 loans and it seems to work so far. As I always say though time will tell.
|
|
|
Post by df on Oct 16, 2018 6:35:28 GMT
Recently, I like the Chip app. It's a e-wallet. It offers up to 5% interest with successful referrals. Now I earn quarterly interest @ 5%. Withdrawal is on processed on the same day. The only downside is £100 daily deposit limit. Well, I wouldn't bother with Nationwide again. I have been offered 5% for the 1st year a couple of years ago. I closed the account and opened a new Flex Direct recently. Then I found out the 5% introductory rate can be only offered once in your life time but never again. Of course, all banks put a limit on generous offers. These offers cost them, as any advertising do. I opened NW account in Q4 2014 because of 5% offer - never closed it. At some point later (for a short period of time) 1% was the best instant access rate... the main benefit is 5% regular saver that's been running for the past few years.
|
|
|
Post by df on Oct 16, 2018 7:08:22 GMT
Not only Lloyds. There are more current accounts that pay 1.5%+ interest: BoS 1.5%, Santander 1.5%, TSB 5%, Nationwide 5% (for the 1st year), Tesco 3%. Some of them allow more than 1 account per person. I have all of them as well as all available 2.5%+ regular savers filled up to their maximum allowance. This is when something like Marcus becomes handy. Yeah i didn't want to go too far as to reveal all but we did have all of those and the ones that don't have DD requirements we still have a considerable amount of skin in the game with. I was amazed the Halifax benefits lasted as long as they did I made some serious dosh on those alone. To be honest the DD thing is a pain so we dropped those that needed DD's and moved out ISA to better performing p2p ones. Whilst p2p stuff may be problematic for some we have been relatively lucky ok we are getting much higher default rates now we have a lot more skin in the p2p game but so far we are still getting 4-5% annualised despite considerable default increases. Mins you I only ever try to lend at max £10 loans and it seems to work so far. As I always say though time will tell. Halifax used to offer £5 a month with strings attached. iirc the "strings" offset the benefit so I didn't bother to join, but when they offered £100 joining bonus I went for it and later switched it to Yorkshire/Clydesdale for £250 bonus. It has been useful to have extra bank accounts ready for switching on few occasions.
|
|
aju
Member of DD Central
Posts: 3,484
Likes: 917
|
Post by aju on Oct 16, 2018 8:35:53 GMT
Yeah i didn't want to go too far as to reveal all but we did have all of those and the ones that don't have DD requirements we still have a considerable amount of skin in the game with. I was amazed the Halifax benefits lasted as long as they did I made some serious dosh on those alone. To be honest the DD thing is a pain so we dropped those that needed DD's and moved out ISA to better performing p2p ones. Whilst p2p stuff may be problematic for some we have been relatively lucky ok we are getting much higher default rates now we have a lot more skin in the p2p game but so far we are still getting 4-5% annualised despite considerable default increases. Mins you I only ever try to lend at max £10 loans and it seems to work so far. As I always say though time will tell. Halifax used to offer £5 a month with strings attached. iirc the "strings" offset the benefit so I didn't bother to join, but when they offered £100 joining bonus I went for it and later switched it to Yorkshire/Clydesdale for £250 bonus. It has been useful to have extra bank accounts ready for switching on few occasions. Halifax even gave us the £100 on existing accounts as long as we transferred an external account in with DD's etc to one of our Hfx accounts we did that too, it was restricted to one piece of that pie each but none the less we both did that as well. £30 pound a month for lot of years was very acceptable for 2dd and £1000 run round every month. its down quite a bit now but as I said we did get quite a bit or a return on that one. We only ever had the 1000 in each the account for < 30 secs and it was possible to do all this internally as well as the external copy in and out of the £1000 dipper fund. There was only ever £2 in each account for most of the time to cover the DD's moving out monthly. Since the amount was taxed money whilst we did not pay tax for few years as well we were able to reclaim the 1.25 tax paid as well so that amounted to £37.50 a month between us. We had that for so many years it was amazing. There were others as well, most of them needed 2DD's and we fortunately at the time had a Tesco savings accounts that provided the DD vehicle as well. Some will say I was greedy but all this happened for us some time in 2009 and stopped very recently. We had bank accounts coming out the seams at the time. It cost me about 2 hours work each month moving money around and only recently did I realise I had enough spare cash to actually create a looping standing order system, which is how I work the current half dozen accounts we have now. Just that 2 hours work meant I was earning at an hourly rate of in the region of £150/hr tax free, that in hindsight I could of had for free. That was the best month I must admit over the whole period when all the accounts were flying from most of the banks that offered these options. I've still got spreadsheets that compare the accounts against each other, I created them when some banks started to reduce the interest or the cashback etc. So we could determine which accounts to move. This was doubly facilitated by the ease of which banks were queuing up to get our business and we obliged by using the switching processes so we didn't even have to restart the DD's again. Sadly it's still available but the returns and the loss of easy DD's means we have moved on with most of them. The other useful thing is that closing accounts was always harder than opening new ones - they don;t like you to close accounts - but again we've recently been using the switching process to do this as well. We've moved on now mostly but for almost 10 years those were very Happy Days for self funded retiree's like ourselves - Happy Days !..
|
|
m2btj
Member of DD Central
Posts: 626
Likes: 749
|
Post by m2btj on Oct 16, 2018 9:04:12 GMT
Marcus doesn't offer a joint account which is a shame. Charter Savings Bank does & pays 1.4% with instant access. I'm tempted to give this a go for a 'pop my clogs' account with my partner. I want her to have easy access to cash in the event of my sudden demise without wrestling with wills & probate. I can now see why Ken Dodd married his partner of 40 years just two days before he died!
|
|