On the liability side, margins are declining as banks store their surplus at the central bank at a negative rate and are reluctant to charge negative rates to small savers.
The reluctance is caused by political pressure and the threat of customers withdrawing their savings when faced with negative rates. As a result, banks are currently only charging negative rates above specified thresholds of the account balance, e.g. EUR 100k.
The reluctance to charge negative rates to small savers has made savings and current accounts an increasingly expensive funding source for banks. At the same time, COVID-19 caused a large inflow of volume on individual’s accounts as holidays and other large expenses were cancelled. The COVID-19 surge reinforced an already ongoing trend of growing volumes on savings and current accounts, with total Dutch account balances currently reaching approximately EUR 512 billion(1). To choose the right strategies to cope with the compressing margins and excess liquidity, an accurate measurement of the interest rate characteristics of the balance sheet is an important first step.
In this article, we explore the interest risk of savings and current account products and we introduce how replicating portfolios are typically used to mimic the risk profile of these products. In addition, the different techniques to model interest rate characteristics of savings and current accounts are discussed and a framework to accurately measure optionality’s that come into play in low (negative) interest rate environments is explored.
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