Due to the rising price of gold, depositors have earned record interest on deposits

Three years ago, Šiaulių Bankas offered a non-traditional savings instrument - a term deposit, the interest rate of which will depend on the change in the price of gold during the planned period. Today, at the end of the deposit term, the bank pays 9.8 per cent (3.26 per cent of annual) interest to customers, which is 5.5 times higher than the Lithuanian banks usually offer for term deposits.

"We always aim at offering our customers various savings and investment solutions. As we currently live in a low-interest environment, the deposit conditions offered in the market are too low for many, but, on the other hand, more and more customers tend to take risks and invest in the capital market. We are glad that the favourable price of gold in the markets allowed depositors to earn attractive interest rates”, - said Aušrinė Vilimavičiūtė, Director of Savings and Investment Products Department at Šiaulių Bankas.

Under the terms of the deposit agreement, depositors will be paid 1.8 per cent of fixed interest and an 8 per cent of additional interest Additional interest shall be paid to depositors as the value of the gold price index had increased by more than 30% on the day specified in the deposit agreement.

According to A. Vilimavičiūtė, during the last three years the price of gold has risen the most among all asset classes - it increased by more than 47 %. Concern about the pandemic, aggressive and coordinated response of central banks in the fight against coronavirus, geopolitical unrest - encouraged investors to seek safe investment and had a positive impact on the price of gold.

Šiaulių Bankas has also distributed more term deposits, the assets of which are linked to financial instruments. Recently, in October last year, depositors were paid 8.5% of interest on a three-year deposit that was linked to shares of the oil companies.

The deposit portfolio of Šiaulių Bankas Group grew by more than 5% in the first half of this year and reached over EUR 2 billion. Šiaulių Bankas also offers deposits to German residents through the virtual savings platform Raisin.