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ECONOMY – The Livret A rate will double on August 1 to reach 2% and that of the Livret d’épargne populaire (LEP) will climb to 4.6%, the Minister of the Economy announced on Thursday 14 July. Bruno the Mayorendorsing the proposal made by the Governor of the Banque de France.
A savings product held by a majority of French people, the Livret A has its rate calculated automatically twice a year. In February, his salary had already doubleddropping from 0.5%, a historic low, to 1%.
“On the Livret A as on the LEP, we have chosen to follow the recommendations of the Governor of the Banque de France”, explains this Thursday the tenant of Bercy on a daily basis The Parisian.
Governor François Villeroy de Galhau had sent him his proposal upstream, as is customary each semester. It was then up to the Minister to ratify it.
The rate partly depends on the level of inflation, measured by Insee at 5.8% over one year in France in June, interbank rates, at which banks exchange short-term money, but also on a possible “boost”, absent this time.
If this increase may seem like good news for French savers, it should not make us forget that the rate, even if revalued, will remain very much lower than inflation.
Favorite placement of the French
For a saver with 10,000 euros on his Livret A, the full-year remuneration will be 200 euros, once morest 100 euros at the current rate.
What attract new payments in the coming weeks, but also “penalize consumption”, reacted Philippe Crevel, director of the Circle of savings.
This revaluation of the Livret A also brings with it the rate of the Sustainable and Solidarity Development Booklet (LDDS).
It is a half-surprise, since the governor of the Banque de France had already qualified it as “possible” at the microphone of Franceinfo on Wednesday.
Livret A and LDDS total more than 485 billion euros in assets, according to the latest score from the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations (CDC).
They benefit from a guaranteed interest rate, are exempt from income tax and social security contributions, and the money deposited remains available at all times.
Managed jointly by the CDC and the banking networks, the Livret A is mainly used to finance social housing, while the LDDS is dedicated to the social and solidarity economy, as well as to energy savings in housing.
Spotlight on LEP
The popular savings account rate, which will drop from 2.2% to 4.6%, becomes “the most effective investment to protect once morest inflation”, promotes Bruno Le Maire.
“You have to go back to 1998 to have a comparable LEP rate (4.5%),” recalls Philippe Crevel. The LEP “will thus be by far the best-paid short-term investment that can compensate for inflation,” he believes.
But too few eligible people hold them. If its opening procedures have been simplified since last year, only 37% of the 18.6 million French people meeting the conditions to have a LEP actually have one, according to the Banque de France.
This product is reserved for people with incomes not exceeding certain ceilings (20,297 euros per year for example for a single person).
The Banque de France, for its part, recalled “its support for this instrument which makes it possible to protect the purchasing power of popular savings”.
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