Good news for mortgage holders
For Irish mortgage holders, the decision means that interest rates remain at historic lows resulting in continued record low monthly repayments for the estimated 400,000 residential tracker mortgage holders here.
Bad news for savers
For Irish savers, the news should be less welcome. Over the course of the last 12 months, savers have been hit with a steady reduction in the amount of interest income they can expect to earn on their money. Additionally, the very significant rise in DIRT payable on interest earnings means that savers are being harshly punished for their prudence, a trend that is expected to continue as more and more banks reduce the rates of interest they are prepared to pay.
Across the savings spectrum, only one bank pays 4%, which is Nationwide UK on a regular savers account with a broad majority of banks paying, in some instances, fractions of a percent to their customers. Savers, who were broadly courted a few short years ago by banks, many of which were struggling to repair their capital ratios have now pushed those very same customers into the persona non grata category.
