Greece referendum: Greek banks prepare to trim clients’ savings as fears circulate ATMs could run out of cash next week
Greece’s banks are preparing the ground for a haircut of deposits over €8,000 in a raid to prevent collapse.
According to the Financial Times, sources in the sector said the trimming would be at a rate of “at least 30 per cent” of all deposits above the €8,000 mark, and that such a scenario was likely for at least one bank.
Read more: "What they are doing to Greece is terrorism" says Yanis Varoufakis
The measures are not unprecedented: back in 2013 clients who had unsecured savings over €100,000 were taken as part of the bailout agreement for Cyprus.
In Greece, the measures are likely to come as part of any post-Yes vote deal to recapitalise the country’s banks.
There are already capital controls imposed in Greece, with customers limited to withdrawing €60 a day. Even so, it is estimated that ATMs can only keep functioning until the middle of next week.
Finance minister Yanis Varoufakis upped the rhetoric today, telling Spanish newspaper El Mundo that the treatment of Greece by its creditors tantamount to “terrorism”.