If Iyou Were Joe Thai,

[roamer]

In the west we have grown up with the assumption, albeit grudging, that banks were a safe place to have your money. In Asia thats been a far more recent situation. Spurred by growing wealth, the need, real or perceived, to have a bank to carry out your transactions has multiplied immeasureably. Yet the need to own commodities such as gold has always been present, far moreso than in the west.

So I'm Thai, I've woke up this morning to find that the gold price is now what...$30-40 more per baht, that even the biggest of the western banks is in trouble, I may not know all the ins and outs of it, but surely I might wonder if the best place for my cash is in the bank right now, if I own shares in that bank I would wonder even more. I'm Thai, I may well profess a love of my government, never said I ItrustedI it, maybe I might feel the best place for my money is outside the banking system.

Thai banks may well operate on a much lower system of customer deposits than in the west but how vulnerable would they be to a sustained run on them ? I'm not talking logic here, rather than the emotions that drive markets, fear & greed.

I'm asking this merely out of curiousity as I have only minimal deposits in the Thai banking system but I confess it was driven by a friends story that his maid had withdrawn her life savings of 600K Baht from the bank IlastI week and bought gold because her friends and family were doing likewise. Good luck to her, a little bit like the Andaman Island natives heading for the hills before the tsunami hit. And me, what do I know, remarked she might catch a cold cos gold was at a high ...doh!!!

So as I said, and no doubt a few of you will remark upon, I am remarkably ignorant of the way financial markets work though I would venture to suggest no more ignorant than the boards of Lehman Bros, AIG, HBOS, etc (how many more to add by the morning ?) this is the question.

What would YOU do were it your life savings in a Thai bank tomorrow ?

[flying]

What would YOU do were it your life savings in a Thai bank tomorrow ?

I have no answer but that is a bit of a scary thought.

Here in the USA at least we have FDIC insurance to cover our cash up to 100k USD for single deposits & more for joint accounts. Hopefully we will not need to test that system

I guess since you say your Thai you will need to weigh the risks there. If you go to gold where do you or the maid you mentioned keep it? That is scary too

The big fish that are failing here are mainly the ones that all took part in the big mortgage fiascoes. Large banks are for teh most part fine here but............anything seems possible these days

As a side note have you ever considered real estate as a savings there?

Edited September 17, 2008 by flying

[roamer]

What would YOU do were it your life savings in a Thai bank tomorrow ?

I have no answer but that is a bit of a scary thought.

Here in the USA at least we have FDIC insurance to cover our cash up to 100k USD for single deposits & more for joint accounts. Hopefully we will not need to test that system

I guess since you say your Thai you will need to weigh the risks there. If you go to gold where do you or the maid you mentioned keep it? That is scary too

The big fish that are failing here are mainly the ones that all took part in the big mortgage fiascoes. Large banks are for teh most part fine here but............anything seems possible these days

As a side note have you ever considered real estate as a savings there?

Sorry you misunderstood me, my fault. I am not NOT Thai. I was simply postulating what I would do were I Thai.

But the question of where you would keep your gold is valid, one of the reasons for the growth of Thai banks was the perceived security of a bank to keep your money safe. Now I would bury it in my rice field, at least the wife has some of those ! :D

[flying]

Sorry you misunderstood me, my fault. I am not NOT Thai. I was simply postulating what I would do were I Thai.

But the question of where you would keep your gold is valid, one of the reasons for the growth of Thai banks was the perceived security of a bank to keep your money safe. Now I would bury it in my rice field, at least the wife has some of those !

Hahaha I see

Well I guess it is impossible for us to answer objectively because of our upbringing.

Of course we with our supposed insured safe account would all say no way would we keep more there than we were willing to lose

[BEENTHEREDONETHAT]

I was under the impression that deposits in Thai banks were insured to 100,000,000 and that would be lowered each year for the next five. But for all I know that has changed already. And the insurance is only as good as the issuer. If it is insured by AIG it might be questionable.

I have my money in 5 different banks and one credit union in 3 countries. Don't know if that makes it safer or surer of losing part of it. Since I don't know where to put it I will leave it there for the time being.

As far as gold goes I'm not a big fan of it but that is from personal experience and not to meaningful.

The only thing I'm comfortable with is my investment in my condo. At least I have a place to live.

[CWMcMurray]

I am not a huge fan of gold either, but if your only choices are a low interest Thai savings account or gold... she may actually be better off buying gold (as long as she has somewhere safe to keep it).

The fact is there are many better options, but she may not be aware or trust any of them.