{"id":482893,"date":"2026-05-13T17:05:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T17:05:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/482893\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T17:05:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T17:05:15","slug":"irish-households-may-invest-up-to-e7bn-in-savings-scheme-in-first-year-bpfi-says-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/482893\/","title":{"rendered":"Irish households may invest up to \u20ac7bn in savings scheme in first year, BPFI says \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The tax-efficient personal savings and investment accounts<\/a> (SIAs) planned by the Government may attract as much as \u20ac7 billion of investment from Irish households in its first year, according to Banking and Payments Federation Ireland (BPFI)<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The industry body carried out an analysis of what portion of the \u20ac170 billion of Irish household deposits in banks may end up being redirected towards SIAs in a report published on Wednesday, May 13th, as it met Minister for Finance Simon Harris<\/a> and his officials to discuss the proposal. <\/p>\n

After stripping out deposits held in longer-term accounts, savings of sole traders and certain small businesses that are categorised by the Central Bank<\/a> as household deposits, and an estimated 40 per cent of balances held by customers over 65 years of age, BPFI said \u20ac20 billion-\u20ac30 billion could potentially be put to work in SIAs. <\/p>\n

\u201cOf the estimated addressable market, only a percentage will be invested in an SIA scheme initially, which would then be built up over a period of time,\u201d it said. \u201cWe therefore believe that after year one, roughly \u20ac2 billion-\u20ac7 billion could be invested in an Irish SIA, split across various asset classes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Harris said in late March that the planned personal investment account regime will feature an annual flat-rate tax that is likely to be set in the budget later this year. He said this flat-rate tax could potentially serve as the sole form of taxation on investments made through the new account. <\/p>\n

The plan is in line with a push by the European Commission for EU member states to adopt tax-friendly models to encourage individuals to invest.<\/p>\n

The Oireachtas finance committee has been examining aspects of proposed regime in recent months, stoking debate about the pros and cons. <\/p>\n

Two academic economists \u2013 Enda Hargaden, assistant professor of economics at University College Dublin, and Barra Roantree, assistant professor of economics at Trinity College Dublin \u2013 told committee members last week that it could poke a hole in the tax bucket that will benefit the wealthy at the expense of the State coffers. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Savings scheme should be delayed rather than poorly designed, economists warnOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Patricia Callan, director of Ibec\u2019s financial services group, argued on Wednesday that the initiative \u201chas been misrepresented at times as a tax cut for the rich\u201d \u2013 noting that it is likely to have an investment cap, which would limit tax-sheltering for those in the high-net-worth category. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe main goal is to help more people in Ireland become financially resilient through investing,\u201d she said in a prepared statement before meeting members of the committee. <\/p>\n

\"\"PrepayPower are hiking their prices – will other energy suppliers soon follow suit?<\/p>\n

BPFI said it was important that a scheme has \u201cclear and attractive tax incentives\u201d so consumers can easily understand the benefit of long-term investing. SIAs should also be easy to understand and use, have broad investment options, and allow access to funds on request. <\/p>\n

They should also have \u201cprudent\u201d contribution limits that balance encouraging participation with \u201cwider financial system considerations\u201d. If contributions were not capped, it could lead to the risk of a large outflow of bank deposits into SIAs. <\/p>\n

BPFI said it was also important that a launch of any such scheme must be accompanied by a \u201cstrong, co-ordinated financial education and public awareness programme, led jointly by Government, regulators and industry\u201d. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The tax-efficient personal savings and investment accounts (SIAs) planned by the Government may attract as much as \u20ac7…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":448296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[174],"tags":[624,625,962,10471,79,22767,179,18,18470,19,17,163128,44],"class_list":{"0":"post-482893","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-aib","9":"tag-bank-of-ireland","10":"tag-banking-and-payments-federation-ireland","11":"tag-budget","12":"tag-business","13":"tag-central-bank-of-ireland","14":"tag-economy","15":"tag-eire","16":"tag-ibec","17":"tag-ie","18":"tag-ireland","19":"tag-savings-and-investment-union","20":"tag-simon-harris"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116568360627645514","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=482893"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482893\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/448296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=482893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=482893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=482893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}