Savings of ordinary Russians not growing – poll

MOSCOW. Dec 26 (Interfax) – Most Russians do not have any savings and, therefore, are not concerned about ways to preserve them; as for those who have bank deposits, they try to minimize their risks by splitting their deposits, having deposits in different banks, and collecting information about various lending institutions, the VTsIOM sociological survey company told Interfax based on a poll of 1,600 respondents it conducted in 130 populated areas in 42 regions of Russia on December 14-15, 2013.

Only 28% of the respondents said they have some money deposited in banks, while 71% do not have bank accounts at all, the poll showed.

A similar poll VTsIOM conducted two years ago showed that 26% had bank accounts and 72% did not have any. The share of those having bank deposits in accounts is relatively larger among seniors (38%) and those having higher incomes (37%) and smaller among young people (18%) and those having lower incomes (18%).

More than half of the respondents having bank deposits (57%) said they do not fear that they might lose their savings, while 38% said they are concerned about such a possibility.

The share of those afraid of losing their savings is larger among the people having only a primary education or lower incomes (48% each) and supporters of the Communist Party (50%).

Nearly two thirds of those having bank deposits – 63% – admitted that they do not care about making any efforts to preserve their money, which is significantly more than in October 2008, i.e. at the outset of the global economic downturn, when only 48% of those polled by VTsIOM gave the same answer.

Among those who do take certain steps to safeguard their savings, 8% follow their banks’ performance, 5% each deposit their money in state-owned banks or in several banks, 4% regularly withdraw money from their deposits or deposit relatively minor sums, 3% insure their bank deposits, and 2% each invest in real estate or purchase durable goods.

Another 2% are sure that they have already found a reliable bank for depositing their savings