More than a million buy popular pensioner bonds
More than a million older savers have bought over £13 billion of the government’s 65+ pensioner bonds, which came off sale yesterday.
These sales figures means that the bonds have been the biggest selling retail financial product in Britain’s modern history.
With annual interest rates of 4% for the 3 year bonds and 2.8% for the 1 year bonds, the government’s 65+ pensioner bonds have offered savers the best available rates in the market.
Chancellor George Osborne said:
The 65+ pensioner bonds have been a huge success. They’re now helping over a million older savers who have done the right thing, by boosting the return on their savings and securing a more comfortable financial future.
It’s part of our long term plan to support savers and boost peoples’ financial security at all stages of life.
The government had originally allocated £10 billion for these bonds. However, in February the Chancellor announced that they would be on sale for four months, until 15 May 2015, to ensure that those aged 65 and over who wanted to benefit from their market leading rates had time to do so.
A key part of the government’s long term plan is to support savers at all stages of their lives and help people secure their financial futures. That is why the government announced at Budget 2014 that National Savings and Investments (NS&I) would launch two fixed-rate, market-leading savings bonds, and why the Chancellor confirmed in December last year that the interest rates these bonds would pay are significantly higher than any others currently offered in the market.
Image by 401(K) 2012 on Flickr. Used under creative commons.