Banks Make a Killing on Low CD Rates

CD rates have been very low for a couple of years now. Before CD rates started going down, you could find 12 month certificate of deposit rates in the 4.00 percent to 5.00 percent range. Now 12 month CD rates are averaging just above 1.00 percent.

Businessweek and Bloomberg recently published an interesting article titled "Lousy CD Rates? Guess Who Wins." In the article, David Henry says collectively banks have made $56 billion since the Fed lowered the Fed funds rate to an all time low of zero percent to one quarter percent.

The article is both interesting and infuriating since it took unprecedented spending by our government to keep us out of a depression, thanks to the risk banks and other financial institutions took. Now we get to leave the deficient burden to future generations.

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