To encourage households to start saving alongside business and government, the National Treasury developed a retail bond which offers guaranteed returns, can be bought for as little as R1, 000 and carries no commission, agency or service fees.
The Retail Bond also allows investors to take control of their own savings portfolio instead of investing through a third party. The RSA Retail Bonds offer competitive rates, with similar benefits as Government is paying in the capital markets. Individuals will now have access to those benefits in the same way as businesses and corporations.
Retail Savings Bonds stimulate personal economic empowerment by providing an alternative investment instrument that is safe and secure while delivering solid and dependable returns as well as creating healthy competition between the investment instruments in the marketplace, to the ultimate benefit of the individual investor.
The simplicity and reliability of the RSA Retail Savings Bonds should lead, over time, to deeper levels of financial and economic literacy in South Africa as a whole. As such, South Africans across the economic strata will have the opportunity to become financially empowered, a development that in turn should stimulate a savings culture and encourage economic maturity.
Total amount invested to date R2.
Gross savings as percentage of GDP 13.
National Savings Ratio 14.
Foreign capital financing gross capital formation 34.
(*highest rate of dependency since 1970 - 26.
Corporate sector savings ratio 9.
Household sector savings ratio 1.
General government savings ratio 2.9% 2007 1 Information obtained from South African Reserve Bank Quarterly Bulletin No.