Some savings products, which sometimes opened decades ago, offer remuneration and, more generally, incomparable benefits compared to equivalent products currently on the market. Here are three examples of old investments to hold on to if you are lucky enough to own them.
The best soups are made in old pots. The adage can also be applied to savings. In a current landscape still marked by more than 10 years of low rates, certain risk-free investments, sometimes several decades old, appear to be good deals, in terms of remuneration and tax advantages. We detail 3 examples here. Warning: if you are lucky enough to own one of these products, think twice before getting rid of it!
The holy grail of old PELs
2013 – 2016: a golden age for the ELP. During these 4 years, the French have placed an additional 66 billion euros in their Housing Savings Plans, i.e. an average of 16.5 billion per year (1). In particular, it held high the other flagship regulated savings product, the Livret A, which only accumulated 2 billion net inflows over the period! The reason is simple. The ELP benefited at the time from a unbeatable pay rate for a risk-free investment: 2.50% until January 31, 2015, then 2% until January 31, 2016 and another 1.50% until July 31, 2016. recr: alerted by the banks of the cost that the success of the PEL represented for it, Bercy undertook to make the product less attractive, by reducing its floor rate to 1%, then by taxing the interest generated.
The Housing Savings Plan, however, is not not an investment like the others. First of all, he benefits from a particularly interesting characteristic: his remuneration is generational, i.e. the interest rate set at subscription remains in effect throughout the life of the plan. Then, the lifespan of PELs opened before March 1, 2011 is not limited: the so-called waiting phase, during which you can no longer supply your PEL, can continue indefinitely.
Result: if you have an old PEL, it remains very interesting, even with the current rise in rates and despite the taxation of interest which occurs from the 12th year of life: 2.59% net, on average, all generations combined . Be careful though: with such remuneration, your bank may be tempted to make you close your plan: hold on!
Old generations of the ELP before 2011
The People’s Savings Plan, 20 years later
20 years! It has been 20 years (since September 25, 2003 precisely) that it is no longer possible to open a People’s Savings Plan. However, two decades later, this distant cousin of the PER still posted, at the end of 2019, an outstanding amount of more than 60 billion euros (2). It is not a coincidence. Having a PEP remains a good deal, for two reasons: full capital guarantee and an income tax exemptionwhether you opt for a lump sum or life annuity.
Savings: what to do with your old PEP?
Its benefits don’t stop there. As long as the 92,000 euros, the regulatory payment ceiling, has not been reached, a PEP can continue to be funded. He can also be transferredfor a fee of one hundred euros, in order to seek better remuneration.
Some insurers have a good sense of the bargain by maintaining their catalog of PEPs destined to welcome his transfers. The only limit: to guarantee the capital, an amount equivalent to the cumulative payments made on the plan must be invested in euro funds, whose remuneration is far from reaching peaks: 1.3% on average in 2021. Capitalized interest, on the other hand, can be invested in more profitable vehicles, such as real estate funds.
Life insurance: the best contracts
Life insurance: old contracts that can be worth gold
For a long time, very old life insurance policies, prior to 1983, benefited from a particularly attractive exception: a total income tax exemption, including income from recent payments. This is no longer the case: the finance law for 2020 has put an end to this historic advantage. Capital gains derived from payments after December 31, 2019 are subject to the current tax standard. However, the benefit remains in effect for old installments.
However, this exemption is not the only potential advantage of old contracts. Some, dating from the last century, benefit from guaranteed annual returnsfixed at the time of super advantageous levels if we compare them with the current rates, marked by twenty years of uninterrupted fall: 3% or even 4%, compare with the most modest 2%, average rate of return in 2022 according to France Assureurs.
(1) Source: Banque de France, no update since this date. (2) Source: Banque de France and French Insurance Federation