Portuguese savings bonds changes

Recent months have seen a rush on the part of the Portuguese public to buy national savings bonds — known as aforros — because hey offered higher interest rates on savings than Portugal’s banks.

The Government has now decided to suspend further issues of the Series E certificates and instead issue Series F from today (Monday, June 5). However there are differences between Series E and F.
With the new series the maximum ceiling for interest yields is lower and cannot be less than 0% or more than 2.5%. The previous series offered up to 3.5%.
The second change has to do with time. Series E was for 10 years, whereas Series F is for up to 15 years maturity, both of which offer an increasing remuneration over time.
But the premium for not cashing in the bonds has been adjusted. It was 0.5% from the start of the second year and the end of the fifth, and 1% from the sixth year.
Now it is 0.25% between the second and fifth years and up to 1.75% in the last two years of the maximum period of subscription.

0.25% from 2nd to 5th year;
0.50% from the 6th to the 9th year;
1.00% in the 10th and 11th year;
1.00% in the 11th year;
1.50% in the 12th ad 13th year.

With these new bonds each first time investor has to buy a minimum of €100 in bonds. Existing investors can do so from just €10.
The maximum amount that can be invested has also changed. Each investor cannot invest over €50,000. Moreover, in the accumulation of these series E and F series certificates, the investor may not have more than €250,000 invested in these products.