On Sun, 30 Jul 1995, Mike Bailey wrote:
The US banking industry has gone to the dogs. The day a non-US bank offers an account that can be accessed over the net will be the day I close my US accounts.
Interesting idea ...
1st question or thing I would want to be certain of is the stability of the currency of the realm so to speak. I wouldn't want to bank in a country that had a weak currencey (sp) or was subject to roller coaster economics.
How could it be worse than with the U.S. of A.?? ;-) Seriously: you may bank in US Dollars (or other major currencies) in many countries, including all the offshore banking centres. Limited amounts of cash may be withdrawn using ATM dispensers, against a fee of two or three USD per operation; for larger amounts, you may ask them to wire money by SWIFT, Telex or bank drafts to other banks or genric payees. For such operations, most large banks accept instructions by snail mail, and sometimes by fax (if the customer signs a letter of indemnity exempting the bank from liabilities in case of forgeries). Sadly, AFAIK no bank is accepting digitally encrypted and signed e-mail instructions, and issuing digitally encrypted and signed receipts.