What happened in S&L crisis (?) may give some precedent. If this risk concerns you my advice would be DON"T keep money in a non bank financial institution. Banks ONLY. Brokers are possibly OK due to SIPC. I have money in brokerage accounts but it is spread across brokers and countries. In the current market I would not have all my funds with one broker. It could take years to be made whole by the SIPC. In Thailand's crisis people with their money in non bank financials had to wait 5 years to get their money back following closure of the institutions by the Governemnet. They were lucky to get it back. Money in banks was OK throughout, although there was no way of being sure of this at the time. In South America during hyperinflation people kept their money in stronger currencies and changed it just prior to use. HTH
While I'm here this is an interesting oint about houseprice declines being offset by inflation. Form The Times "Then the slide started. On the face of it, this didnât appear to be a sharp fall: from their 1989 peak to the 1995 trough, average house prices fell 13.2%. Over six years, thatâs not too drastic. However, the headline number is misleading. It was a period of high inflation â far higher than today. The fall in house prices may appear modest, but in real terms â taking general inflation into account â it represented a 34% decline. After prices started to recover in 1996, they took just two years to get back to the level of 1989. "
It's started. Big companies delaying payment to their suppliers because they need the cash, and because they can. http://business.timesonline.co.uk/t...ectors/banking_and_finance/article3739879.ece