Finance: Direct bank ING enters the race for retirement savings accounts

Frankfurt/Main. Germany's largest direct bank ING is entering the race for savers in retirement savings accounts. From the beginning of 2027, the institute, which has over ten million private customers in this country, will be offering two variants for a retirement provision portfolio that do not require any portfolio management, exchange or order fees and also do not charge any execution fees for savings plans.

This means that ING is entering the price war among banks, which have presented a series of offers with low fees for retirement savings accounts. From 2027 onwards, savers will be able to receive generous allowances from the state if they invest in index funds (ETFs), mutual funds and bonds for old age.

ING offers a self-decision portfolio where investors can choose from many ETFs and funds, starting with a total expense ratio of 0.03 percent. There is also a fixed standard portfolio consisting of two active ETFs, which has a total expense ratio of 0.20 percent. ING manages the composition of the two funds that invest globally. The offer differs from a purely passive solution, but is also slightly more expensive than other models on the market, such as those from Deka and Neobrokers.

Customers can save from a monthly savings rate of ten euros. “Retirement provision does not have to be the same for everyone, but it has to start simply for everyone,” says Burcu Civelek Yüce, who heads the private customer business at ING Germany.

For retirement savings accounts, the state supports deposits with an allowance of up to 540 euros per year, and there is an additional allowance of up to 300 euros per child. Deposits between 120 euros and 1,800 euros per year are eligible. Capital gains such as capital gains, dividends and interest remain tax-free during the savings phase; they are only taxed in the payout phase. Anyone who has a Riester contract can switch to the new system and transfer saved credit.

A race for retirement savings has broken out in the financial industry, with more and more banks offering low fees. Deutsche Bank, for example, offers a standard depot developed by the fund subsidiary DWS, for which the annual costs should be 0.1 percent in the first two years and 0.28 percent thereafter. Deutsche Bank is also planning a retirement account with advice, for which an annual fee of 0.99 percent will be charged. And Dekabank, which supplies the savings banks with products, charges 0.1 percent fees per year for its standard deposit account. Particularly great price pressure comes from digital banks such as Scalable Capital and Trade Republic.

According to a study by DWPBank, more than 90 percent of the 88 institutions surveyed are planning a retirement savings account - despite the price war, which hardly enables banks to make money with it. However, customer loyalty and the opportunity to do further business with savers once won outweigh economic viability.