The number of cash payments in Swedish retail stores has dropped 25 % over the past 5 years, which means that 95 % of payments are now done electronically, although not everyone is pleased with this evolution.
Negative interest
Sweden’s interest rate is just barely above zero, which means it is no long interesting to keep money stored away in a bank account. A negative interest rate may even arrive sometime soon, which means that customers would have to pay money to keep their money in a bank account.
It makes much more sense to start paying things in cash, but such behaviour is heavily discouraged in Sweden. A lot of Swedish banks no longer have cash money available and charge extra when cash is actually used to pay for something. Many Swedes have gotten used to paying bills from the comfort of their own home, using internet banking.
Swedish consumers have to pay extra when they store money in a bank and when they use cash in stores. It remains to be seen whether the Swedes will accept this system when they realize they actually lose money either way.
