All about Fixed Deposits (FD’s)
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CA Kunal Singhal
Introduction
Although a very familiar term in everyday life, fixed deposits or “FD” as we call it, is one of the
very crucial investments which almost every individual happen to make or open with their
bankers.
Definition
Fixed deposits are high interest yielding term deposits offered by bank in India. It is a type of
financial instrument which generally offers higher rate of interest than a usual savings bank
accounts. FD’s may or may not require opening a separate bank account with the bank. One can
place an FD in his usual savings bank account.
It may be interesting to know that, being considered to be one of the safest investments options,
FD’s come with an insurance cover from Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation
(DICGC) which is a government agency regulated by RBI. This means in case of a bank failure,
DICGC protects bank deposits that are payable in India upto a limit of Rs. 1 lac per depositor
per bank and refunds to customers. This feature also makes them safer even than post office
deposit schemes.
Fixed deposits are liquid assets as they can be realized very easily when in need of money. Some
banks even offer additional facilities to their account holders such as loans/ credit cards against
the FD’s placed with banks. This feature is very lucrative in real sense, as individual gets to
retain his investments which shall mature at a specified date with interest and simultaneously his
need for funds is also satisfied in form of loan against FD which he can repay during the tenure
of the fixed deposit.
The tenure of FD can vary from 7, 15 or 45 days to 1.5 years and can be as high as 10 years. The
longest permissible term for an FD is 10 years. Interest rates offered on fixed deposits differ
from bank to bank and is a factor of tenure for which deposit has been placed. Longer the tenure
of the deposit higher is the interest rate offered by the bank and vice-a-versa. For example, State
Bank of India offers an interest rate of 8.75% on fixed deposits with 1-3 years maturity whereas
ICICI bank interest rate ranges from 8.00% – 8.75% on deposits with 1-3 years maturity.
If we calculate an FD can double the amount of investment in approximately 8.5 years from the
maturity date. For eg: An FD is placed on 1st-Jan-2015 at interest rate of 8% for a tenure of 9
years. The amount receivable on maturity of the term shall be calculated as follows:
FD amount: Rs. 1 Lac
Interest rate: 8.5% per annum compounded annually
Tenure: 9 years
Amount receivable on maturity: Rs. 2,08,386 (100000*108.50%^9)
Benefits
Tax benefits
As a common practice it is understood that investments made in fixed deposits for a tenure
exceeding 5 years qualify for deduction from taxable income under income tax. It helps in
lowering the tax burden of the assessee to the tune of Rs. 15,000 (considering that maximum
amount eligible for deduction is 1.5 lacs).
Now consider below how you can earn higher rate of interest on FD than offered by most banks:
If you invest Rs. 150,000 in fixed deposits for 5 years
Principal amount: Rs. 150,000
Interest rate offered by bank: 8.50% per annum
Amount receivable on maturity: Rs. 225,549
Tax saving: Rs. 15,000
Total savings: Rs. 240,549 (Rs. 15,000 + Rs. 225,549)
Effective interest rate comes to 10% approx.
This way you can double your money in only 7.3 years approximately as against 9 years as
shown above.
Good savings!!
Retirement planning
For the reasons mentioned above fixed deposits surely qualify as one of the safest options to
invest for retirement. You can building your corpus over a period of time till retirement. To
understand this lets again take an example:
Current age of assessee: 30 years
Retirement age: 65 years
Current salary: 30,000 per month
FD placed in first year: Rs. 1 lac
Tenure: 10 years (maximum permitted)
Interest rate: 8.50% per annum
Amount receivable on maturity: Rs. 226,098
Re-Invest this amount in 10th year for 10 years
Amount receivable in 20th year: Rs. 511,204
Re-invest this amount in 20th year for 10 years
Amount receivable in 30th year: Rs. 11,55,824
So, the amount of Rs. 1 lac invested in 1st year (at the age of 30) becomes Rs. 11.5 lacs by the
time you attain age of 60 years. Now imagine what you can achieve if you place FD’s every year
for tax benefits. This is called power of compounding which converts a simple FD into a
financial planning tool.
Other similar benefits of fixed deposits for which you can consider placing deposits:

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Planning for childs future/higher studies
Planning for childs marriage etc.
Some common types of fixed deposits
Fixed deposits can be categorized as under:
1. Simple FD – These are standard deposits with wide range of tenures ranging from 7 days to 10
years. Interest rate depends on the bank and may vary.
2. Special FD – These are special tenure FD’s where investors can apply for deposits for special
periods like 190, 290 or 390 days as offered by banks.
3. Tax saving FD – These are placed to gain benefit under section 80C of income tax. Point to
note here is that interest earned on FD’s is fully taxable.
Hope you find this article relevant.
For any specific query please drop a mail to info@caksc.in
- See more at: http://taxguru.in/finance/fixed-deposits-fds.html#sthash.QE4uQ0bF.dpuf