Deposit Rates Sink to 15-Year Low

Belizeans are earning less on their bank deposits today than at any point over the past 15 years.

Recent Central Bank figures show that the weighted average deposit rate slipped to 0.9 percent in September 2025, marking a continued decline in what banks pay customers for keeping money in savings and time-deposit accounts.

The biggest drivers behind this fall are savings deposits and time deposits. Savings accounts currently earn between 2.6 and 2.7 percent, while time deposits—often used for fixed-term investments—have dropped to around 1.9 to 2.0 percent. Because these two types of deposits hold the largest share of customer funds, their steady downward movement pulls the overall average down with them.

Demand and chequing accounts, which typically offer little to no interest, have not changed much and therefore play a smaller role in the decline. Their low rates matter far less than the shifts happening in savings and time deposits, where most Belizeans keep their money.

The long-term trend shows how sharply deposit earnings have fallen. Back in early 2010, the average rate was close to 6 percent. By 2015 it had slipped to about 1.5 percent, and by 2020 was roughly 1.3 percent. The continued drop into 2024 and 2025 suggests that low deposit returns have become a normal feature of the banking system rather than a temporary change.

To put the idiosyncratic changes by sub-type into perspective, in 2010, Demand-deposit rates was around 0.5 percent. That figure, as of September this year, is 0.2 percent. As already mentioned, Time Deposit rates were closer to 7.4 percent 15 years ago, but today have slumped to 1.9 percent—representing a 74% decline.

Several factors help explain this shift. Banks have more than enough liquidity, meaning they do not need to offer high interest rates to attract deposits. At the same time, lending has grown relatively slowly, so banks face less pressure to compete for customers’ savings.

For everyday Belizeans, these historically low rates mean that money saved in the bank grows very slowly, making it harder for deposits to keep up with rising living costs. For context, during this period of time, headline inflation has climbed by almost 30%.