World Savings Day 2021: History, Significance and Why it is Celebrated

World Savings Day/World Thrift Day is celebrated across the world every year on October 31. However, it is celebrated annually in India on October 30.

World Savings Day was established on October 31, 1924, during the 1st International Savings Bank Congress (World Society of Savings Banks) in Milano, Italy. The Italian Professor Filippo Ravizza declared this day the “International Saving Day” on the last day of the congress.

World Savings Day or World Thrift Day was established to inform people all around the world about the idea of saving their money in a bank rather than keeping it under their mattress.

World Savings Day is an event created to increase the public’s awareness of the importance of savings both for modern economies and for individuals alike. Savings is important in the global economy and every depositor contributes to its development.

For more than 90 years, the World Savings and Retail Banking Institute and its members have spearheaded annually a day dedicated to promoting the virtue of people saving money. Called World Savings Day, it was the first initiative of WSBI, the voice of savings and retail banks in close to 80 countries, the day remains relevant for members who engage actively in celebrating in their local areas. World Savings Day is celebrated in countries around the world.

For Brussels-based WSBI and its members, World Savings Day places added focus on the stabilising role played by savings and retail banking in the overall financial system. It evokes some of the ethos of local banks: responsible partners in communities, close to the customer, serving households, small and medium-sized firms (SMEs) and local authorities. ​WSBI member banks demonstrate their locally focused approach to banking through World Savings Day activities in the communities they serve.