700 euros to invest: from 2% deposits to silver

I have 700 euros in the bank: where should I invest them?

The question seems textbook, but the answer gets complicated when the amount is exactly what doesn't work for almost anything. With 700 euros you can't buy an apartment, cover community fees, or pay the entry fee for a serious fund. It's the money left over after paying the mortgage, electricity, and groceries, and what many Spaniards have as their only cushion. The discussion starts with a user asking for options to place that money and receives everything: from fixed-term deposits to silver bars, including promissory notes from bankrupt companies and a motorcycle to let loose.

The first block of responses moves between jokes and disqualification. Someone suggests investing in nightlife services, another proposes Nueva Rumasa promissory notes —the company of Ruiz-Mateos that left thousands of investors empty-handed— and a third recommends buying a weapon. Life, says one, "had less value than a Ruiz Mateos note." The tone changes when someone recalls that 700 euros are not an investment: they are disguised spending. Seventy euros a month for a year, and that's it.

What can you do with 700 euros in the bank?

The most repeated answer is the least exciting: leave them where they are. A participant calculates that a six-month fixed-term deposit at an online bank at 2% annual interest generates about 7 euros gross, which after taxes remain 5.60. With that money, he says, you go to a pizzeria and blow half a year's profits on dinner. The drawback: you cannot touch your fortune during those six months. The irony is that even that 2% does not cover inflation, so the money loses value while sleeping.

Another current points to savings products with monthly remuneration. A platform is mentioned that pays interest every month without commissions, although several warn of bad experiences with it. Also appears an alternative offering 4.2% for a few months. The consensus, if there is one, is that with 700 euros it is not worth complicating things: the yield is so low that the time spent managing it is worth more than the interest generated.

Gold, silver and bitcoin: the safe haven route

When the debate tires of deposits, hard money enters. A participant recommends buying 20 ounces of silver, keeping them and forgetting about them. Another points to gold or bitcoins as a refuge against what he considers a constant loss of value of paper money. The logic is the same as Nueva Rumasa notes, but reversed: instead of trusting a company, you trust a metal that depends on no one. The problem is that 700 euros in silver take up little space and generate less profitability, unless the price skyrockets.

The riskiest option is proposed by someone suggesting a roulette strategy: bet two euros on a number for 35 spins, then four euros on another number for another 35, then 210 euros on a tonalidad and, if it fails, 150 euros on leisure services and 100 on dinner. The rest, he says, for cyanide. It is a way of saying that with that amount no strategy works.

The option nobody discusses: spend it on yourself

The most repeated and least disputed recommendation is investing in education. A participant says he spent 6,000 euros on a private course and did not find a job, so it is not a guarantee. But others defend that a higher vocational training degree (FP), especially in technical sectors, has prospects in countries like Netherlands, United Kingdom or Ireland, where demand for qualified workers is high. The problem is that 700 euros do not cover tuition nor travel.

Also appears the idea of buying a broken car and repairing it to sell it. A participant assures that he has a vehicle that does not start and that, if someone tunes it up, he gets 2,000 euros. It is a way to turn 700 euros into 2,000, but requires time, tools and knowledge. And it does not always work out.

The advice nobody wants to hear

The most repeated warning is that 700 euros are not an investment, they are a cushion. A participant recalls that any average car breakdown eats that amount, and that a building levy can leave you at zero. His recommendation: maintain immediate liquidity and do not put it in treasury bonds, retirement funds or anything that prevents taking it out when you need it. Another goes further: leave 50 or 60 euros in case an unexpected bill comes and take the rest out of the bank. "Soon you will see that it is no safer there than under the mattress," he says.

The conclusion, if you can call it that, is that with 700 euros you don't get rich. You make, at most, a dinner. Or you save it for when the next unexpected bill comes. The best investment, say some, is not losing it.

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Key data

• Fixed-term deposit 6 months at 2% annual: 7 euros gross, 5.60 net.
• Platform offering 4.2% for a few months.
• Private course of 6,000 euros that did not guarantee employment.
• Broken car that can be resold for 2,000 euros.
• 20 ounces of silver as long-term investment.