When I was young, I had a piggy bank. A piggy bank is incredibly secure. It’s fairly big – so it is hard to lose. It is brightly coloured – so you can find it easily. No one else can see how much money there is in there. The only way to get money out is to smash it – providing visible evidence if someone has robbed you. And smashing makes a noise – deterring would-be thieves.

A piggy bank is close to perfect security. If you are seven and your adversary is a younger sibling.

Storing your own money is a mug’s game. Having a fiver on you for emergencies might be sensible – but stuffing cash under your mattress is not advisable. Loss, theft, and fire are all real concerns.

The world is moving away from cash. Just before the pandemic, I went a year without using cash. Since then, I haven’t withdrawn any notes.

Holding on to cash is like running your own bank. You have to check that the money you’re given isn’t counterfeit, store it safely, insure against loss, protect against theft, project future needs, etc. It is a massive faff.

So people use banks. In the UK, t