There's big money for banks in people's loose change, according to a report TowerGroup Inc. published Monday.
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The Needham, Mass., independent research unit of MasterCard Inc., estimates that people redeem $3 billion of coins at supermarket coin-counting machines, which charge a fee. They also deposit $6 billion of coins at bank branches.
If banks charged the same fees as the machines for accepting coins, they could make $500 million, said Jerry Silva, the TowerGroup research director who wrote the report. According to his research, coin-counting services will become more necessary as people make more purchases with payment cards instead of cash and have fewer opportunities to spend loose change.
