BIF

BIF (1)

See: Bank Insurance Fund

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BIF (2)

The ISO 4217 currency code for Burundian Franc.

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BIF

1. Bank Insurance Fund. A pool of money created in 1989 by the FDIC to insure deposits made by banks who are members of the Federal Reserve System. The BIF was created to separate bank insurance money from thrift insurance money (which came from the Savings Association Insurance Fund). While this was likely beneficial for a time because of the savings and loan crisis, it created a perverse incentive for banks and thrifts to reclassify themselves as the other (i.e., a bank to a thrift or a thrift to a bank), depending on which fund had lower fees. This led to the passage of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act of 2005, which abolished the Savings Association Insurance Fund and the BIF and created a single Deposit Insurance Fund.

2. ISO 4217 code for the Burundian franc. It was introduced in 1964, replacing the Rwanda and Burundi franc. There are currently plans to replace the franc with the East African shilling, a common currency structured along the lines of the euro, by the end of 2009.