James' and Lily's gold

[Eddie]

No: HPFGUIDX 160802

> montims:
> Do wizards have insurance?  Quite apart from that, all the money James
> inherited had sat untouched in the Grigotts vault for 11 years,
acquiring
> interest...

Eddie:
Do the Gringotts' goblins pay interest?  Since it is a bank, I assume
that they do, but this seems inconsistent with the goblin telling
Harry that they only check the vaults about once every 10 years. 
(Harry had asked how often they look to see if somebody got trapped in
one.)  How is the interest paid then?

Lots of possible speculation to follow here without any canon:

* Do the goblins pay interest at all? (Seems contrary to goblin
personality)

* Do the goblins pay interest on the contents of vaults, or are the
vaults like safety deposit boxes in Muggle banks -- privately secure
contents, but not opened by bank employees nor is interest paid

* If they do pay interest, is the interest inserted into the vault
magically?

* If they do pay interest, then the goblins would need to know the
exact value (or count of) the contents.  Right?

* What was the interest on the Philosopher's Stone?

OK, I guess I'm persuading myself that there was no interest paid on
the Potter's wealth.  But maybe I'm wrong.

Eddie, who has often wondered why Harry thinks he has no Muggle money,
only Wizarding money.  (I think this came up at the beginning of
Prisoner of Azkaban, when Harry ran away from Privet Drive and was
pondering what to do next.)  Harry could probably have gone to
Gringott's and exchanged Wizarding money to Muggle.  Recall that
Hermione's parents went to Gringotts and were exchanging Muggle to
Wizarding money.