BDO Unibank is strengthening its push to promote financial literacy among Filipino youth through its Junior Savers account.

BDO’s Junior Savers account is a peso savings product designed for children aged 12 and below. It can be opened with an initial deposit of P100, making it accessible to families who want to introduce children to formal banking without committing large sums.

The account earns interest once the balance reaches P2,000, allowing young account holders to see how savings grow over time.

Standard savings products with parental oversight

From a practical standpoint, the account functions much like a standard savings product, but with parental oversight. Parents or guardians manage the account and can fund it through branch deposits or transfers from existing BDO accounts.

This setup enables families to build savings gradually — whether for education, emergencies, or basic money management lessons.

While similar “kiddie savings” products are available across the banking sector, the Junior Savers account reflects how large banks are positioning themselves early in a customer’s financial life cycle.

For households already within the BDO ecosystem, it offers a straightforward way to formalize children’s savings and introduce financial discipline at a young age.

Financial literacy

Beyond retail banking, the BDO Foundation has expanded its financial literacy efforts through partnerships with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and the Department of Education (DepEd) to bring money management education into public schools.

Under a memorandum of agreement signed last year by BSP Deputy Governor Bernadette Romulo-Puyat, DepEd Secretary Sonny Angara, and BDO Foundation president Mario A. Deriquito, more than 300 lesson exemplars and 10 financial education videos aligned with the K–12 curriculum are now available through the DepEd Learning Portal.

These materials help teachers integrate topics such as saving, budgeting, financial planning, and scam awareness into regular classroom instruction.

Teachers are the strongest allies

“Teachers are our strongest allies in building a financially responsible generation,” Deriquito said, noting that the resources were designed to make it easier for educators to “teach money skills in the classroom without the need to develop materials from scratch.”