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I thought we were talking within the context of "serious problems". As for greece, well..it happened to Washington Mutual in 2008 - the largest savings in loan institution in the US. Of course, this is only one of many US banks which were not able to produce money when it was wanted in 2008.

There's a reason banks have a legal right to refuse a withdrawal, specifically because they may not have enough funds. That reason is: because it has and will happen.

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I had my "life savings" in WaMu. Now it's in Chase. I didn't lose a penny. At no point was I unable to withdraw my money.

What happened with Washington Mutual is not what's going to happen if there's a run on Mt Gox.

There are stories (see consumerist.com) of cash withdrawals not being possible.

I admit I got a little off track though. My parent specifically stated withdraw money when he wants. There's plenty of evidence that at the peak of the crisis, some people had problems. But I agree, it seemed to have been few, and in the context of Mt Gox, it isn't really relevant.

I don't know of a single person unable to withdraw their money from WaMu as it went under. All of WaMu's accounts were then passed on to chase, and chase honord them. If WaMu went under, the savings accounts would have been FDIC insured. None of that will happen if Mt Gox is compromised in some catastrophic way.

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