The month of August is the second consecutive month in which the population and corporate contracted lending dynamic tempered considerably, to 50.4 percent, from rhythms exceeding 60 percent, according to data from the National Bank of Romania (BNR). Romanians contracted loans worth RON 183.63 billion (€52 billion) in August. “However, Romanians continue to prefer foreign currency, as the rhythm of deceleration of foreign currency loans was much greater than that of leu-denominated loans. Foreign currency liquidity is harder to obtain by banks from the international market and it is possible that people will begin to understand the risk of the evolution of the foreign exchange rate,” according to a declaration for Business Standard by Valentin Lazea, BNR Chief Economist.
Bankers are expecting that the galloping advance of lending in the past few years, which has become a major concern for the officials of the central bank, will temper once the lending regulation for the population goes into effect, brought on by the effects of the international sub-prime crisis.
“Because the BNR regulation goes into effect in October, we are expecting a continued deceleration in September and October. The advance of non-governmental lending will reach 35-40 percent by the end of the year, but a healthy annual rhythm of lending growth is 25 percent. It is likely that the new BNR norms and more expensive lending will shortly lead to a healthy rhythm of growth,” said Lazea.
