National Bank press-service: Prakapovich’s letter to Sidorski subjective
44- 14.10.2009, 13:40
The press-service of the National Bank of Belarus has commented on the letter of the bank chairman to the prime minister.
Deputy spokesperson Mikhail Zhuravovich stated that a letter from official correspondence of the two officials couldn’t be viewed as an objective document on the state of the banking system.
“It is official correspondence. And facts mentioned there are within the limits of the international norms and even lower,” Zhuravovich said to the European Radio for Belarus.
“State banks are getting stronger every day. They are banking state programs, and engaged in concessional lending. Naturally, certain inflows are needed. Like founders of other banks, they sometimes need to reinforce them,” noted the deputy head of the National Bank’s press-service.
As for the statement that state of affairs in banks deteriorates because of loans, which are not returned by Belarusians more often, the official says that the situation in Belarus is completely normal.
“This figure is never concealed. Now we have about 3% of problem loans, while the norm is 5%. International practice allows 5-6%. So we have the most law-abiding population as far as the banking system is concerned,” Mikhail Zhuravovich believes.
The National bank does not think that the situation with growth of problem debts in Belarusian banks is extreme, the spokesperson of the press-service of the main bank of the country Anatol Drazdou said.
As we have informed, on October 12 “Interfax” informed that Pyotr Prakapovich, the chairman of the National Bank board, said about a “significant threat” to the Belarusian banking system in his letter to Prime Minister Syarhei Sidorski.
The National Bank of Belarus emphasizes that the dangerous situation in the banking sector is caused by the rising liquidity crisis of state-run banks. The situation is complicated by an increase in problem loans.
Pyotr Prakapovich offered Sidorski to level down standards of financing governmental programmes for state-run banks and delegate these functions to the state development agency.
