Foreign currency deposits up

Foreign currency banking deposits resumed growth at the end of last year, after having gone down for several months in a row. This happened at a time when the interests on deposits had declined month by month and the depreciation of the ROL against the USD, which is still the benchmark currency for the Romanian economy, was rather low. The trend can be grounded on the interests for the ROL deposits, which have gone down in their turn, and even reached real negative (below the inflationary rate) values in some cases. Take November, for instance, when this indicator went up 3.9%, following the October 0.2% increase and the 1.7% gain in September. The rate cuts for the foreign currency banking deposits (in dollars and euros) have been heftier since last summer, a trend induced by the latest developments on the international markets, where interests have drastically shrunk. The interests offered by the banks for foreign currency deposits kept going down all through the year, plunging from 5%-6% a year to a mere 1%-2% a year now. Still, both individuals and corporations had placed some $4,027 million with the banks in various term deposits and in various currencies by the end of November. ZF