Savings hit by low interests

Savings in the banking system increased only 1.1% in nominal terms in August, up to 94,990bn ROL, fuelling the central bank’s concerns about eroding savings. The fast-paced decrease of interests paid by banks for the deposits in ROL and the relaxed lending terms have both contributed to the trend. Maintaining savings in the banks for interests’ sake, which hardly covered inflation anyway, did not prove that appealing anymore, especially since the money could be easily used as a down payment for getting a loan. Moreover, the periodically negative real interests made banking ROL deposits unattractive. ZF