Cyprus’ non-performing loans (NPLs) recorded a small decrease by €13.5 million, totalling €6.52 billion at the end of August, according to the latest data from the Central Bank of Cyprus (CBC).
According to the data, as a percentage of total loans, NPLs amounted to 21.9%, with the NPL index remaining unchanged compared to the previous month. From the end of December 2019, the total NPLs showed a decrease of €2.4 billion, which is mainly attributed to the sale of a bad loan portfolio by the Bank of Cyprus (also known as Helix 2) as well as to NPLs write-offs by the Hellenic Bank.
Due to COVID-19 disruption there’s a moratorium of loan repayments in the country from March 2020 to December 2020, while according to instructions of the European Banking Authority (EBA), these loans are not classified as non-performing loans.
Total NPLs (under the EBA directive) at the end of August amounted to €6,517 million compared to €6,530 million last month. The decrease is mainly attributed to the transfer of restructured loans, amounting to €13.56 million in the portfolio of serviced loans, after the completion of their monitoring period under the EBA directive.
Loans with arrears of more than 90 days amounted to €5.44 billion or 18.2% of total loans in August, showing a decrease of €19.8 million compared to the previous month.
Total restructured loans at the end of August amounted to €4.19 billion, of which €3.02 continue to be classified as NPLs.
In addition, total accumulated provisions amounted to €3.63 billion in August, of which €3.47 billion for NPLs, compared to €3.62 billion and €3.46 respectively in the previous month.
Total loans at the end of August, amounted to €29.81 billion of which €15.14 billion, or 53.13% concerned businesses and €12 billion concerned household loans.
Bad corporate loans at the end of August amounted to €2.87 billion, of which the vast majority, (€2.43 billion) concerned SMEs of small and medium enterprises, while household NPLs amounted to €3.3 billion or 27.5%.
(Cyprus News Agency)
Perhaps if they published the ‘secret’ PEP list the NPL’s would decrease even further and faster?