For the first time, the European authorities issued a warning to prepare us for the situation of the materialization of serious risks. And national banks must prepare the full range of tools so that the financial system is affected as little as possible, Florian Nyagu, deputy director of financial stability at the BNR, said on Friday.

Florian Nyagu, director of the BNRPhoto: Hotnews

To soften the shocks that may arise, the National Macroprudential Supervisory Committee decided to increase the countercyclical capital buffer, a measure that will be applied in the next 12 months.

We increase the reserves we build in banks to be able to release them later in the event of adverse events. We also have 9 systemically important banks, the largest is BT, which has the largest buffer of additional capital, followed by UniCredit, BRD, BCR and others.

What else did the government official of the BNR say:

  • We have 3 risks on the dashboard. The first is geopolitical risk combined with energy risk. You see how the forecasts of economic growth in Europe are getting worse. We expect certain pressures on the external channel.
  • The second risk is represented by internal imbalances, especially the deficiency of twins. We look very closely at the current account deficit because that’s where a lot of problems in the economy end.
  • The third risk is related to the ability of the authorities to attract European and PNRR resources.
  • We urge banks to be just as careful about their dividend policy.
  • Uncertainty for many reasons: we have a war on the border, we have an energy crisis, rising prices. And it is normal that in this context of overlapping problems, we wonder whether banks will still be able to finance the real and public sectors.
  • The banking system was part of the solution. The two very big vulnerabilities that we had – the share of foreign currency credit and dependence on external financing – have reduced. Banks have funding resources, but there are few acceptable projects.
  • Credit activity was significant. We are in second place in terms of credit growth rates, and on average over 3 years – in first place. The good news is that the banks have supported the economy. We look carefully at the dynamics, because we know that in the previous crisis, the crisis came through companies.