BANKS

In an exclusive interview to Business Daily, Mr. Yiannis Stournaras talks about the economy, the grate opportunity of the Recovery Fund but also about the banking system.

Credit risks are expected to increase in the near future, exposing banks to the formation of high-end provisions that will hurt their results, at a time when they need internal capital formation to deal with losses from loan securitizations.

At the Extraordinary General Meeting, quorum exceeded 57 percent, with the vast majority of shareholders supporting management’s plan for the capital boost.

According to analysts, the increase in deposits, in the midst of a pandemic, has created a large misconception: that the increase is a result of savings, money that will be poured into the economy once the conditions allow for it.

The big change in the bank’s working model comes with the transfer of Retail Banking, headed by the General Manager Iakovos Giannaklis, which is expected to start this month, with the first 500 employees directly passing through the doors of the new offices.

As noted by the Alpha Bank executives, the Recovery Fund and resources that will be channeled into our country create a unique opportunity for the Greek banking system to increase its assets and revenues.

Top bank officials do not hide their optimism about the new growth environment that the Recovery Fund will create. Alpha Bank became the first bank to raise new funds from shareholders to support fresh lending.

The increase, amounting to 800 million euros, will not take place in the classic way, by giving the right to existing shareholders, as this is a time-consuming process that would lead to the implementation of the increase being completed in July.

With Frontier 2, further actions from management in 2022 and the increase of bank lending, it is estimated that National Bank’s bad debts index will be close to 3 percent, ie close to the average of the eurozone banks, by the end of 2022.

According to Business Daily sources, the Association of Claims Management Companies and the Hellenic Banking Association have sent letters to the Ministry of Finance.