Skopje, 1st November 2013 (MIA) – Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, Zoran Stavreski invited the banks stating that they may and must support the economic growth since they have sufficient funds.
– General situation in the economy in Macedonia is better than the other European countries, in Europe, the economic perspectives improved and the liquidity of banks is high. NBRM and the Ministry of Finance provided for more funds to remain with the banks and thus I believe that it is the bank’s turn to do that. There is no any reason for them not to credit several Macedonian companies and the households since we need both private investments and consumption, Minister of Finance said when asked following the conference at the occasion of the Insurance Day.
Yesterday, it was pointed out that the growth of crediting is 3.7% and that all conditions have been created for achieving higher growth rate of 7-8% next year.
Support to the business sector will be also provided from the new credit line from the European Investment Bank in the amount of EUR 100 million, to be available after the legal solution is adopted by the Parliament, which is expected in two weeks.
According to professor Tome Nenovski, in conditions when there is great restraint by domestic commercial banks in terms of financing the economy activities, it turns out that the strong impetus to economic trends in this country is made by the Macedonian Bank for Development Promotion, particularly by using the credit lines Macedonia obtains from EIB.
– In the past period, there were tranches in the amount of EUR 250 million, most of them already being used. At present, there is third tranche, which in my opinion will be soon realized as a result of the exceptionally favourable conditions, which will compensate to the significantly large shortage of funds that the banks should usually use for financing the economy. However, due to many different reasons, they refrain themselves and yesterday we heard from the Governor that they even refrain from one strange phenomenon, i.e. from certain orders by their parent banks abroad. Accordingly, we may expect that this credit impetus will be stimulus for the expected economic growth in the next period of development of Macedonian economy, Nenovski stated.
As for the most recent data on public debt announced by the Ministry of Finance, amounting to 34.1% of GDP, Starveski said that it remains low and Macedonia remains to be the fourth least indebted country in Europe.
Nenovski pointed out that the he cannot say the precise amount of the debt, however, he believes that there should be caution as for all borrowings not to cross the red line, which is somewhat determined at maximum 40% of GDP.
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