Bulgaria C-Bank to Unveil Supervision Boosting Measures by End-September

Bulgaria's central bank BNB said on Thursday it will publicly unveil a plan for the strengthening of its banking supervision role by the end of September 2015.

The BNB board said in a statement it discussed the assessment of the central bank's supervision role made by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank earlier this year and proposed the final version of a report on the state of the banking supervision system to be drafted by the end of August. The report will form the basis of the plan to boost the efficiency of BNB supervision.

Weaknesses in the BNB's banking supervision functions have been blamed as a reason for the collapse of Bulgaria's Corporate Commercial Bank, or KTB last year. 

The BNB also said it launched a procurement procedure for the selection of an independent consultant to advise a planned assessment of the assets of commercial banks in Bulgaria.

Strenghtening banking supervision and evaluation of banks' assets are key to successful reform of Bulgaria's banking sector, the newly elected BNB Governor Dimitar Radev said earlier this month before parliament voted him into office.

According to a 18-month plan drafted by Radev, the BNB should make the assessment of the financial sector in the second half of next year and a stress test of local banks should be completed by July 2016.

The BNB board also said it decided to make public the wages of its members and tie them to the average monthly wage paid to the managers of commercial banks operating in Bulgaria. The move followed recent legislative proposals made by some MPs to set limits to those salaries, which they claimed were exorbitantly high.

According to the formula unveiled on Thursday, the monthly wage of the BNB governor was set at BGN 15...