Interest rate

The presentation delivered by Central Bank Governor Erdem Başçı at the beginning of the week had a self-defending feature in the matters of the monetary policy and interest rate decision.

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan, who has criticized the Central Bank for not cutting interest rates enough, said he did not accept Governor Erdem Başçı's approach on rates and hoped the bank would act immediately to resolve the issue.
    

Turkish Central Bank Gov. Erdem Başçı gave no signals of an immediate rate cut during a critical and much-anticipated presentation in front of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on June 2, but sought to draw an optimistic picture of the economy.

Erdoğan, a harsh critic of high rates, has been vigorously slamming the bank for “insufficient rate cuts.”

I was planning to take on Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s claim that high interest rates beget high inflation - until I realized that I would be wasting my (and your) valuable time.

The Turkish prime minister’s harsh criticism of the Central Bank has rattled markets as investors have priced in concerns that pressure on the bank will continue.

Bulgarian banks continue to lower interest rates on savings products and to improve, mainly through new promotions, the consumer loans and credit cards conditions.

According to an analysis of MoitePari.bg for April 2014, there has been an improvement in the conditions for housing and mortgage loans, as banks mainly focus on cutting back fees, Bulgaria's National Radio informs.

The savings deposits of Bulgarian households reached BGN 40.3 B in the end of Q1 2014, shows data of the central bank (BNB).

In the same period the total sum increased by BGN 1 B, half of which was from the interest rates. 

The sum of the households' savings is nearly half of Bulgaria's GDP, which this year is supposed to be BGN 81.6 B.

Interest rates on deposits for the businesses are on the rise, according to the latest data of the Bulgarian National Bank.

Deposits grew by over half a billion euros in March, Bank of Greece figures showed on Tuesday, despite the significant decline in interest rates.

“The Bulgarians don't think what will they do, when they take a credit”, said Georgi Kadiev, Bulgarian Socialist Party MP. 

“Those people need someone to protect them from themselves, because they don't think,” he added in an interview for Nova TV, regarding the amendments to the Consumer Credits Act, aiming to cap the interest rates at 50.5% per year.