Loans on ice total €30 billion

Loans whose repayments have been frozen due to the pandemic add up to 30 billion euros, concerning some 400,000 individual and corporate borrowers, according to the Hellenic Bank Association. The moratorium on tranche payments expires on March 31.

All banks, as well as the companies managing loans for them, have created special programs for the gradual restoration of tranche payments. Their aim is to prevent those loans from turning into nonperforming exposures; that would force banks to take increased provisions to cover them and would constitute a serious threat to their capital in the middle of a securitization procedure that has already started affecting their financial balance.

For example, National Bank will offer the "Ethnogefyra" program that will reduce the tranche due by up to 50% throughout 2021 for clients who prove they are unable to pay their original...