The Finance Ministry on November 8 asked the HNB to analyse the interest rates on housing loans in or pegged to the Swiss franc when the loans were granted. On November 11, the HNB asked the banks to submit the data, which was done by 11 banks and refers to 73,700 clients.
The analysis is expected to help in drawing up an amendment to the law on consumer loans for the calculation of the interest rate on loans in the Swiss franc. The average rate is expected to be reduced by 30 per cent to about 3.1%.
Although parliament was to have voted on the amendments to said law today, in order to facilitate the position of clients with loans in Swiss francs, this did not happen.
Finance Minister Slavko Linic said in Brussels the vote was postponed to consider the HNB's report on the average interest rates, adding that a compromise solution might be sought at the next government session on Thursday "so that we don't have a conflict between the banking sector and the government."
"We attach far more attention to the HNB report and believe it is more responsible than the draft amendment forwarded by banks," he said, adding that "HNB data can be trusted."