Austria’s decision to place a cap on lending by its banks in central and eastern Europe
Austria’s Focus on Own Banks Ruffles Feathers
By Paul Hannon
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development isn’t at all happy with Austria’s decision to place a cap on lending by its banks in central and eastern Europe. The development bank sometimes sees its role as advocate for and defender of the region it was established to help way back in 1991, and Thursday decided to speak up on behalf of those countries where Austrian banks play a big role, and which were mostly taken by surprise when Austrian regulators dropped their bombshell.
Austria wanted to do a bit of Habsburg empire but seems not to have to gone very far.
“If it was meant to calm things down, it had the opposite effect,” EBRD Chief Economist Erik Berglof said.
Austria’s move was primarily intended to reassure bond investors, who worry about the cost of bailing out the country’s banks should they run into trouble. Relative to the size of its economy, Austrian banks are large, as is their exposure to CEE. By announcing tougher capital requirements and the lending limit, the government was trying to ensure no support would be needed.
So far, so understandable. But Austrian authorities don’t appear to have considered the impact on those countries in which their banks are big lenders. In Mr. Berglof’s view, “they didn’t do a very good job” of consulting with the affected countries, and the measures were widely seen as discriminatory, favoring the banks “home” market over others.
“That’s certainly how it’s perceived by [CEE policy makers],” he said. “It sends a signal that has not been appreciated by the host countries.”
But the impact of the new measures may not be as great as initially feared. Having examined the new rules, the EBRD believes they won’t encourage a withdrawal of current funding from the CEE subsidiaries of Austrian banks, and may not have a significant impact on the pace of new lending, since demand for credit is low as a result of weak economic growth.
“It’s probably not as drastic a measure as it’s perceived to be,” said Jeromin Zettelmeyer, the EBRD’s deputy chief economist. “This accepts what has happened in the past on funding. It restricts new lending, but it’s not about having to reduce current asset positions.”
Indeed, over the longer term, the rules may lead to a more stable banking system, based on local savings rather than foreign borrowing.
But the EBRD economists said that while some economies have reached a stage where that transition is appropriate, others continue to need foreign capital.
“From a long-term perspective, most of what these measures are getting at is good,” Mr. Zettelmeyer said. “We won’t be very concerned if foreign funding flows less easily to Poland and Hungary. But we would be quite concerned if that happened in the western Balkans.” |
