Will there be enough money for lending is a question that most troubles companies. Whether interest rates will rise is a question that primarily interests citizens. The director of HUB, Zoran Bohaček, says he cannot say whether and when interest rates will rise, as individual banks make their moves, not the banking association.
However, HUB’s informational calculation shows that pressures for rising interest rates are still ongoing. On average, interest rates could rise by 1 percentage point this year. Bohaček explains that there are several elements that influence the creation of interest rates. For instance, the cost of regulatory burden (HNB measures) is slowly decreasing, just as operational costs in the banks themselves and their profits, which pushes interest rates down. However, although reference rates in foreign markets are falling, the risk premium for Croatian bonds has increased almost fivefold, and interest rates on savings are also rising, which, along with the increasing risk of clients defaulting on loans, is pushing interest rates upward. The movement of interest rates will also depend on whether the crisis will lightly graze us or whether the recession will last longer, says Bohaček.
