August 29 (SeeNews) - Loans to Croatian households declined 0.8% on the year to 117.3 billion kuna ($19.1 billion/15.8 billion euro) in June, but added 0.1% on the month, the local unit of Raiffeisen Bank International said on Tuesday.
Loans in the local currency continued to grow in June as loans denominated in a foreign currency followed a deleveraging trend, Raiffeisenbank Austria Zagreb (RBA) said in a daily report. Kuna loans to households reached 45.5% of total loans, up 7.3% on the year.
The lender explained that Croatians have become aware of foreign currency-related risks following the conversion of Swiss franc-denominated loans into euro which saw their loans increase significantly.
Housing loans accounted for 43.9% of total loans to households, while their value decreased 2.1% on the year to 51.5 billion kuna. They were followed by general purpose cash loans with a 35.5% share and rising value of 3.1% on the year.
RBA noted that the process of household sector deleveraging is coming to an end, but added that its recovery is expected to be very modest and largely dependent on trends in the labour market.
(1 euro=7.41402 kuna)