August 19 (SeeNews) - The ratio of non-performing loans (NPLs) in Serbia's banking sector fell to 3.7% at the end of June from 4.0% in March, the central bank said on Wednesday.
"The gross NPL ratio continued down in Q2, to 3.7% in June, the lowest recorded level of this asset quality indicator," the central bank said in its inflation report for August.
The NPL ratio of the corporate sector fell by 0.2 of a percentage point on a quarterly basis to 2.8%, while the NPL ratio of households went down 0.3 of a percentage point to 3.8%, the central bank said.
"NPL coverage remained high – allowances for impairment to total loans measured 91.6% of NPLs in June, while allowances for impairment to NPLs stood at 62.6% of NPLs," it added.
The central bank started to regularly monitor NPLs in 2008. After a temporary decrease in the second half of 2012, NPLs rose again in 2013 and continued to grow in 2014 and the first quarter of 2015. At the end of April 2015, NPLs in the Serbian banking sector reached 442.6 billion dinars ($4.5 billion/3.8 billion euro), or 23% of total loans.
(1 euro = 117.571 dinars)