Czurda: Banks facing more issues than just bad loans

The course of the Greek economy will depend on the capacity of the country’s banks to reduce their nonperforming exposures to a satisfactory degree without requiring any additional capital, warns Martin Czurda, the chief executive officer of the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund (HFSF), in an interview to Kathimerini.

However, tackling the problem of bad loans may be the most important but it is not the only challenge facing lenders, stresses the head of the bank bailout fund.

Czurda says that changing the operating model of local banks and the reduction of their costs are also important issues, which will determine the return of lenders to profits and the restoration of investor confidence.

The HFSF chief calls on banks to adjust their business model according to the baseline expansion rate scenario for the Greek economy, as well as to the possibility of weak growth in Europe, making it clear that the fund will accept no backtracking on corporate governance matters.

In the interview, the Austrian official further admits that the amount of the state’s investment in the Greek banks, which comes to 45 billion euros, is immense and will be difficult to recover.