BUDAPEST: Data from banks show that repayments of 82% of FX borrowers have fallen because of the settlement of compensation due under borrowers relief legislation and the conversion of FX mortgages into forints, deputy chairman of the Hungarian Banking Association András Becsei said yesterday. On average, the size of repayments decreased by 20%, Becsei said.
Clients that earlier opted into an exchange rate cap scheme were the best off after the settlement, he added. The settlement cost the banking sector about HUF 1 trillion, he noted. Banks were required to compensate their clients for using exchange rate margins when calculating repayments on FX loans, once the most popular lending product in Hungary, and for making unilateral changes to contracts.
Levente Kovács, the associationʼs chief secretary, said about three-fourths of the settlement had gone to FX borrowers and the rest to clients with forint loans. He said banks had spent “several tens of billions of forints” on payroll related to the settlement, which involved some 25,000 staff and several hundred experts hired to deal exclusively with the process. Since 2010, banks have paid HUF 1.438 trillion to the state because of the bank levy and financial transaction duty, Kovács added.
